Strangely blasé Italian starts to descend by rope (6)
I believe the answer is:
abseil
'descend by rope' is the definition.
(I've seen this before)
'strangely blase italian starts' is the wordplay.
'strangely' indicates an anagram.
'starts' indicates taking the first letters.
The first letter of 'italian' is 'i'.
'blase'+'i'='blasei'
'blasei' is an anagram of 'ABSEIL'.
'to' is the link.
(Other definitions for abseil that I've seen before include "go down the line" , "Is able (anag.)" , "let oneself down" , "Descend vertically by rope" , "Descend rock-face using a doubled rope - like Isabel" .)