Saturday, September 6, 2008

Gianna Nannini, Villa Manin 03/09/08








Italy’s 53 year-old rocker Gianna Nannini packed a small and yet mighty punch in front of about 5,000 fans at the splendid Villa Manin venue near Udine. Nannini, who is the older sis of former Formula 1 driver Alessandro (anyone remember him? He had had an accident with the family’s helicopter and ended up having his forearm severed by the helicopter’s blade), is perhaps Italy’s most famous female rocker who began her long career back in 1976 (she’s also famous because along with a Neapolitan singer. Edoardo Bennato, she sang the popular theme song to the 1990 Italian World Cup, “Notti Magiche”, which was actually the first time in World Cup history that the major soccer event really had its own theme song. Your correspondent STILL has fond memories of that great sporting event as he was not only Korea’s interpreter but he took in several matches, such as the Argentina-Cameroon opener in Milan, the semi-final between Argentina and Italy in Naples and the W.Germany-Argentina final in Rome).

The V.M. concert opened, luckily on time, with “Mosca Cieca” and followed with some of her older hits, such as “Bello e Impossibile”, “Radio Baccano” and “Sei Nell’Anima” all the way to more recent hits such as “Io”. A nice ditty was “Meravigliosa Creatura” which the folks over at Fiat’s advertising company have recently used to launch on tv. networks one of their newest cars. Gianna was backed up by 6 fine musicians who helped her through a 90 minute show. Apparently, on May 24, 2008 at Monaco’s Olympiastadion, Gianna’s energetic performance even impressed a fellow by the name of Bon Jovi as she opened for him in front of some 60,000 people. She’s also one of the few musicians in Italy who also happens to have a university degree (University of Siena, 1994). She’s also sung together with Paolo Conte (all pics by M. Rimati).

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