Let’s be honest, sometimes I ask myself: do I really have to go to a concert? Why would I want to drive again to a place where it might be scorching hot? Sometimes laziness wins, other times the part of me that’s still active and my love for music prevails. And in the end, sometimes the effort is rewarded, even if not always.
In the case of the concert of Florist at ARCI Bellezza, which opened the new concert season, doubts were dispelled even before Emily Sprague and her only bandmate, Felix Walworth, began playing. In fact, shortly after 9 p.m., Hannah Frances appeared on stage alone. She’s the author of one of the best female singer-songwriter albums of 2024, Keeper Of The Shepherd, and is about to release another one in October.
Besides enchanting us with her mature writing, a wonderfully fingerpicked electric guitar, and a perfectly modulated, angelic voice, her performance set the mood for the evening: an intimate and familiar atmosphere with a respectful and attentive audience that demonstrated an unusual but obviously well-deserved warmth for an opening act.
In addition to some songs from his previous works, among which a thrilling version of Keeper Of The Shepherd, Frances played two tracks from her upcoming album, which made our already high expectations for her new album even higher..
Then came Florist, as a duo for these European gigs. Despite their different music, they maintained the intimate atmosphere that had been spread in the room. Like Hannah before her, Emily spoke amiably with the audience, even baring herself a little, as happens in her songs.
While Sprague played the acoustic guitar from start to finish, Walworth showed off his eclecticism by switching from a basic drum kit to the electric guitar and keyboards.
When they started playing, a little magic happened: they managed to recreate, thousands of kilometers away and in the middle of the city, the rustic atmosphere that characterizes their records.
The band sounds exactly as I imagined it: gentle, delicate, persuasive, and scented with open spaces, bucolic sunsets, and crickets chirping. The acoustic guitar, Sprague’s velvety voice, and the measured drums create a “household” music, from the hearth, and the audience magically finds itself pampered as if in front of a bonfire.
A warmth that can be felt in the welcome given to all the songs, and which Emily greets with a shy smile.
The songs in the setlist come mainly from the album of the same name and the recent Jellywish..Among the songs we highlight the enchanting Two Ways with its simple and hypnotic arpeggio and the chorus harmonized by Emily and Felix, the impalpable melody of Red Bird Pt. 2 (Morning), which paints an invisible dawn in the room, the minimal Sparkle dedicated to her namesake dog who taught Emily what it means to be human and the melancholy of Time Is A Dark Feeling.
The emotional peak was, however, Our Heart In A Room, a song that perfectly sums up in its title the atmosphere that the duo has been able to create. And finally, it is worth mentioning If I Have Eyes, taken from the album Emily Alone, which shows how the band is also capable of effectively stepping on the accelerator and the rhythm, going to touch on territories not far from the sound of Big Thief.
When you come back from a concert and they ask you, “So how was it?” you usually answer beautiful, exhilarating or exceptional. In this case, I would obviously answer, beautiful, but above all, precious.
