Interview with Davide Van De Sfroos

Davide Van De Sfroos (pseudonym of Davide Bernasconi), singer-songwriter, guitarist and writer from Como, celebrates 25 years of his solo career in 2024, with a concert at the Forum di Assago (Milan) and a new album, ‘Van De Best’, which collects his great successes. Van De Sfroos, which in Como’s dialect means ‘they go smuggling’, tells Blu about himself, between music, Lake Como and his love for Como 1907.

Indeed, Davide has chosen the local dialect to tell the stories of the lake, its characters, and the places of his heart.

Born in Monza, Davide moved as a child with his family to Mezzegra, on Lake Como. Over the years, he has taken his art outside the borders of Como, taking many stages, including that of the 2011 Sanremo Festival (the most important music festival in Italy), with the song Yanez, which came fourth.

About his passion for music, Davide says: “It is something that invaded me, and that was rooted in me since I was a child.” Of his career as a singer, Van De Sfroos states: “I would never have imagined myself on a stage. In fact, as a child, I was sociable but also quite shy. Passion, however, was stronger than shyness, and now here we are.”

Davide says that choosing the local dialect to tell stories about Lake Como was natural: “If you use folk rock and the language in which the stories you want to talk about happen, then the result is magic. Otherwise, if you have to translate it, to explain it, you somehow empty it and make the path less linear.”

When he started singing, Davide did not expect to achieve this success. He says he began as a child who heard a calling and jumped in without thinking. Then, he says: “I realised as I went along that the stories I sang had incredible power and entered into the people who came into contact with them. I found myself representing a place, a region, a language, a way of being. And to represent the football team as well.”

A song by Van De Sfroos, ‘Pulenta e galèna frègia’, released in 1999 in the album ‘Brèva e Tivàn’, has long since become one of the most representative songs for the Como 1907 fans, the ‘biancoblù’. Como’s fans took the song and transformed it into their stadium chant. Davide says that hearing ‘Pulenta e galèna frègia’ sung as an anthem from the Curva creates a great emotion in him. Indeed, Davide has had Como in his heart since childhood: “I followed Como 1907 in Serie C, in Serie B and until Serie A. There was a time when, in Serie A, I was the Como’s correspondent for the national TV programme ‘Quelli che il calcio’ (Those who football….), both at home and away games. Now, back to Serie A, I feel all the excitement of this new Serie.” A revisited version of ‘Pulenta e galèna frègia’, mixed with the voices of some of the fans, was presented on the occasion of the last match of the 2023/2024 season when Como 1907 celebrated its promotion to Serie A.

At the centre of Van De Sfroos’ work are the stories of the people and places that are part of the experience of people on Lake Como and its region. There are many places Davide recommends visiting. Among the villages of Colonno, Sala Comacina, Ossuccio, Lenno, Mezzegra, Tremezzo and Griante, “the Greenway of Lake Como allows you to walk through a paradise. Then mysterious places like Praa de la Taca and Madonna del Soccorso.” Moreover, “Monte Piatto and the areas above Palanzo.” Visiting means “entering the mysteries of the villages along the lake.” Visitors can go up almost to Valtellina and then to Porlezza and Val d’Intelvi: “Everyone finds their favourite corners, even hidden ones, which they perhaps don’t unveil to prevent them from becoming too packed.” Moreover, Monti di Nava, Alpe di Colonno and Boffalora are part of a region “that the world envies us and visits and where important and popular people buy houses and villas.”

Alongside the most popular places, there are also “those corners where people live in contact with the land, and the agriculture, living according to the tradition and the canons of the rural world.” The local cuisine is part of this traditional world: “When you find the right place and the people who are still able to cook like their ancestors, even a simple dish of ‘polenta e brasato’, ‘polenta uncia’ or marinated fish takes on the flavour of yesteryear.” For Davide, rediscovering the tastes of when he was a child “is a bit like listening to a song that was the soundtrack of my youth.”

As a kid, Davide, from Mezzegra, often visited Como, where his paternal grandparents lived: “For me, it was the big city of reference. I remember going up to Garzola.” One of his favourite places to admire the city is the Brunate’s lighthouse: “Arriving there at sunset when everything turns red and looking down overlooking the city is wonderful. I have memories from my childhood when, at the age of 6 or 7, I was already taking in emotions from this incredible region.”

Among his songs, which are about the lake, its stories, people and places, peace, war, love and life, Davide does not have a favourite: “I may be fond of some because, when I wrote them, I wanted to explore specific topics. However, they all have great importance. Otherwise, they would not have become songs. Therefore, in this mosaic that has become my story for 25 years, it is not easy to find a work more important than others.”

If it is not possible to change the fortunes of a world in which there are still many fears, music can help people who listen to it: “We who sing songs, who write poetry can do something: let out an energy that makes people feel better.”