“Are you moist?” my wife asked me yesterday.
Ed Sheeran and Andrea Bocelli’s “Perfect Symphony” made me cry. Why, she wondered.
The love Bocelli put into the translation of Sheeran’s song, and the effort Sheeran put into learning Italian made the orchestral version more magical than the original. More universal.
Bocelli had to consider how to best capture the spirit of “Perfect” without messing up the metering.
Google Translate can’t do that.
Google did help me find an interview in which the duet partners discussed their collaboration, and I got a glimpse of Bocelli’s translation.
I couldn’t find anything online about how Sheeran went about learning Italian. He once tweeted that he failed French and German in school. To sing the Italian part “Perfect Symphony” with Bocelli at Wembley Stadium, I reckon he had some help.
Watching that masterpiece performance from here in Maynard, MA, I felt united with the artists and the 90,000 people at the concert. I was moved to tears, again.
Have you written a song or poem that deserves a wider audience?
I can help you reach the more than 400 million Spanish speakers that share the planet with us.