Synopsis
In the spring of 1956, musicologist Sergio Liberovici travels through the Cogne Valley in Northern Italy. He begins his recordings at the Hotel Grivola. The singer who performs in front of him is a woman from Cogne, Henriette Guichardaz, nicknamed “La Piéròtta”. For him, she will perform five songs. Péroline Barbet questions the trace and directs her microphone towards the oral memory of the places. With these musical archives as the starting point of the journey, she offers a sound portrait where it is a question of love and abandonment, of deliverance and exorcism through song.
A word from Tënk
La Piéròtta is first and foremost a country, the Aosta Valley in Italy, the villages of Cogne and Gimillan. Then, it is a characteristic accent carried by a string of grainy voices. The small crowd that clings to the microphone evokes, not without emotion, a local figure from the beginning of the 20th century, as mythical as it is alive in the memories of the country: "La Piéròtta", a fascinating and mysterious woman, famous for her extraordinary singing.
Who is this character with a particular song? What is the story behind her eloquent way of singing? And what about the song itself? Through the musicologist Sergio Liberovici and his precious recordings, but also through other witnesses who knew "La Piéròtta", Péroline Barbet retraces the story of this emblematic character and of her song. The vocal practice of our protagonist, which emanates from an oral and popular local tradition, is skilfully studied in its form, also depicting in filigree an era, a territory and sociological behaviors.
Beyond the individual trajectory, this documentary pays tribute to the women of Cogne and Gimillan; to the survival and strength of their song.
Daniel Capeille
Sound recordist, sound designer and sound editor
