Raffaella Cazzaniga on Sara Conti and Niccolò Macii: “Their biggest quality – their skating skills”

We met Raffaella Cazzaniga at Crystal Skate in Otopeni, Romania, just one week before the Grand Prix in Angers, France, where Italy’s Sara Conti and Niccolò Macii are scheduled to begin their GP season.

Coach and choreographer at IceLab in Bergamo, Raffaella Cazzaniga has worked throughout the years with Barbara Fusar-Poli, Valentina Marchei, Stefania Berton, Nicole Della Monica and Matteo Guarise, Maurizio Zandron, Laura Barquero and Marco Zandron – and, since 2019, when Sara Conti and Niccolò Macii joined their hands in a partnership, she has been alongside them, choreographing programs and working on skating skills, edges, lines, interpretation. “I come from ice dancing”, Raffaella Cazzaniga will say more than once during our talk.

With Barbara Luoni, Sara and Niccolò’s coach, they make a great team, Team Conti-Macii, and they’re all looking forward to their students’ first Grand Prix event this season: the GP in Angers.

Interview by Florentina Tone / Otopeni

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Florentina Tone: Mrs. Cazzaniga, so nice to see you at Crystal Skate – who are you here with?

Raffaella Cazzaniga: I came here with two students: one is Italian, Elena Agostinelli, who competes in seniors and comes after a year of absence, due to a big injury in her foot. And the other one is a junior skater from Spain, Ariadna Gupta Espada. They both train in Bergamo, at IceLab.

Of course, people know you better as the longtime choreographer of Sara Conti and Niccolò Macii, the 2023 European champions in pairs…

Yes, I work with Barbara Luoni, the coach of Conti / Macii. And after winning their first two competitions, the Challenger series in Bergamo and Tayside Trophy in Dundee, the guys are now getting ready for Angers.

This season, did you do Sara and Niccolò’s short or…?

Both programs.

Let’s talk about those programs then, how did the process go, who chose the music, do you feel it suits them? I’m now passing the mic to choreographer Cazzaniga, this is your field of expertise…

We started with the free program immediately after Worlds, after vacation – we decided together the free program’s music, Barbara Streisand’s Papa Can You Hear Me, thinking about Sara’s father, who died during the first period of COVID, in 2020… I remember her calling me back then: “Rafaella, my father went into the hospital with COVID, maybe I won’t see him again…” And he died five or six days after, a real tragedy. And for Sara, this choice, this program is very emotional.

As for the short, we started with another music: “Love of My Life” from Queen.

We skated to this music for one month and, after a month, Niccolò called me and said: “Raffi, maybe we can change it…” And I was: “But, why, Nic? This is a very beautiful short program”, because it was indeed very beautiful. “No, I want to skate to a strong music, a music with character – because Sara is fire and maybe we can use that”, “And what do you want?”, “I want Carmen”.

And I said Yes because I remember two or three Carmen very beautiful in ice dancing, from Tessa and Scott, Bestemianova / Bukin, Cappellini / Lanotte, but I don’t remember anyone from pairs.

So I said: “OK, we use Carmen, but not the cuts, the pieces that were used too much”.

We listened, we decided on the pieces, we cut the music… – we worked closely with a composer for the cuts, for the beats. We started the short program from the beginning – and I think it’s a very good idea, I am very happy with how everything turned out.

When I saw Sara and Niccolò’s Carmen in Lombardia, with the elements perfectly executed, I was very, very happy!

Sara will definitely be a Carmen to remember…

Sara is a very good Carmen! And the guys are very happy with the program.

At Tayside Trophy in Dundee, they skated so and so, they were not very “in condition” for this competition, their work in the legs was not that… brillante, not very bright. Because you have to have the stamina, and the perfect condition needs to be now, arriving next week, in Angers [smiling].

Actually, Barbara [Luoni] just called me and said: “Today the guys skated a very, very good short”, and so we wait for next week.

…and we also changed the costumes for the free program, because in Lombardia Trophy the costume of Sara got lost. It was sent through a courier, and it was lost; even now, we don’t know where it ended up. Back then, we asked the girls in Bergamo if it was possible to have a body for Sara for the competition.

But now we have a new one, the lower side is green, while the top part is light pink, as the sky, for Sara’s father.

Mrs. Cazzaniga, what do you consider to be Sara and Niccolò’s forte? Their strength, their biggest quality?

First of all, Sara and Niccolò are very, very good skaters. Their biggest quality is their skating skills.

I come from ice dancing, my first student was Barbara Fusar-Poli… and, in Bergamo, we work the most with Sara and Niccolò on skating skills, edges, lines, interpretation.

Because their physique is not the pairs’ standard, it’s more similar to ice dancing – but Barbara Luoni is a very technical coach for the pairs and with Sara and Nic she did a very, very, very good job!

Because it’s not very easy to twist, because it’s not very easy to lift, but with a very, very clean technique, they can get the job done.

So very good technique, skating skills, and a lot of charisma from both of them, and especially from Sara, eyes are naturally drawn to her…

I agree: when Sara skates, you see Sara!

But Niccolò is a beautiful skater too – and to skate with Sara is not so easy [laughing]. Because Sara is like: Go, go, go! And Niccolò is like: Waaaaaait! Staaaay! [laughing heartily].

But the guys are very, very nice.

Mrs. Cazzaniga, what do you think about some of the other strong pairs in competition this season? Have you seen them already?

I saw the Japanese, Riku and Ryuichi, in Bergamo, at Lombardia Trophy: they did one big mistake in the lift, and Sara and Niccolò a big mistake in the jumps, so the difference was made in the components.

But the Japanese are a very, very strong couple [she emphasizes that], the Canadians also, the Germans also.

I think there are four couples that are very, very, very strong this season. And… I think that even a little mistake can decide the results.

The Japanese have this very good speed – they have the knees very elastic, the ankles very elastic.

Sara and Nic are very strong, are fire!

Minerva and Nikita are very strong, very stable in their elements, with very little mistakes.

And I haven’t seen Deanna and Maxime this season yet – they’ll be in Skate Canada tonight [the interview was done before 2024 Skate Canada started – n.a.].

But Minerva, for example, has a big experience in pairs, while Sara didn’t even do pairs! Sara wasn’t a pair skater until 2019, and Minerva went to the Olympics as a pair skater, so she has a lot of experience.

They will meet in Angers, so let’s hope for the best for Sara and Niccolò.

For our last question, tell me who your favorite skaters are, Mrs. Cazzaniga, and also who holds your interest the most at present time? We’re all fans of the sports at the end of the day…

My favorites are Tessa and Scott, Davis/White – I come from ice dance and I love ice dancing.

But, for me, there is also Nathan Chen, Tarasova / Morozov for the pairs, and Carolina for the women. [Smiling proudly to the ears]: Carolina is Carolina.

For the present time, maybe, in the last year, Chock / Bates. I like their rhythm dance this season. They are not very in condition now, I saw them at Skate America, but the season is still early. Chock / Bates are, physically, very beautiful, very attractive, for me they are a really a couple for ice dancing. Also the British couple is not bad this year, I like it. But, technically, Guignard / Fabbri are the best, for me they are the best.

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During our talk, we also asked Raffaella Cazzaniga about her former students, pair skaters Laura Barquero and Marco Zandron, and she shared: “With Laura, we don’t know anything – after three years, she still doesn’t have a decision in her case. Marco skates with another girl now, a Canadian girl – they skate for Spain”.

As for the students she accompanied in Otopeni, Romania, at 2024 Crystal Skate, Mrs. Cazzaniga was very happy with the results.

Coming after a big injury and resuming skating after a very long break, Italy’s Elena Agostinelli finished the competition on the second place, behind Romania’s Julia Sauter, but winning the free skate. “It’s a very, very good result – I am proud of how she skated here, with a lot of courage, after her injury. The only thing we didn’t put in yet is the triple Lutz”.

Spain’s Ariadna Gupta Espada had the third best free skate of the day and finished the junior women’s competition in Otopeni on the 4th place. As with Elena’s case, both of Ariadna’s programs have been choreographed by Raffaella Cazzaniga: the short to Malaguena (and her dress really caught the audience’s attention), while the free was set to the soundtrack of the movie “Romeo + Juliet”.

[Interview by Florentina Tone in Otopeni, Romania
Photos by Alberto Ponti in Bergamo, Oberstdorf, Montreal
Other photos by Wilma Alberti and Florentina Tone]