Antonello Venditti
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Antonello Venditti | |
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Background information | |
Birth name | Antonio Venditti |
Born | Rome, Italy | 8 March 1949
Genres | Pop |
Occupation(s) |
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Years active | 1971–present |
Labels |
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Website | www |
Antonio "Antonello" Venditti (born 8 March 1949) is an Italian singer-songwriter and pianist who became popular in the 1970s for the social themes addressed in his songs.
Biography
Antonello Venditti was born in Rome, the son of Vincenzino Italo Venditti from Campolieto, in Molise, who at the time was deputy-prefect in Rome, and Wanda Sicardi.
He studied piano in his youth and made his debut in the music world in the early 1970s at the
Venditti and De Gregori subsequently parted ways. Venditti moved to Milan in 1973 and released his first solo labum
After a live performance of the song "A Cristo" ("To Christ"), Venditti was denounced by an Italian police officer for blasphemy. He was later acquitted. Although Venditti's use of religious language was not typical of the left-wing culture he adhered to, his lifestyle in the late 1960s and the 1970s was, as he later told the journalist Giampaolo Mattei, "secular": "They were years in which the influence of the left was really strong and the life of young people then was somewhat Godless. I think it was the everyday life of the time that led me to participate in and embrace certain things. I emerged from that when I realised it was a dead end because it took away people's joy. Maybe it did give them social growth, but it had nothing to say about happiness. Too much materialism and too little spirituality. A whole generation grew up with that materialism, supported by political slogans."[1]
Venditti's fortunes grew and peaked in 1975, with the LP
Political involvement, however, had side-effects on Venditti's inspiration in the late 1970s, marked in Italy by the growing menace of
Success was, however, marred by his divorce from his wife Simona Izzo. She won custody of Venditti's son, Francesco Venditti. The following LP, Buona domenica (1979), was strongly marked by this difficult period. It contained, however, several classics, like the title-track and the ballad Modena, which featured Gato Barbieri on saxophone and is considered one of Venditti's finest works.
In 1982 the bitter Sotto la pioggia marked Venditti's passage to his own label, Heinz Music, and the beginning of the long-lasting collaboration with producer Alessandro Colombini. The following year
: Venditti was therefore called upon to take part in the official celebration show, and the song that he composed for the occasion, "Grazie Roma" ("Thank You Roma"), turned into a great success, surprisingly not just in Rome. Venditti had already composed several songs about his favourite football team; some people criticized them harshly, mostly because of the strong contrast with the political-social themes of his other songs.In the following years, and notably in the 1990s, Venditti's inspiration seemed to become more mainstream and commercial and use of covers for his main hits widespread. His LPs (
In April 2008, in an interview with a Catholic website, Venditti spoke of his faith in Christ, his devotion to Padre Pio and his respect for Pope Benedict XVI, and also mentioned having been assaulted when he was sixteen by a malevolent entity which he identified with Satan.[2] This led the media to class Venditti with other high-profile show-business converts like Claudia Koll (who was also attacked by a malevolent entity) and Giovanni Lindo Ferretti,[3] although actually his conversion long predates theirs.[1][4]
In October 2009 Venditti was criticized for asking, during a concert in Sicily, "Why did God create Calabria?" and declaring that "there is really nothing" in
In November 2011, Venditti released his new album, named Unica. The following tour started in march 2012 in Rome and ended in September 2013 in
In January 2014, Venditti started his small sold-out tour 'Ritorno al Futuro', which consists of the songs from the 1970s and 1980s, such as "Lo stambecco ferito", "Marta", "Compagno di scuola", "Campo de' Fiori" and others.
Venditti's latest album is Tortuga, released in 2015. The opening concert of the following tour had been held at Stadio Olimpico in Rome.
Due to the 40th anniversary of one of his most popular albums, Venditti released a remastered version of the album and started a large tour throughout Italy. The tour started at the Arena of Verona, and played (a.o) five times for a sold-out Palalottomatica in Rome. The final concert at the Hammersmith in London had initially been postponed due to Covid-19 restrictions and was eventually cancelled.
In 2022 Venditti re-united with Francesco De Gregori for a national tour to celebrate the 50th anniversary of their friendship and artistic association.
Soundtracks
Venditti released the soundtrack for the 1985 movie Troppo Forte by his friend, the Roman director Carlo Verdone. Verdone also occasionally played drums in Venditti's concerts. Furthermore, he appears in the
Discography
- Theorius Campus (1972) (With Francesco De Gregori under the collective byname of Theorius Campus)
- L'orso bruno(1973)
- Le cose della vita (1973)
- Quando verrà Natale (1974)
- Lilly (1975)
- Ullàlla (1976)
- Cronach (1977)
- Sotto il segno dei pesci (1978)
- Buona domenica (1979)
- Sotto la pioggia (1982)
- Circo Massimo (1983, live)
- Cuore (1984)
- Centocittà (1985, live)
- Venditti e Segreti (1986)
- In questo mondo di ladri (1988)
- Gli anni ’80 (1990, collection)
- Diario (1991)
- Benvenuti in Paradiso (1991)
- Gli anni '70 (1992)
- Da San Siro a Samarcanda – L’amore insegna agli uomini (1992, live)
- Prendilo tu questo frutto amaro (1995)
- Antonello nel Paese delle Meraviglie (1997, live)
- Goodbye Novecento (1999)
- Se l'amore è amore... (2000, collection)
- Circo Massimo 2001 (2001, live)
- Il coraggio e l’amore (2002, collection)
- Che fantastica storia è la vita (2003)
- Campus Live (2005, live)
- Diamanti (2006, collection)
- Dalla pelle al cuore (2007)
- Le donne (2009)
- Unica (2011)
- TuttoVenditti (2012, collection)
- io, l'orchestra, le donne e l'amore (2013, live)
- 70. 80. Ritorno al Futuro (2014, live)
- Tortuga (2015)
- Tortuga un giorno in paridiso (2015, live)
- Sotto il segno dei pesci The anniversary tour (2019, live)
References
- ^ a b Stefano Solegemello. "Antonello: politica e religione" (in Italian).
- ^ Bruno Volpi. "Intervista con Antonello Venditti" Archived 26 July 2011 at the Wayback Machine, Petrus, 26 April 2008 (in Italian).
- ^ "Posseduto dal demonio", Libero, 28 April 2008 (in Italian).
- ^ Antonio Lodetti. Venditti: "La fede l'ho cantata per primo", Il Giornale, 17 December 2008 (in Italian).
- ^ Domenico Malara. "Venditti, la Calabria e il caffè... corretto!", 15 October 2009 (in Italian)
External links
- Solegemello, Antonello Venditti-Solegemello-web site
- Vendittando, Venditti blog