The Italian singer-songwriter, protagonist of the spring summer 2023 campaign and brand ambassador of Superga tells how the collaboration was born, her relationship with fashion and her latest album &quot;Opera Futura&quot;. His next challenge? Sing at the Arena di Verona.

Text by SIMONE VERTUA

During the tests on the rooftop of the new Basic Village building, the intensity of Levante's voice spreads in the adjacent streets. Baptized in Caltaggirone with the name of Claudia Lagona but musically consecrated with the pseudonym of Levante, after the successes at the Sanremo Festival she presented her fifth and last album <a href="https://open.spotify.com/album/2uAZ5T3c9VbcCeb5ntc0e4?si=M58BagQLRv2Z8udK-KhP7g" target="_blank" rel="noopener">"Opera Futura"</a> . In life she has written 3 novels, with "Alfonso" she made herself recognizable for her "Che vita di merda!", <span style="background-color: transparent; font-family: inherit; font-size: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant-ligatures: inherit; font-variant-caps: inherit; font-weight: inherit; letter-spacing: 0px;">while at the Sanremo Festival she brought "Tikibombom" in 2020 and this year "Vivo" . She says she grew up with records by Janis Joplin, Carmen Consoli, Mina, Verdena, Tori Amos, Alanis Morissette and the Afterhours. Together with Tina Kunakey, the Italian singer-songwriter is the new Superga brand ambassador<text class="_textbox_1titd_17" direction="ltr" height="7.90463256835938" lengthadjust="spacingAndGlyphs" textlength="263.1669921875" x="275.356323242188" y="-488.279998779297" data-test="textbox">, protagonist of the shots and video of the spring summer 2023 campaign which </text><text class="_textbox_1titd_17" direction="ltr" height="7.94879150390625" lengthadjust="spacingAndGlyphs" textlength="337.889896392822" x="57.3576011657715" y="-475.559997558594" data-test="textbox"> conveys a praise to classicism.</text> &laquo;The collaboration was born in a funny way&raquo; says Levante after the sound check of the performance , &laquo;I've been wearing the shoes for many years, the ones I'm wearing now are my first pair and date back to 5 years ago, I ripped them off. Do you think that the CEO saw me during the rehearsal with these shoes and said: &ldquo;Keep this pair for the performance, they are so beautiful! They are more real&hellip;&rdquo;. I have lived in Turin for 19 years and have buzzed around this brand, but the company decided to call me just as I left the city. <text class="_textbox_1titd_17" direction="ltr" height="7.92672729492188" lengthadjust="spacingAndGlyphs" textlength="11.132194519043" x="71.6630401611328" y="-483.070007324219" data-test="textbox"> My favourite model a</text><text class="_textbox_1titd_17" direction="ltr" height="8.10336303710938" lengthadjust="spacingAndGlyphs" textlength="5.03424072265625" x="150.932006835938" y="-483.070007324219" data-test="textbox">nd </text><text class="_textbox_1titd_17" direction="ltr" height="7.92672729492188" lengthadjust="spacingAndGlyphs" textlength="3.37149047851562" x="160.239685058594" y="-483.070007324219" data-test="textbox"> The </text><text class="_textbox_1titd_17" direction="ltr" height="7.92672729492188" lengthadjust="spacingAndGlyphs" textlength="37.3372802734375" x="168.137603759766" y="-483.070007324219" data-test="textbox"></text><text class="_textbox_1titd_17" direction="ltr" height="7.7611083984375" lengthadjust="spacingAndGlyphs" textlength="22.0364532470703" x="209.257034301758" y="-483.070007324219" data-test="textbox"> 2641 </text><text class="_textbox_1titd_17" direction="ltr" height="8.136474609375" lengthadjust="spacingAndGlyphs" textlength="6.30384826660156" x="237.110961914062" y="-483.070007324219" data-test="textbox"> St</text><text class="_textbox_1titd_17" direction="ltr" height="7.92672729492188" lengthadjust="spacingAndGlyphs" textlength="20.8987121582031" x="244.044555664062" y="-483.070007324219" data-test="textbox">ripe </text><text class="_textbox_1titd_17" direction="ltr" height="7.92672729492188" lengthadjust="spacingAndGlyphs" textlength="5.91744995117188" x="269.439422607422" y="-483.070007324219" data-test="textbox"> P</text><text class="_textbox_1titd_17" direction="ltr" height="8.037109375" lengthadjust="spacingAndGlyphs" textlength="32.0711975097656" x="276.549682617188" y="-483.070007324219" data-test="textbox">latform </text><text class="_textbox_1titd_17" direction="ltr" height="7.92672729492188" lengthadjust="spacingAndGlyphs" textlength="25.8335876464844" x="313.0703125" y="-483.070007324219" data-test="textbox"> beige </text><text class="_textbox_1titd_17" direction="ltr" height="7.92672729492188" lengthadjust="spacingAndGlyphs" textlength="42.5923461914062" x="342.87158203125" y="-483.070007324219" data-test="textbox"> eggshell".</text>
L'OFFICIEL ITALIA: More generally, what is your relationship with fashion? LEVANTE: Narrow, like all human beings. Since I was a child I've always been fascinated by "getting my look" because I was born an esthete, from kindergarten onwards I've always fought with my mother to dress a certain way. When I came into contact with small and big fashion brands it was beautiful and fun, for me the dress is a message, when you choose to wear something you already talk about yourself. Sometimes the clothes are masks and therefore try to mislead people in individual reading. I think that even those who seem less attentive to exteriority choose and communicate a certain type of message.

L&#39;OFFICIEL ITALIA: Why did you get involved with Superga? LEVANTE: I think it&#39;s the way I customized these shoes individually. I put them in slightly more chic situations and in other more sporty ones, for me they are a sort of passepartout. The campaign we did together was very nice, they gave me the opportunity to create looks in my own way. LOI: Recently you mentioned that with your past lyrics you often brought up feelings of frustration or sadness. While today you sing that you have a &quot;light soul&quot;. How did you come to this change? L: I say it without shame, &quot;Anima Leggera&quot; is a doped song. I wrote it during Alma Futura&#39;s pregnancy, any pregnant woman is in the throes of hormones and at that moment I felt like the happiest woman in the universe. I don&#39;t think it&#39;s a state of mind that I will try again in the future, it was like the world couldn&#39;t touch me or take me, and it didn&#39;t feel real to fly that high. With adulthood I&#39;ve managed to gain an awareness that even the most bitter sadness brings me down a little less, I&#39;m able to recognize it, to give it a perimeter to take the right detachment.

LOI: And will it always be like this now? L: I don't think I can change my nostalgic nature and my propensity to sink into thoughts. This means that I write denser texts, then I happen to have peaks of lightness&hellip; LOI: How has life changed after Alma Futura was born? L: On the one hand it was overwhelming because it's a third person who enters the life of a couple. The pregnancy was wonderful, Alma's arrival was just as beautiful, I only had eyes for her. But then, I tried to become familiar with emotions that didn't correspond with those that society asks you to experience, which are those of a happy mother at all costs. Motherhood can sometimes also be sad in hormonal or physical terms, and there's nothing wrong with saying that. Eventually all pregnant women ask themselves questions such as: "Will I go back to how I was before?" or: &ldquo;Will I be different as a person?&rdquo; or: &ldquo;what will become of my time?&rdquo;. Then I got back in shape, I started working again very soon and I feel like I haven't completely cancelled myself. I had given myself some deadlines on the new album that I absolutely wanted to respect. LOI: What did your latest album &ldquo;Opera Futura&rdquo; teach you? L: What the previous one and the first one taught me too. When you write I've always had the feeling that I can't repeat myself in something beautiful, but my writing surpassed the last work, not because it's better, but because it's different and this is a sign of hope and renewal.
LOI: What do you expect from your next dates? L: It will be a very powerful comeback summer, the last live was in 2021, then I got pregnant and last summer I made the record. There will be 9 Italian dates between cities and islands (scroll to discover the complete tour) and we see these stages as a warm-up for the final date at the Verona Arena. I have the feeling that I have to fight a dragon, the expectation scares me a lot and the arena is a sacred place for music.

LOI: What is your relationship with the fame of being an Italian singer? L: I have a very distorted view of myself, I have the perception that people see me as a snob, but in recent years I have tried to get closer to others. It&#39;s a bit like when you&#39;re in therapy and they tell you: &quot;Put yourself in front of a mirror and describe yourself&quot; and you describe yourself in a different way from how you see yourself. I believe I live with this misperception. I don&#39;t know if I feel so much appreciated, in recent years I&#39;ve felt loved and understood, but not by everyone and mainstream situations have shown it. Maybe I&#39;m a bit tricky, or people don&#39;t get the messages I send. Everyone looks at the world with the measure of their own heart and head. LOI: And what is the song you wished you had written? L: &quot;It rained your name&quot;, written from Calcutta together with Elisa, that song has a series of wonderful images that I would have liked as inspiration. LOI: Who are the authors or writers of reference or your absolute favorite? L: In my adolescence I fell in love with Andrea De Carlo&#39;s books, I remember &quot;Due di Due&quot; or &quot;Di noi tre&quot;, they made me dream a lot. Goliarda Sapienza is one of my favorite authors, I loved the themes she covered and the way she did it and now I&#39;m falling in love with Romain Gary, &quot;Life Ahead&quot; which is a wonderful story. LOI: What inspires or helps you in your writing process? L: Life, I&#39;m creatively selfish and I need to vent myself. And this is how my passion for music and writing was born, I needed to throw out everything that was exploding inside me and that hurt me and that was a key to channeling anger and pain in a certain way.

&quot;Life can be destructive but with music I managed to be constructive&quot;

The Superga spring summer 2023 campaign with the singer Levante

LOI: Who were your life teachers instead? L: Grandma Rosalia and my mother. Usually we tend to look for the bigger ones outside, I&#39;ve had them at home and they taught me strength. They are two very intelligent and powerful women, who knew how to love a lot, at a certain point in their lives I saw them broken when my father passed away and they both got their lives back. My grandmother is a mother who recovered after burying her son, while my mother built herself from scratch at 38 with 4 children and without a diploma she did dizzying somersaults in front of my eyes. LOI: I know that you paint in your spare time, how did you get started with painting and why do you paint? L: My mother painted, there has always been a creative air at home: my father with the organ, my brother with the guitar, my sister sang and attended the fine arts academy, she painted whatever she found within reach, even the roof tiles. So as a child I drew by reflex, then I realized that I really liked doing it and in recent years I&#39;ve done watercolor and then I switched to oil on canvas. LOI: You often convey religious figures like God or the Madonna within your lyrics. What relationship do you have with religion? L: Strange, I am very fascinated by biblical stories but I have sought God, I must say, in times of need when I was little. But I didn&#39;t receive a strict Catholic upbringing. We weren&#39;t practicing and we didn&#39;t go to mass on Sundays. I have tried over the years to develop a spirituality, I like to think that there is something great above it. LOI: What is the greatest satisfaction of your job and your life? L: It hasn&#39;t arrived yet. LOI: Is there anything you&#39;ve never said or would like to communicate? L: I don&#39;t know if there&#39;s anything I haven&#39;t said yet, but I&#39;d like to spread a message of freedom for people. Being free means respecting the freedom of others and therefore there is still a lot to work on.

LEVANTE - &quot;OPERA FUTURA&quot; LIVE IN CONCERT MAY 28 - YOU LOVE ME 2023 - MILAN 09 JULY - OVERSOUND MUSIC FESTIVAL - TRAMONTANO CASTLE - MATERA JULY 15 - PINEWOOD FESTIVAL - THE EAGLE JULY 18 - BENIAMINO GIGLI ARENA - PORTO RECANATI JULY 22 - CAVEA AUDITORIUM PARCO DELLA MUSICA - ROME 20 AUGUST - IOD FESTIVAL - FANTIANO QUARRIES - GROTTAGLIE 23rd AUGUST - THE BEST FESTIVAL - CASTLE OF FOSSATO DI BARLETTA - BARLETTA 25 AUGUST - THE STAIRS OF MUSIC - THE STAIRS OF THE CATHEDRAL - NOTO 27 SEPTEMBER 2023 - VERONA ARENA

The "Light" soul of Levante and its "Future Work"

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