Firma, Barbati pe Matasari, 09.10.2022

photo: Dana Tole @danatole.photographer

Slowly, the world of live shows is coming back into its senses and events are starting to pop off as often as they used to a few years ago. And one of these events was Firma’s recital at Barbati pe Matasari on a wonderful autumn evening.

Barbati pe Matasari is a spin-off of the festival Femei pe Matasari, where women (or men, this time) take over a street famous for its commerce back in the day and prostitutes, more recently, and gather to exhibit and sell their hand made merchandise. It’s a cute little thing on a cute little street, with a very boheme vibe and a fair-like atmosphere, and Firma have been regular performers at most (all??) editions of this festival.

It was a short show, about an hour, in a very pitoresque setting, with hay ballots on the ground and warm lights. There was a cozy and friendly atmosphere, and Firma were awesome as always. I love how open and down to earth they are, and how they had a lot of fun on stage despite singing for maybe a couple hundred people. I had a lot of fun as well, it doesn’t take much to teleport me into my magical world whenever Firma are playing. Our toddler was enjoying himself too, that hay on the ground… magical as well. And he was very excited about the music, he was beyond tired and yet he didn’t want to go home because he wanted to keep watching the concert. Yes, proud mama here, who did her share of playing Firma for him. He must’ve listened to Prietene imaginar about a gazillion times. Unfortunately they didn’t play it the other night, but I still liked the setlist a lot. To be fair, there’s not exactly much they could go wrong with anyway.

For many of the people in the audience it was more like a gathering than a live show, but I treated with the utmost responsibility and I sang all the lyrics and never stopped clapping, cheering or moving to the rhythm (unless I had to stop the kid from throwing hay into someone else’s drink). You know how devoted I am to my beloved Rocca. I jest, but yeah, I was absolutely there for the band, not just to pass the time. I left the show feeling energised and humming Primul descantec, I was happy.