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Permanent LinkMar 22, 2009 
:hippy: Move over Penélope and Scarlett - a struggling musician-turned-diva is the real feelgood story behind Woody Allen's new movie.

When British cinemagoers flock to Woody Allen's latest film Vicky Cristina Barcelona this week, they are likely to have been drawn by the triple attraction of Penélope Cruz, Scarlett Johansson and Javier Bardem, who star in the tale of a love triangle conducted in one of Europe's most charismatic cities. But in Catalonia the true hero of the film is an Italian busker who has never been anywhere near the studios of Hollywood.

The film has already garnered a Golden Globe and an Oscar nomination, but last week a less publicised award - a Catalan film festival award for best original music - went to Giulia Tellarini, whose "Barcelona" forms the opening soundtrack to the film and has already been adopted by the city's tourist board.

Tellarini and her band are now touring Spain, as the success of the song and the film promises to launch their musical careers. In an age when stars are manufactured through programmes such as X Factor and Pop Idol, her extraordinary transformation from busker to diva deserves a feel-good sequel in itself.

In 2006 Barcelona was the dream destination for Tellarini, a self-described "Gypsy" who, aged six, moved from Treviso with her family to Cottesmore, Leicestershire, when her father, an Italian air force pilot, became an instructor at the RAF base. At 13 she moved to Rome before heading to Paris for university and a job as a radio sound technician. Losing her job, she packed up her accordion and joined the tens of thousands of Italians lured to Barcelona by the promise of work and a good time.

In the Catalan capital, Tellarini was lucky to find work singing a TV commercial jingle for Argentinian producer Alejandro Mazzoni, the first time she had sung into a microphone. The pair hit it off and, after rounding up musicians they knew, the Latin and jazz-influenced street group Giulia y los Tellarini was born.

As Barcelona played host to Allen during the production of Vicky Cristina Barcelona, the band plotted to capture the director's attention. "Our amazing bit of luck was when a band member dropped our homemade CD off at the hotel where Woody Allen was staying and he loved it," recalled Tellarini.

By then, October 2007, the band had broken up after only three gigs and Tellarini had moved to Berlin with Mazzoni, where she was teaching French and busking in the arty Kreuzberg district.

"We received urgent messages on our MySpace site from Woody Allen's people saying they had fallen in love with the music and offering a deal. At first we thought it was a joke," she said.

Allen was so keen on her Italian- and French-accented Spanish voice that he picked "Barcelona" to play over his opening credits rather than the jazz numbers he had been using for years. According to the director, the song's up-tempo guitar and whispered lyrics made it the "perfect" way to frame the film.

Success has now brought Tellarini back to Barcelona to tour, pick up her award and record a new album with a "gypsy swing" feel. But even with royalties pocketed from the soundtrack, she was not planning on staying.

The city may have fallen in love with her but, said Tellarini, modern Barcelona had become an expensive "theme park", pushing her to leave her adopted city and make her home in Berlin. A close reading of the Spanish lyrics to "Barcelona" reveal the tough time she had settling in the artistic Gràcia neighbourhood in 2006, where she lived in a caravan to make ends meet.

"The city is getting so expensive and they are closing down the small clubs and making it harder to play on the streets," she said. "The song is about being lost in Barcelona, where relentless tourism makes it hard to be introspective. I love Catalans, but Barcelona feels like a former lover; I have to move on. And people only have time to be creative when they can afford a roof over their head."

With almost every tourist destination in Barcelona providing backdrops, from Gaudí's town houses to the funfair, Spain has been quick to use the film to promote tourism, and Allen has been criticised for accepting funding money from the city for the film. Tellarini, despite her reservations about the real Barcelona, is a fan.

"I really liked the film," she said. "Woody Allen may have got backing from the tourism board to make Barcelona look great, but the film is very ambivalent, just like my song."


Tom Kington
The Observer

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