He arrives on time for our appointment in a small café in Locarno, we sit down in a corner on comfortable armchairs and a journey begins. The journey of a river, the river of life, the life of Anna Oxa. A woman with a gentle, elegant, profound soul. She is different and, like all the different people, naturally rebellious and often opposed but also much loved by an important public, of whom she speaks with affection like a family. A strong woman who has been able to raise two children alone, she has never received maintenance from her exes, she has always lived on her work that she has never left, an exemplary woman. She is a person as sophisticated as she is simple that, when she gets off the stage, she loves getting lost in the peaks of the Ticino mountains where she has chosen to live, immerse herself in the plants and animals, even making friends with the local farmers. She has been a vegan for a long time, she is devoted to the search for justice, truth and individual freedom, regardless of dogmas. Anna Oxa who, tired of the media that distort reality by creating sensationalism, has granted few interviews for some time, today (after a turbulent Sanremo due to fake news) gave us the opportunity to listen to her, inviting us into her spring stream to understand her way to experience art and the world…
How is Anna Oxa today?
«I'm fine, for some time now I've found an inner tranquility and I'm serene. I feel centered, aligned, very vertical. The journey of life is a continuous getting to know each other, there is no finish line or moment where one says "well, I've arrived, now I'll stop". It is a continuous growth and awareness of oneself, of what has been, of what is. Music leads me to travel a lot but I always gladly come back home, which has been in Ticino for a long time, close to nature, close to my children who grew up here. I love the rhythm of a simple life, in close contact with nature, I spend hours walking around listening to its sounds, marveling at its poetry. The change of the plants from one season to the next, the purity of the eyes of the farm animals of the place I've made friends with, the music of the wind... In this dimension everything is wonder and nourishment for the soul».
What significant moments made you take a "quantum leap" by changing the way you look at yourself?
«Undoubtedly there are strong events, so intense as to penetrate you and shake the foundations of your certainties. Moments in which you question everything… the sense of being in the world as a human. These crucial passages, in these "crises", give the opportunity to investigate, trying to understand the why of so many things. This has happened in my life and, since there is no split between me and music, between me and Anna Oxa as a public figure, the inner changes have led to gradual evolutions on an artistic level».
Over time Anna Oxa has changed and with her her music…
«Music, sounds and frequencies go hand in hand with the personal growth of the artist. The inner evolution ensures that even the voice can grow and change over time. Change your awareness of the instrument you have, of the instrument you are knowing that the voice is generated from every part of your body. Unlike a guitar or piano, which are somewhat more confined, the voice unleashes from all over you. My inner transformations have also manifested themselves in vocal growth, today I have a greater awareness of my vocality and of the worlds that are within it and that music allows me to express».
What do you feel like expressing to the audience today?
«From the vast space of my vocal experience the sounds of the peoples of the world emerge. My artistic journey has led me to represent a world of sound, frequency and vibration, which expresses a sense of unity, where the sounds of the world converge towards a unique experience… that of the human being. After all, the whole story is inside you, it happens that you look elsewhere until you realize that we carry within us a book full of memories, events, of the many "who we were" and of all the ancestors who preceded us. When you contact this inner world, a totally different world opens up from there, this I share with my audience when I sing. With my voice and the connection to this wider perception, I invite those who listen to me to enter the same vibration, opening the portals of their perceptions».
The concert is no longer just a diversion but becomes a real e own holistic experience…
«The spring voice then flows naturally from the source, singing creates the here and now, there is a sacredness in this. In fact, my new tour is called Voce Sorgente and starts from the idea of an expressive space and of sharing with the public free from the standard codes that harness the expressive flow. The standard codes set limits on what you can give as an artist and therefore, by doing this, you also limit the experience of the listener. If you follow the showbiz protocols imposed on society it becomes just entertainment and there is no sacredness but dispersion of the origin of sound and therefore of music. Instead, by letting creativity, writing and forming an arrangement flow, you develop the songs in a very different way to the distorted ways we are used to».
What do you think of mainstream music and pop music in general?
“We have a strange idea of pop that has become the trendy “hit” song for many. In reality, pop is popular or something that belongs to the people and therefore belongs to everyone. Obviously it is a broad musical dimension within which you choose what to listen to and what not based on your nature. We have labeled the music but at the source it has no labels, just like water. Why the source? Water itself does not have a shape but it can become everything and nothing, it has the power to bring information and to modify elements as hard and apparently firm as rock. Water knows how to make a stone full of edges soft, it passed there, it became for a moment the belly of one side of the rock and then it became water again, bringing with it that new information, the memory of that contact. So even vocality can arise, it can become, suddenly go back to being nothing and it can change. This happens when it springs, it is alive and not crystallized in pre-defined forms, in songs resounded and repeated a thousand times like parrots».
Live authentically…
«Often we live in a crystallized way in memory, in perfumes, in thoughts, in customs and habits. My song is to live without fear, being a natural voice. I believe in the beauty of a voice free from judgments. For the same vision I chose to have my children study at the Steiner School in Origlio. An educational field (at the time) that went beyond the canons and followed a more holistic approach that observed and gave space to the child as a whole, letting his natural talents emerge and avoiding clipping his wings with judgments and competitive forms ».
How important is curiosity as an evolutionary factor?
«It's important, over time I've learned that more than looking for answers, the important thing is to listen and live the questions intensely... Ask yourself the questions and leave space for the answers to emerge within you without first seeking confirmation from the outside. If we don't learn to create an empty and silent space where we can receive an inner indication, we ask for an answer from the other and in doing so we get lost. As Krishnamurti said, there are no rafts that will take you to your destination, you have to investigate carefully and promptly».
This year in Sanremo you sang "Sali". An invitation to return to one's essence, to the innocence of when we were born… how do you see the era we live in today?
«We live in an era in which power has been delegated to the outside, to the fees dictated by the world, and the invitation is to go back to connecting with the heart - that is, with the truth that vibrates in each one - and be free. The heart is tied to an unconditional love that is not the romantic one, and full of conditions, to which we are accustomed. Our three bodies, mind, spirit and matter, are disconnected today. When these three are united, we will be in the understanding of wholeness. The conflict instead arises from fragmentation, the mind thinks one thing, the heart perceives yet another and the body somatizes the inconsistencies. The path forward is that of separation, both individual and of society, just think of the ideological wars that have arisen with the pandemic, of union and therefore of harmony. Ignorance makes us pit against each other, as they tried to do with me too with fake stories in Sanremo without success. Those who think differently and do not adapt are often targeted by a now fossilized system but this does not detract from the power of a message like that of the song I brought to Sanremo and the Voce Sorgente tour and, in fact, I am having a important response from the public. People of all ages, including many young people and many musicians, are attracted by the power of authenticity and the vibrational depth I give voice to… It's a great, immense, adventure!».
Anna Oxa, one of the illustrious characters present in Ticino, is surrounded by a work team in unison, made up of Milly Milano, manager and owner of the Ticino company Oxarte; Abit by Yohji Yamamoto/Greg Lauren/Avant Toi; makeup by Elisa Calcinari and hairstyles by Pier Giuseppe Moroni.
WHO IS ANNA OXA
An artist with a rebellious light and a unique voice. In addition to having released 23 studio albums, collaborating with the best artists of the Italian and international scene, she is a peace ambassador for the war in Kosovo and other conflicts. Her role as the bearer of a message of unity has been recognized by several states. She was awarded by master Bacalov as Honor Artist as evidence of the value of her art in today's art scene. She is an artist loved in Italy but also abroad, for Albania she is in third place among the most important names.
For many years he has chosen Ticino as his home, appreciating the beauty of the mountains and the calm that reigns there, between one trip and another he recharges his batteries by taking long walks in nature. Today his central interest is the exploration of the voice and the search for a pure, true, constantly changing sound. You are in a continuous path of research, both artistically and personally, and work with musicians open to making music following this approach. Even on stage she brings something new.
The VOCE SORGENTE 2023 tour creates unity and makes the public travel, climbing beyond all limits and borders. His artistic investigation reflects a life dedicated to the authenticity and free expression of one's being.
