Era di Acquario

Michele Seffer (vocals, guitar, bass)
Angelo Giordano (flute, sax, vocals)
Pippo Cataldo (drums, percussion, vocals)

A trio from Palermo, one of the few important bands to come from Sicily, Era di Acquario only released an album that, despite the title Antologia was not a compilation of already issued tracks.

The album can be disappointing for the prog fans as it's mainly based on acoustic guitar and flute creating soft atmospheres like in the dreamy instrumental Campagne siciliane.
The 10 tracks are short (total time is around 29 minutes) and the only exceptions to the band's style are the faster Padre mio and Geraldine, with a rockier sound and New Trolls-like falsetto vocals.

Before the LP the group had issued two singles, the first of which, Geraldine/Arabesque had a rather hard sound with a strong bass to the fore. The group had a three-piece line-up here, with guitar, bass and drums in the same style as many important foreign power trio's, and it included a different musician, Gianni Garofalo (guitar, flute) later replaced by Angelo Giordano.
In the second single, Hold on is an English-sung mainstream rock track, while Campagne siciliane is a sweet ballad built on flute and 12-string guitar, with a style closer to the album's atmospheres.

A very active live band, Era di Acquario had a second album ready to release, with a new four-piece line up, when their first came out, but this never appeared. The line-up included drummer Claudio Rego and a bass player also named Claudio.

Michele Seffer briefly played with Il Volo after their second album, and is credited as composer and arranger on some 70's singles by Alcatraz, Hansel & Gretel, I Teppisti dei Sogni and others, but it's unclear whether he was in these bands also as a musician or not. He sadly died in 2006.

LP
Antologia	RCA (PSL 10565)	1973	matt single cover
CD
Antologia	Vinyl Magic/BMG (74321 26547-2)	1995	reissue of 1973 album - now deleted
	BMG (74321-98286-2)	2003	as above with mini LP cover
SINGLES (with picture sleeve)
Geraldine Arabesque	RCA (PM 3650)	1972	side A also on Antologia
Hold on Campagne siciliane	RCA (PM 3686)	1972	side B also on Antologia
PROMOTIONAL AND JUKEBOX SINGLES
Geraldine	RCA (EM 50)	1972	33rpm EP including excerpts from 10 singles - colour cover

Antologia is a very rare album, housed in a rather poor rough cardboard black/silver single cover.
The album has never been counterfeited nor issued abroad.


Era di Acquario - promotional photos 1972 (from "Ciao 2001" magazine - June 1972)