E ZinzaleWhat brought us here
The band has existed since the early 2000s. But the story starts well before that.
Laurent is born, into a family on tour
The couple's first child. His parents live off music and can't afford childcare. The solution is simple: he goes with them. Everywhere.
Growing up backstage
Contracts take the family far from Balagne: the Hilton in Tunis, Club Med resorts in Corsica and on the mainland. Laurent follows along, between the suitcases, the soundchecks and the small hours.
When it gets too late, an improvised bed is set up for him: a blanket at the bottom of the bass drum. He sleeps there while the room dances.
The A Stalla cabaret
On rue Clemenceau in Calvi, their aunt Maryse Nicolaï runs A Stalla, which becomes the fashionable place in town. Their parents handle the entertainment there: making people dance, every night.
Alongside that, there are village festivals all over Corsica, next to musicians still recognised on the island today.
Sebastien arrives
The second son is born into the same setting. Six years apart, the two brothers share the same backstage childhood: the stages, the instruments, the nights that never end.
Laurent co-founds L'Alba
With several friends, he founds the Corsican band L'Alba. First real band, first stages under his own name.
Two years of national service
A forced break. Music stops, for the length of the service.
Lucien Ferreri's orchestra
Back home, Laurent makes a living from music alongside his father. Both join the orchestra of Lucien Ferreri, a jazz guitarist based in Bastia with a career as an accompanist to major names in French chanson behind him. The orchestra works mostly around Bastia, notably at the La Madrague hotel, as well as at village festivals.
Decisive years: rubbing shoulders daily with musicians of that calibre teaches faster than any course could.
Sebastien, the more gifted of the two
He takes up the guitar very early and progresses fast, with an almost immediate grasp of music. He joins L'Alba in turn, enters the professional world at 16, becomes a registered performing artist at 18. Over the years he establishes himself as one of the band's pillars.
The two brothers as a duo
Laurent and Sebastien regularly team up as a duo: guitar, voice and keyboard. They notably play at the piano bar of the L'Acapulco nightclub in Calvi, singing late into the night.
Laurent, for his part, gradually moves away from the stage for his entrepreneurial ventures, mainly in retail, without ever stopping playing with his brother.
GENERATIONS, the family on stage
The two brothers form a band with their parents. The name speaks for itself: GENERATIONS. On the same stage, their father and mother, Jessie, on one side, Laurent and Sebastien on the other.
Uncle André Tomasso comes to play regularly, aunt Brigitte sings from time to time. What Laurent and Sebastien had experienced from backstage, they finally live at the microphone, alongside those who brought them there.
The birth of E Zinzale
Four musicians are behind the project: Fred Nello, Laurent Lafarge, Nicolas Debelle and Sebastien Lafarge. A real band, four strong. The idea of a collective comes later.
At the start, Laurent is on keyboard; only later does he move to guitar. The idea isn't to start yet another traditional band, but to make Corsican roots talk to everything that makes an audience sing and dance, across every generation.
It's Fred Nello, the drummer, who finds the name: E Zinzale, "the mosquitoes" in the Corsican language. His argument, with a smile: "The Beatles were basically beetles. We can very well be mosquitoes."
Hard to argue. The name stuck.
For a while, the two bands coexist: GENERATIONS on one side, E Zinzale on the other. Then the latter takes over. It hasn't let go since.
Fred, Laurent, Nicolas, Sebastien
The founding quartet forges the band's stage identity: Fred Nello on drums, Laurent Lafarge on keyboard then guitar, Nicolas Debelle on bass, Sebastien Lafarge on guitar. A line-up owing as much to the music as to the friendship binding its members.
It's during this time that Fred sets the principle that will become the band's trademark: if one is unavailable, another takes their place. The project depends on no single individual. The collective was born from that idea.
The passing of Michel Lafarge
Their father passes away following an accident. He had drifted a little from the stage in recent years, having become an IT trainer, but the accident changed everything. He had said it clearly: stop everything else to do nothing but music.
He didn't get the time. His sons, for their part, have never left the stage since.
The passing of Fred Nello
Fred wasn't just the drummer: he was part of the band's balance and its human story. His passing could have stopped everything. The music went on, partly as a way to keep alive what had been built together. Two weeks later, the family also lost Maryse Nicolaï.
A collective that carries on
New musicians have joined the adventure without ever erasing what came before. E Zinzale now performs as a duo, a trio, a quartet, a quintet, up to about fifteen musicians for the biggest occasions, in Corsica, on the mainland and abroad.
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