Songwriters From Italy

"He had a heavenly, world-class voice: if he had been born in a country other than Italy, he could have been even more successful. But he was happy at home, in Lagonegro. He was a quiet guy [...] Italian music has lost something very important, something he perhaps never fully understood. His full potential was never realised."

"I started out in the 1980s singing “Lei Verrà” in piano bars. It was one of the songs that gave me the chance to start my musical career. The news of his death is shocking. Mango will always be remembered as a great artist, because death cannot silence a voice and a song."

"I have always respected Mango, a virtuoso and decent singer, always on stage performing his art, right up to the end."

"Mango's death is one of the most touching moments I can remember. An artist who feels ill on stage, apologises to the audience for the disturbance before dying is absolutely incredible. Of course, Mango's style was far from mine, but I wanted to celebrate the person, the artist who was true to himself until the very last minute, with incredible respect for his audience."

"I didn't know him very well personally. I met him a few times, but I was enchanted by his talent and his unique voice. I saw many of his concerts. Once, at the Sistina in Rome, I was in the audience and at the end his brother Armando, whom I knew better, approached me and took me to his dressing room to meet him. I went in and saw him putting his things in a bag. He smiled at me and shook my hand with simplicity and warmth. My village is 19 km from his, which made him my closest idol. I adore his songs, his inimitable style, his notes that pierce the glass of my soul like diamonds."

"But why, in Italy, does a great artist have to die before he is recognised?"

"One of the most beautiful voices in the Mediterranean."

"He was a generous artist. He had a kind heart and exceptional sensitivity, as all of Italy saw when he felt ill on stage. He was a true Lucanian, a different kind of artist with a unique quality that cannot be found even in other great artists."

"If you listen to Mango's records now, you realise that he is a world number one."

"Mango was a unique case in Italian pop music: he was able to combine refined melodies with a touch of vocal experimentalism and a sprinkling of ethnic influences, without losing sight of rock or singer-songwriter music, genres from which he always carefully avoided drawing any effects, chords or practices that were in any way predictable."

"Metaphorically speaking, one could say that Mango plays the part of an elf who moves nimbly and stealthily in a complex architectural environment, without knocking over the crystal glassware whose exact location only he knows, in a very pictorial and never banal vocal-instrumental ensemble. In his case, one can speak of “a voice that becomes an instrument with special modulations”."

"I rule out Mina reappearing, because it would be a mistake and she doesn't make mistakes in this sense. Mina is a legend because we can only imagine her. We don't know what she is anymore. She is a memory, and that is her strength. If she did appear, it would be a huge success, people would kill to get a ticket. But she would lose her depth. In short, Mina must not be seen, otherwise she is not a legend. And she knows this very well. Legends either die young or disappear."

"All my life I have been a passer-by and have always sought out secondary paths. I am always fascinated by what I do not know, and those are the secondary paths. And that is my goal."

"I think the best of Renato. I think he's full of imagination. It's not true that he imitates ambiguous British singers, as they say. He's been like that for 10 years, he's always dressed in a certain crazy way, he doesn't imitate anyone. He's a hybrid, but his real strength lies in the fact that he was born in the suburbs of Rome, among real people. And he has remained a “suburbanite”, with the sincerity and humanity of those people. More than ambiguous, he is one of them. For kids, he is a fairy tale, he is Disneyland, with dreams and hopes. Even for kids, he is one of them. That's why he's successful."

"Mina is the greatest Italian singer, even though for some years now she has not cared about singing, and you can tell. I envied her greatly for her joyful success. Italy went crazy for her. Good humour exploded from this girl who moved against the whining of the time. And since she is gifted by God, she has this surprising ease: she sings with the same ease as someone doing anything else. She is still capable of evoking great emotions. It makes me angry because she makes records because it suits her, and I don't agree with that. You either do this job well or you don't do it at all. I say to myself: you have the money, so for goodness' sake make a record with Gil Evans, with a big orchestra. Enjoy yourself."

"Milan has some beautiful areas, it is beautiful in the fog, it is a bit like a woman wearing a veil."

"Interviewer: What was it like to duet with [[w:Eros Ramazzotti|Ramazzotti? Vanoni: Nothing. He doesn't give off anything. When I sang with Dalla, Gino, Jovanotti, Renato Zero, something happened to me, but with Ramazzotti I didn't feel any emotion."

"For a poet, everything becomes material."

"I am a courageous woman, not a strong one. I am very fragile and I pay for everything with tears and effort."

"Trieste is a beautiful, wonderful city; all seaside cities are beautiful, but Trieste is particularly so because it is right on the sea."

"[Before the general election on 4 March 2018] Who will I vote for? I'm voting for mma Bonino. The best foreign minister, a radical woman who has always fought for her beliefs. We owe abortion, divorce and living wills to the Radical Party. They fought for these three concrete things."

"(About Giorgio Strehler) The first year, he followed my tram in his car. Then he drove me home and it was love. Giorgio was such a genius and I was so overwhelmed by passion... My father lost his voice. I lived at the Piccolo, I slept with Giorgio. He was the man who loved me the most. [...] I left him, he made me suffer, he had vices I couldn't stand. But he introduced me to culture. He talked and I kept quiet: I just had to learn. He sensed that I could sing, he made me write songs about the underworld."

"I had become Roman at the time of Rugantino. Aldo Fabrizi taught me the slower, more indolent pace of life and acting. When we went to Milan, Garinei, Giovannini and Trovajoli would put on their fur hats and take their passports like Totò and Peppino in the film. They teased me."

"The Lirico theatre was dedicated to Gaber, the two Piccolo venues to Strehler and Grassi, the Liberty building to Fo and Rame, and the Studio to Melato; there was nothing left for me, which is why I am appealing to Mayor Beppe Sala: dedicate a flowerbed in the city centre to me."

"I am fond of very few things. I believe that every house has its own soul that must be respected. There is no point in dragging around baggage from other lives. You start over every time."

"Stendhal must have been high when he said that the landscape of Lombardy was the most beautiful in the world... This grey sky."

"Among those in the hip hop world, Marracash is the best, I think the Premio Tenco award is justified. But I listen to other things, I like Cosmo, I like Maneskin even if they need to write new songs, as I know they are doing... But I have to say one thing about Damiano. I'm not the type to be shocked, but even Mick Jagger, the most sinful of singers, didn't show his bare arse on stage. What's the point of showing your bum? It's not in good taste..."

"I don't get any satisfaction from being Ornella Vanoni, I've never been super egocentric. I have my own way of being, people thought I was unpleasant or snobbish, but the truth is that I was incredibly shy and insecure. I cured that with theatre and with Strehler, with the audience, with music."

"(About Gino Paoli) He's a cat. I don't know, I didn't see him for three days, then I went downstairs and he was sitting on the steps of the front door. His first child was mine, but then I lost him."

"While romantic love is complicated, the love you feel for your children and grandchildren is a love made of serenity."

"Was I sensual? Yes, I realised that quite early on. And yes, of course, I played on it."

"Inteviewer: You are always ironic... Vanoni: Humour alleviates fear. We need to play, because we are living in tragic times. I feel exhausted and saddened after reading the newspapers and listening to the news. It seems that human beings cannot help but wage war. This is the zeitgeist: the spirit of the times is war. Then we also have Donald Trump, so we're in a bad way..."

"Interviewer: Among the companions of her life, you mention loneliness... Vanoni: I have the letter S for Solitude tattooed on my chest. I have always felt alone. For as long as I can remember, since I was a child. A feeling of incompleteness, the certainty of having a vulnerable side and that no one can really protect you."

"We will never get rid of Berlusconism, just like we will never get rid of Fascism. Nothing is more anti-political than our politicians. The PDL, but also the PD. I voted for Di Pietro, tomorrow I don't know. My utopia is to have real experts, not like these who hit pensioners and mock young people (referring to the Monti government)."

"(About Matteo Renzi) A scrapper to be scrapped. He put a tombstone on culture in Florence. He arrived, young and sprightly, and killed everything. A little Berlusconi who takes trips to Arcore."

"There is a proverb that I heard on “'The Voice”': ‘A Pelù by Litfiba pulls more | than a cart of oxen.’"

"Interviewer: What is rock? Piero Pelù: Freedom, positive anger, a naive utopian search for truth and irony. Rock must see the glass as half empty: it must be thirsty. And make few compromises."

"[...] rock is explosion. Not implosion."

"[Unlike the previous generation] We songwriters who started out in the 1980s, on the other hand, explored reality in a socio-emotional sense. Anyone familiar with my songs can see how I am closer, if anything, to the legacy of Mogol, an artist who always avoided talking about politics in order to put normality in the spotlight instead."

"I hope no one ever tells me that eternal love does not exist: I do not want to know. It would be like taking a toy away from a child when there is still light and time before bedtime."

"Everything that life brings is unexpected. Planned things fail, but when we don't aim and just shoot from the hip, we always hit the target. Magically. Following our instinct leads us to the sun."

"Love is a cage without which I could not live. The time when being called “the singer-songwriter of love” felt restrictive is over. We are no longer in the 1960s and 1970s, the era of red and black. Today, talking about love is like talking about politics."

"I cannot say that I am a peaceful man; peace does not go hand in hand with the word love. Without torment, passion cannot take off. There is no such thing as polite love; the horse of love cannot be tamed."

"Biagio Antonacci, Se ami devi amare forte, Mondadori, 2008. ISBN 9788804577737"

"Biagio Antonacci, Generazioni a confronto (pp. 29 – 30); in Andrea Pedrinelli (editor), Gaber, Giorgio, il Signor G. Raccontato da intellettuali, amici, artisti, Kowalski, Milano, 2008. ISBN 978-88-7496-754-4"

"Se stamo qui stasera è pe salutà un amico, | pe ricordà un fratello che se chiamava Rino. | So annato lì al Verano solo pe fa un saluto | perché, lo posso dì, co te so cresciuto. | Ce fosse un monumento, verrebbero in milioni | a rende omaggio ar genio che cantava le canzoni."

"Then third place Simone Cristicchi, who went to Sanremo with his song about disabled people and blew everyone away! He sang ‘I want to be like Biagio Antonacci’. Guys! What the hell is wrong with us! Oh well, never mind."

"Qui nun c'è Gianna, Aida, né Berta che filava | e quando tramonta il sol, Maria se n'è già andata. | Malgrado i cambiamenti, 'sto cielo è sempre blu, | è sempre der colore che l'hai lasciato tu."

"Gaber belonged to a generation for whom the concepts of revolution and protest were not mere slogans. They were something that had been experienced. And it was clear that when Gaber called for change, or tackled sensitive political issues, he did so because it was an inner need that he felt he had to convey to people."

"[‘After Turin, you were sent to serve in Garlasco. How did that go?’] I would say well, although I must confess that my mind was focused on music. I carried out my duties as a “CC” with the necessary attention and respect for the uniform with the stars, but I felt that my destiny was to play and sing. So much so that, having learned that Ron lived in Garlasco, one day I plucked up all my courage and went to ring his doorbell to leave him some of my songs recorded on a cassette tape'."