RIP Nico Fidenco

 

Rai News

November 19, 2022

 

Nico Fidenco, author of popular songs of the 60s has died

The news was confirmed by his wife Annamaria and daughter Guendalina

 

Died last night in Rome, at the age of 89, the singer-songwriter and composer Nico Fidenco. The news was confirmed by his wife Annamaria and daughter Guendalina.

"I learn with sorrow of the death of Nico Fidenco - writes in a note the Minister of Culture, Gennaro Sangiuliano - important singer-songwriter and composer of famous soundtracks and unforgettable songs such as 'Legato a un granello di sabbia'. The world of culture is affectionately close to the family and bids farewell to a great Italian artist".

The career

Fidenco, born Domenico Colarossi, was born in Rome on January 24, 1933 and achieved success in the 60s, with songs taken from soundtracks, first of all 'What a Sky' (in Italian 'Su nel cielo'), from the film by Francesco Maselli 'I delfini', but above all with the song 'Legato a un granello di sabbia', considered the first summer catchphrase in the history of Italian music.

In 1939, at the age of six, he moved with his family to Asmara, where he remained until 1949. In 1960 Fidenco was already in the stable of the Italian RCA in Rome, where he had been presented by Franco Migliacci, especially as an author. But the artistic director Enzo Micocci also found his voice interesting. And in fact, when Maselli was looking for a song for his film 'I Delfini', Micocci proposed an unpublished song, What a Sky, composed by maestro Giovanni Fusco. The audition was recorded by a young Little Tony, Fusco's son and Fidenco. But it was the latter that was preferred by the production.

The record company initially did not foresee the publication of the piece on 45 rpm, but the pressures from shopkeepers and wholesalers, due to the requests of the public (the film was very well received in theaters), pushed the label not only to publish the English version, but to rush Fidenco back to the recording room to record on the same orchestral base the Italian version 'Su nel cielo' to be put on the B side of the 45 rpm which from 31 December 1960 remained first in the charts for four weeks.

After 'What a sky' Fidenco recorded other songs in English and Italian taken from the soundtracks of great successful films such as: 'Just that same old line' from the film 'La ragazza con la valigia' with Claudia Cardinale, 'Il mondo di Suzie Wong' from the film of the same name with William Holden which reached the first position in the charts for five weeks in 1961, 'Exodus', from the film of the same name with Paul Newman, 'Moon River' from the film 'Breakfast at Tiffany's' with Audrey Hepburn, 'The man who could not love' from the film of the same name with George Peppard and 'A woman in the world' from the film 'The woman in the world'.

But his successes did not stop at the soundtracks. In the mid-60s, Fidenco ringed several great successes in the charts: 'Con te sulla spiaggia' (runner-up at 'Un disco per l'estate' 1964), 'Se mi perderai', 'Come nasce un amore', 'A casa di Irene', 'La voglia di ballare' (finalist at 'Un disco per l'estate' 1965), 'Goccia di Mare', 'Non è vero', 'Tutta la gente', but above all 'Legato a un granello di sabbia' (1961), considered the first example of Italian summer catchphrase in history, as it remained first in the charts for 14 weeks and was the first 45 rpm to exceed one million copies sold in Italy (it even reached one and a half million).

In 1966 he left the RCA to move to the Parade but, from here on, his popularity suffered a decline, despite a participation, his only one, in the Sanremo Festival in the 1967 edition remembered above all for the death of Luigi Tenco. Fidenco, who presented the song signed by Gianni Meccia 'Ma piano (per non svegliarti)' paired with the American singer Cher, failed to bring the song to the final.

After reducing his pop recordings, Fidenco returned to deal with newof soundtracks, composing for the so-called genre cinema throughout the seventies and eighties, ranging from spaghetti-westerns (the first soundtrack was for 'In the shadow of a colt') to the films of the so-called sexploitation as 'The strange law of dr. Menga' (1971), 'La ragazzina' (1975) and the cult series 'Emanuelle', also attending the horror film 'Zombi Holocaust' of 1980 and the crossover 'Porno Holocaust' by Joe D'Amato.

The only pop album recorded in this decade was 'La mia estate con Cinzia', released in 1970 on the Ri-Fi label. In the late seventies and early eighties it found an unexpected popularity with the public of children, also in terms of sales, thanks to the numerous acronyms recorded for Japanese anime, a real phenomenon of television costume of that period. The theme song 'Don Chuck Beaver' in fact managed to sell over four hundred thousand copies, bringing it back to the charts. In this decade he also returned to record pop albums such as 'La mia mania' in 1981 and 'Direzione vietata' in 1989 and while in 1992 he published a collection of rearranged hits entitled 'Ieri e oggi'.

From 1984 to 1994 with colleagues Riccardo Del Turco, Jimmy Fontana and Gianni Meccia he gave life to I Super 4, a quartet with which he proposed hits taken from their respective repertoires of the sixties rearranged in a modern key, with which he published three albums of moderate commercial success.

In 2007 he performed live as part of the Lucca Comics & Games, sang live some of the soundtracks and cartoon theme songs, object of rediscovery and revaluation by fans and professionals. In the wake of this revival, the Siglandia label printed in 2019 a collection of all the Fidenco cartoon theme songs in a remastered and limited edition, to make up for the absence of these recordings from the record market, including digital.

FIDENCO, Nico (Domenico Colarossi) [1/24/1933, Rome, Lazio, Italy – 11/19/2022, Rome, Lazio, Italy.

Nico Fidencos’ westerns – composer, singer:

Dynamite Jim - 1966

     Song: “Dynamte Jim” sung by I Cantori Moderni

In a Colt’s Shadow – 1966

A Taste for Killing – 1966

Bandidos – 1967 [sings “La ballata del treno”]

The Bang-Bang Kid – 1967

John the Bastard – 1967

Bury Them Deep - 1968

Full House for the Devil – 1968

I Want Him Dead – 1968

The Texican – 1968

     Song: “Texican” sung by Nico Fidenco (Domenico Colarossi), chorus ‘I Cantori Moderni’

His Name Was Pot... They Called Him Allegria – 1971

The Rough and Ready Cowboy (TV) – 1973-1974 [sings: "Sam, Sam, Sam!"]

Those Dirty Dogs – 1973