Aggiungi un Posto a Tavola

Mar 6, 2007

I'm a huge fan of musical theater, grew up singing along with The Music Man, Camelot and Oliver. The first show I saw on stage was You're A Good Man, Charlie Brown, in what must have been a local or travelling production, in San Francisco, when we were on home leave in 1969. I knew all these shows by heart, and by now know (and have seen) many more - most recently, Spamalot.

Italy, of course, famously has opera, and, to a lesser extent operetta, but not much tradition of modern musical theater as we know it in the US and UK. Of the few musicals produced in Italy, most are translations of English-language standards. (We saw a very good production of Grease years ago, which I enjoyed, but found the translation inadequate and distracting.)

But there are a few native Italian musicals, of which the most famous is Aggiungi un Posto a Tavola ("Add Another Place at the Table"), a fable set in a mountain village somewhere in Italy, whose parish priest suddenly starts hearing the voice of God... and I'll explain the story as I (gradually) translate the songs.

I can't find good video of this anywhere online; the above is from a TV contest and I don't think much of the lead voices, but it gives you something of the flavor - in particular, the (offstage) voice of an irascible God who doesn't approve of everything that's been done in His name in the last 2000 years.

I saw a production many years ago on TV, but have been unable to find it on DVD. Enrico and I saw it in Spanish in Madrid (also years ago), which was a little weird as some of the Italian puns didn't work in Spanish (though they might have added Spanish puns that I didn't get). As far as I know, there has never been any attempt to produce in English, which is a pity - it's a great show and well deserves to be better known.

Note: Unfortunately, it is not currently available on DVD anywhere, except perhaps eBay.it.

Here is a translation of the opening (and closing) song.

Don't ask him: what do you want?

* Companatico - literally "what you eat/have with your bread"

** Evviva - "long live!" or "up with!" or "hurray for!" - is often abbreviated VV (when written by hand, the two Vs overlap, forming a sort of W). Therefore the opposite (abbasso - down with) is sometimes written ^^.

List of songs in the show:

1. Aggiungi Un Posto A Tavola
2. Peccato Che Sia Peccato
3. Sono Calmo
4. Concerto Per Prete E Campane
5. Buttalo Via
6. Notte Per Non Dormire
7. Consolazione
8. Notte Per Non Dormire 2
9. L'amore Secondo Me
10. Una Formica e' Solo Una Formica
11. Ballata Di San Crispino
12. Peccato Che Sia Peccato
13. Clementina
14. Ti Voglio
15. Quando L'arca Si Fermera
16. L'amore Secondo Me
17. Aggiungi Un Posto A Tavola