Every repertoire says something about the world we live in. Choosing what to play is never completely neutral. When a musician chooses a song, they bring certain voices and stories back into the light, while others can easily be forgotten.

Interpretation starts long before the first note. That is at the heart of Lorena Fontana and Paolo Birro’s new album.
Choosing to dedicate an entire album to the lyrics of Fran Landesman is also a way of bringing attention to an artist who deserves to be heard more widely.  
Landesman wrote some of the most original lyrics in American songwriting in the second half of the twentieth century, yet she is still much less well known than many of her contemporaries. Her words can be funny, ironic, sad, and deeply human. She writes about life without becoming sentimental or cynical.Her lyrics have something to say, and they need to be understood as much as they need to be sung.

That makes Lorena Fontana’s choice especially interesting. Throughout her career, she has often been drawn to music that asks for time, attention, and real involvement. She is not interested in simply showing what her voice can do. Her technique is there to serve the song and, above all, the words. Every change of tone, every pause, every small detail has a purpose. For her, singing is about telling a story and making the words and the music feel like one thing. 

Paolo Birro is an important part of that formula. His playing has a strong personality, but he never tries to take over. His sound, his harmonic ideas, and his touch give the songs space to breathe.He listens to the voice and responds to it, creating a real conversation between pianist and singer. Every musical choice feels connected to the next, and to the song itself. So this album is more than a collection of songs. It is also about why we choose certain music, and what happens when we decide to bring it back to life. Jazz has always been about this: not only creating something new, but also finding new ways to present music that might otherwise be forgotten.In the end, the real story of this album is not just Fran Landesman, or the meeting between Lorena Fontana and Paolo Birro. It is the choice to stop, listen, and say: this music still matters. And perhaps that is one of the most meaningful things an interpreter can do.

Vincenzo Martorella, 2026

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Some encounters happen by chance, they take you by the hand, leading you into unexplored places. That is what happened to me a few years ago when I first heard Scars. Of course, the melody by English composer Simon Wallace immediately captivated me, but it was the lyrics that truly made me stop and listen. 
A song about the scars that life leaves on us: not exactly the most common theme in the jazz repertoire, which is so often populated by happy or unhappy love stories, in search of an explanation. 

That was the beginning of a brief exploration that led me to discover a universe of surprising songs: The Secret of Silence, The Girl You Can’t Forget, Living in Overdrive, Forbidden Games (referring to war) are just a few of the titles. In the lyrics of In Her Words, irony and tenderness, eccentricity and depth, small everyday absurdities and great questions coexist. In short, a world very much like our own. 

When I began thinking about turning this project into a musical reality, I immediately imagined pianist Paolo Birro by my side: an extraordinary musician, a refined improviser, and the ideal companion for travelling through such diverse sonic landscapes. 

If these songs have made it this far, it is also thanks to those who believed in them before they had even taken shape. For this reason, I would like to thank the Maderna-Lettimi Jazz Festival 2025and, in particular, Michele Francesconi, for the support, encouragement, and trust they have given to this project and my friend Bruno Marini, whose precious advice contributed greatly to the live recording of the work.

Enjoy listening!
Lorena