MY TOP ITALIAN SONGS

 

 

 

You knew it was coming, didn’t you?  My favourite Italian songs.

 

I love Italy and everything about it: its countryside, art, sculpture, food, the sound of its sweet language, beautiful women, handsome men, movies, songs and everything else! Sometimes people tell me I don’t look like an Indian and I hate that, immediately correcting them saying I am 100% Indian and proud to be so. But in Italy, when someone told me I could pass off for an Italian, I let it go smugly!

 

I have been to Italy four times and each time thrown a coin in the Trevi Fountain. Three times it has worked- I have revisited Italy, but the fourth coin’s magic is awaited. Will it work? Or would it lead to being born in Italy in my next life!

 

I have digressed: back to songs. Generalisations are not entirely fair but since I wrote about French songs earlier, to me it appears that the French are a little sad and brooding while the Italians are happier and more open with their emotions and not afraid of wearing the heart on the sleeve.

 

Now for the hard part. I love so many Italian songs that it is tough to select. However, I will attempt with two provisos: one, many will be left out because of sheer numbers and space, and two, songs listed will not be in any particular order: they are all equally good.

 

First, there are the evergreen Neapolitan songs exclusive to Italy. They date back to 1835 when the first music festival took place in Naples and was held annually till late 1940s. The songs became very popular from end-19^th century and remain so till the present. Most of them have been sung by every famous tenor starting with Enrico Caruso, Mario Lanza and Beniamino Gigli down to the modern 3 tenors, Jose Carreras, Placido Domingo and my favourite Luciano Pavarotti, and the youngest, Andrea Bocelli.  Apart from the usual theme of love, many of the songs celebrate the sun, the sea and the city of Naples or lament the greatest tragedy for a Neapolitan which is not death but absence from Naples.

 

I have four favourites.  I was introduced to the first one by Vinnie Mama when he brought a 78 rpm disc of ‘Santa Lucia’ by Enrico Caruso on his return from a Europe visit in the early 1950s. In fact, ‘Santa Lucia’ happens to be the first Neapolitan song to be given Italian lyrics in 1849. The song is an invitation by a boatman to sail in his boat along the picturesque waterfront of Santa Lucia district in the Gulf of Naples.

 

‘Funiculi Funicula’ was composed in 1880 to mark the opening of the first funicular on Mount Vesuvius. ‘O Sole Mio’ (My Sun) is probably the most popular and won the Grammy award for Luciano Pavarotti in 1980. ‘Torna e Surriento’ (Come Back to Sorrento) praises the scenic surroundings of Sorrento. Twice I have had the pleasure of sailing in a boat from Capri to Sorrento and then a train ride to Naples and the beauty of the sea and coastline are fabulous beyond words.

 

Coming to other Italian songs, let me start with three numbers which I always requested for when visiting a nightclub or restaurant during my visits to Rome. First, ‘Il Mondo’ (The World), a 1965 hit by Jimmy Fontana and arranged by the well-known composer Ennio Morricone. For Fontana, it was his most successful recording. Inevitably, it had English versions titled ‘My World’ of which I like Englebert Humperdinck’s the best.

 

‘Al Di La’ (Beyond) sung by Betty Curtis was the Italian entry in the Eurovision song contest in 1961 but the version I like best is by Emilio Pericoli who mesmerized Troy Donahue and Suzanne Pleshette and us in the 1962 movie ‘Rome Adventure’ also known as ‘Lovers Must Learn’. It became a great hit both in the US and UK. Donahue and Pleshette’s screen romance turned real leading to their marriage a few years later!

 

‘Grande Grande Grande’ (Great Great Great) sung by the Italian singer Mina was the no.1 hit in Italy in 1972. Its lyrics were written by the famous singer Julio Iglesias along with two others. Sample the lyrics (translated) to get the flavor of the song, ‘I hate you, then I love you, and then I love you, then I hate you, and then I love you……You are great, great, great….’ This song was titled ‘Never Never Never’ in English and sung with equal passion by Shirley Bassey. The English lyrics are also similar: ‘I love you, hate you, love you, hate you…..I never, never, never want to be in love with anyone but you’.

 

Umberto Tozzi is a great Italian pop singer and I love his ‘Gloria’ which was a big hit in Italy in 1979-80. The English version of this song by Laura Branigan is equally good and was on top of the pops in many countries including 36 weeks in US in 1982. At least two other hits of Tozzi are worth listening to again and again, ‘Ti Amo’ (I love you) and ‘Tu’ (You). Along with ‘Gloria’, these are guaranteed to chase your Corona blues away!

 

In 1958, Italian singer Domenico Mondugno recorded ‘Nel Blu Dipinto Di Blu’ (In The Blue, Painted Blue) which became an instant hit internationally. It was then sung in an English-Italian mix by Dean Martin as ‘Volare’ (To Fly) which too became a global hit. Its popularity lasts till today and it ranks among the best known Italian songs worldwide.

 

Dean Martin, original name Dino Paul Crocetti who had an Italian father and Italian-American mother, will be remembered as the person who truly injected Italian flavor in English songs and some of them are worth recalling here though they are not strictly Italian. ‘That’s Amore’ is a love song ‘in Napoli where love is king ….. when the moon hits your eye like a big pizza pie, That’s Amore’. In the pre-fast food joints era, that’s when I first heard of a pizza! ‘Innamorata’ is an ode to a sweetheart while in ‘An Evening in Roma’, the lonely singer is envious of couples that he sees on the streets of Rome and invites his girlfriend to meet him perhaps for an espresso.

 

Let me mention here that there is a group called ‘Il Volo’ consisting of three handsome guys aged 26-27 who sing most of the songs mentioned above beautifully and very often, I play them on TV. Appropriately, they call their style of singing ‘popera’!

 

In an Italian-American musical of 1957 'Seven Hills of Rome', Mario Lanza sang 'Arrividerci Roma' which familiarised us with the Italian 'farewell'. 

It is now time to sing ‘Buena Sera' (Good night) a la Louis Prima.