Posted22. August 2023, 5:50 PM
“L’Italiano”: Italian singer Toto Cutugno is dead
Winner of Eurovision with “Insieme”, the interpreter of “L’Italiano” died Tuesday, at the age of 80, announce the Italian media.
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Jérôme Wiss (with AFP)
Toto Cutugno is dead! The Italian singer died on Tuesday, around 4 p.m., at San Raffaele hospital in Milan, where he was hospitalized, reports the Italian press. He had celebrated his 80th birthday last month. His manager Danilo Mancuso explained that “the singer’s condition had worsened after a long battle with illness”, indicates the ANSA agency.
Author of the legendary hit “L’Italiano”, Toto Cutogno had conquered Europe by winning Eurovision in 1990, with “Insieme: 1992”, a hymn to European construction and friendship between peoples. After Gigliola Cinquetti in 1964, he is the second Italian to win Eurovision. The following year, he presents with the latter the program of the competition which takes place in Rome.
From his real name Salvatore, Cutugno was born in Tuscany in 1943. The son of a Sicilian soldier, he grew up in La Spezia, in Liguria. As a child, he launched into music and learned guitar, drums, piano and saxophone. He founded his first group at the age of 19. In 1976, he took part in the prestigious Sanremo festival.
Composer, he writes songs, including some huge hits, for Joe Dassin (“Indian summer”), Johnny Hallyday (“Behind love”), Dalida (“Let me dance”)… His biggest success, he sings it, and it dates from 1983: “Un Italiano vero” (also called simply “L’italiano”) is number one on the charts in Italy and Switzerland, and number two in France. The song also appeals to audiences in Israel, Iran and South Korea.
The heady chorus of this timeless hit is still a hit on the radio: “Lasciatemi cantare con la chitarra in mano, lasciatemi cantare, sono un italiano” (“Let me sing with the guitar in my hand, let me sing, I am an Italian”).
The clip for the song, shot on the Champs-Élysées in Paris, is a succession of rather caricatural shots on Italy and the Italians: we see the singer eating pasta and flirting with the waitress.
The singer-songwriter, whose funeral will be held Thursday in Milan, has also participated 15 times in the Sanremo song festival, a real institution in the peninsula and followed each year by millions of viewers. He won the 1980 edition of the festival with the title “Solo noi”.
According to the newspaper The Corriere della Serahe has sold more than 100 million records during his career.
Some of the songs whose music was composed by Toto for others:
2023-08-22 18:03:20
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