Another way to explore the Italian culture is also through music......................De Gregori was born in Rome to a middle-class family, and spent some of his youth in Pescara before returning to the capital. His elder brother, Luigi, was a musician and later had a personal career with the name of Luigi Grechi (Grechi is De Gregori's mother surname, later chosen in order to avoid confusion with the more famous Francesco).

 

Influenced by Bob Dylan, Leonard Cohen and the Italian singer-songwriter Fabrizio de André, De Gregori started to perform his songs (mainly personal translations of American folk songs) at the Folkstudio, in Rome, which was already frequented by his brother. On one occasion De Andrè himself is said to have listened to De Gregori's work and appreciated it.

 

Later De Gregori formed a band with his friends Antonello Venditti, Mimmo Locasciulli and Giorgio Lo Cascio, who all had success as singer-songwriters in the following years. De Gregori made his debut as a professional singer in 1972 with Theorius Campus, in collaboration with Venditti. The LP included the early masterpiece "Signora Aquilone" ("Kite Lady"), but Venditti had more songs and, having a better voice, earned better consideration by the label. The duo subsequently broke up.

De Gregori's next album, Alice non lo sa (1973), was a commercial failure.

 

In 1978, however, he returned with another inspired album, De Gregori, containing one of his most famous songs, "Generale". He declared that he felt this song much too important for him to continue staying away from the music world. The following year he joined his old friend Lucio Dalla with a highly successful live tour, entitled Banana Republic, and published a studio LP, Viva l'Italia featuring American musicians. The title track was later adopted as the Italian Socialist Party song, but De Gregori always opposed this choice.

 

After a pause of several years, De Gregori returned with the album Titanic, the first part of which was like a concept album devoted to the famous episode of the sinking of the eponymous liner. The ballad "San Lorenzo", with a rare piano performance by De Gregori, concerns the dramatic episode of the bombing of the Rome's quarter during World War II by Allied planes. The freshness of the music and lyrics made this an outstanding commercial success, as well as earning the praise of critics. Titanic has been recently declared the best Italian LP of the period 1975-2005, in a poll conducted for the authoritative Italian newspaper Il Corriere della Sera.

 

De Gregori recovered his bestseller status in 1992 with Canzoni d'amore ("Love Songs"). In the 1990s he released fewer studio albums than collections and live albums. His next original work was Prendere e lasciare ("Take and Leave")(1996): from this point his song and his musical performance were marked by an increasing Bob Dylaninfluence.

 

In November 2006 a triple CD Calypsos that collected together his most representative tracks was released. As well as the celebrated track "Diamante" ("Diamond"), this contained pieces written by Zucchero and included on his album Oro incenso e birra ("Gold, Incense and Beer"), a demo of "Mannaggia alla musica" ("Damn to the Music") from 1979, originally written for Ron and previously presented on the live album Bootleg, and the B-side of the single "Viva l'Italia" ("Long Live Italy"), the celebrated "Banana Republic", sung without Lucio Dalla.

 

 

 

 

 

 

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