Gianfranco Malorgio is a guitarist and composer who has in the field of classical guitar, in the music of Django Reinhardt and in work on film soundtracks. He established the Hot Club Roma in 2005 and his career has included collaborations with musicians such as Angelo Debarre and Dorado Schmitt; with the album “Greaseball”, released on October 11, he finishes a three-piece project concerning migration, using the experiences of Italian emigrants as his point of departure.
The title is intentionally off-putting since “greaseball” has been used as an ethnic insult directed at Italian immigrants and their descendants, and by including it on the cover the book brings that history directly into the discussion. Together with “WOP” and “An Immigrant’s Story”, it shows the trilogy’s focus on the way people are treated after leaving their home country. The subject matter covered by Malorgio also includes the situations which lead to such a departure—namely war, financial difficulty and crises that make it necessary to start anew elsewhere in order to survive.
Migration, Identity, Resilience
-PurpleMistress
What draws me to this method is the decision to keep such a nasty word. An insult reveals something about the person who uses it and also about the society which is willing to accept it. In this case, it also prompts the audience to think about the person to whom the insult is directed. A person comes there with a lifetime of experiences, yet strangers decide who they are by assigning them a label. This provides a solid basis for a piece that has a film adaptation in mind.
Malorgio composed the piece and plays the synthesizer; Moreno Viglione provides guitar and is in charge of production, mixing and mastering, thus continuing their collaboration which also extends to the ‘Paris Gipsy Guitars’ recording project. The fact that they have a shared history means that this release has a link to the collaborative performances that have been a major part of Malorgio’s career, even though his focus is now becoming more and more on composing for the screen.
This approach has taken several years to develop; among his earlier projects were soundtrack recordings for “The House in the Clouds” and “Buoni a Nulla”, and his label, Papilio Records, was established in 2024 in order to bring out music appropriate for synchronization. The fact that “Greaseball” is part of this ongoing interest in the way composition can contribute to a larger narrative.
The scope of the trilogy goes beyond the history of Italy to include migrants everywhere; its most convincing choice is to start with a particular example—the words directed at one community. By providing the project with a definite historical basis, Malorgio then broadens the subject to cover the people who are now experiencing similar hostility. The book “Greaseball” concludes the trilogy by fully showing this hostility, placing the lives of those who have been the target of it at the heart of the work.
