Tra il segno e il suono:gesti vocali nella poesia sonora

The article claims that vocal experimentation in the second half of 20th century shows convergence zones both in sound poetry and in avant-garde music. The disintegration of language in its phonetic unities and the magnification of the intonational profile is a strategy shared both by sound poetry and by experimental vocal music, as Karlheinz Stockhausen, Luciano Berio, Luigi Nono, and Gyorgy Ligeti. The contribution of Luciano Berio to this field is of paramount importance, notably in work such as Thema. Omaggio a Joyce, Visage and Sequenza III, as well as in the reflection about the concept of vocal gestures. Performers play a seminal role in vocal experimentation: Cathy Berberian in a case in point. Luigi Nono’s, A floresta é jovem e cheja de vida shows a innovative compositional practice, which involves collaboration between composer, actors and musicians, and highlights the strategic function of performance in the creative process. The third part of the article tackles the collection of poems by Luigi Pasotelli Serraglio and its complex array of texts and paratexts focusing on the performativity of audiotexts. Drawing on Steven Connor’s distinction between ‘phonomemes’ (onomatopoeic signs) and ‘phenomemes’ (iconic sounds), the author claims that performativity depends on the successful use of iconic potential of vocal sounds and on the provocative handling of vocal gestures embedded in languages and dialect.