Extraordinary, from every point of view out of the ordinarythe passage on this Earth of Francesco Cercenà from Vicenzalived between 1947 and 1990, profession “creative” following Pink Floyd before falling prey to fatal drug addictions. One who half a century ago, plowing through London at the wheel of an emerald green MG Spider that became legendary, loaded a girl into every bar she went into for a drink. Who knows how much she remembers it Nick Mason, 79 years old, English from Birmingham, profession musician? In theory, an opportunity to find out presents itself this evening, Wednesday July 19, when precisely the Pink Floyd drummer will re-propose the pieces of a band that contributed to the history of rock, in Piazza dei Signori, in Vicenzawhere he will be on stage together with his new group, i Saucerful of Secrets. Indeed, it is pleasant to think that, while performing psychedelic «ballads» such as «If» or «Remember a day» in the shadow of the Palladian Basilica, the good Nick, a polite gentleman known for one of the most impressive in the world may it be illuminated by the memory of a wild and beautiful boy. Of a dreamer, son of a wealthy family from Vicenza, who ideally started from that Piazza dei Signori to become road companion of the first Pink Floydauthors between the 60s and 70s of albums such as «Ummagumma» and «Atom Heart Mother», still listened to by millions of fans.
The daughter and the book to come
«I can’t know how well Nick Mason knew my father, but surely he ran into him for a long time, who lived in London in the 60s with David Gilmour, the band’s guitarist. She was part of a group of creative young people and beautiful girls who followed the Floyd everywhere: concerts, parties, nights out.” The story is by Francesca Cercenà, painter and fashion professional who has returned to live in her father’s Vicenza for thirty years, after having lived for a long time in the United States together with her mother, Katrina Fortuna, a Polish model of a certain notoriety. «My parents separated very soon – explains Francesca Cercenà. – Consequently I I have few and intense memories of dad, whose thread is brutally interrupted during my adolescence, when he dies suddenly. But now the time has come to find myself with him, and I plan to do it through a book».
Study at Cambridge
Runs the year 1990 when Francesco Cercenàwho has long since returned to Italy, devoured by the obsession of obtaining psychotropic drugs “specializing” in thefts of Fiat 500sdies in a house fire where he is alone at the timein Dozza di Zoldo, on the Belluno Dolomites. “The dynamics of the accident has never been clarified – specifies the daughter – but it is still the curtain that suddenly comes down, like a liberation, on a life now without a future”. The story that emerges is that of the second son of Giovanni Battista Cercenà, top executive of Ceccato which outside Vicenza produces components for cars, and his wife Anna Maria Rossi. He obtained his high school diploma from the Paolo Lioy scientific high school in 1966 in this Vicenza area not even twenty leave the tanks in Corso Palladio for the city Cambridge university. The idea is simply to study English, and that’s enough to throw yourself headlong into the most transgressive «Swinging London» bequeathed by the Beatles and the Rolling Stones to new generation bands.
Meeting Pink Floyd
Here the life of Francesco Cercenà definitely becomes a film«because – reveals the daughter – finds a home in London, in the Kensington district, together with David GilmourAnd not far from Syd Barrett’s home». The latter is the founder of Floyd together with bassist Roger Waters, keyboardist Ric Wright and drummer Nick Mason. When Barrett left the group at the end of the 60s, Gilmour took over the guitar, inevitably dragging into the band friends like Francesco and Iain Owen, another “inseparable” of the same crumbly dough. “So far I haven’t been able to contact Gilmour – Francesca Cercenà confides – but it is not so essential to talk to him after discovering how close they were. The guitarist he was very close to himto the point of touring Italy with him, playing wherever he could, and giving him the keys to his London mansion before going on tour with Floyd. There my parents gave their wedding reception». It seems that Gilmour was not so happy with how he found the mansion when he returned. But the passing of time destroys all gossip to leave instead the Beauty of sidereal and enchanted pieces such as «Arnold Layne» and «Fearless». In Vicenza, Nick Mason will give them as a gift to those who, listening to them, will remember how beautiful and wild Francesco Cercenà was, who perhaps half a century ago drank spritz with his mutual friend David in nearby taverns.
