Pino Daniele

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Pino Daniele.

Pino Daniele (March 19, 1955, Naples) is an Italian pop-blues singer, songwriter and musician.

[edit] Biography

Daniele was born to a working-class family, his father being a port worker. A self-taught guitarist, he began his career as a musician playing for other successful singers of the 1970s.

His striking debut in the Italian music world was in 1977 with the album Terra mia, which proved to be a successful mix of Neapolitan tradition and Blues sounds. Daniele defined his music with the term "taramblu", which indicated a mix of tarantella, blues and rumba. His lyrics also attracted critical praise: written and sung in an intense Neapolitan, they contained strong though bitter accusations against the social injustices of Naples, as well as Italian society in general, and included melancholic personal themes. Several of the later songs are characterized by a free intermingling of English, American and Neapolitan passages.

Daniele's talent was confirmed on the following album Pino Daniele (1979). He scored his greatest success in 1980, with Nero a metà ("Half-Black Skinned"), which was noted by some authorities as the hallmark of the rebirth of Neapolitan song. In that year Daniele opened the Bob Marley concert at the San Siro stadium in Milan. In 1981 Vai Mo was released. The presence of some of the most renowned musicians of the Neapolitan musical milieu, including James Senese, Enzo Avitabile, Tullio De Piscopo and Tony Esposito, as session men on his albums has also been widely praised.

In 1982 Daniele gradually shifted to a personal and early version of world music: in Bella 'mbriana musicians such as Alphonso Johnson and Wayne Shorter appeared as guest players. In the following year Daniele held a concert in Havana, and later formed a Latin-American band featuring Juan Pablo Torres, Adalberto Lara and Nanà Vasconcelos. In (1984), the former King Crimson member Mel Collins played on Daniele's album Musicante. Daniele's skills in creating well-balanced blends of Mediterranean, Blues, rock, music, salsa and Neapolitan melodies are well shown in his first live work, Live Sciò of 1984.

Later Daniele collaborated with the American singer/guitarist Richie Havens on Common Ground, an album written and played together. His interest in Arabic music is emphasized on Bonne Soirée (1987), while the subsequent Schizzechea With Love (1988) was more Mediterranean-oriented. In the same year he started a collaboration with the Italian actor and director Massimo Troisi: Daniele completed the soundtracks for Troisi's films Le vie del Signore sono finite and Pensavo fosse amore invece era un calesse.

A certain loss of inspiration and a move to a more pop-oriened songwriting can be detected in his greatest commercial success, Mascalzone Latino (1989), a success confirmed by the following albums Un Uomo In Blues (1991) and Che Dio ti benedica (1993). The latter contains two song produced by Chick Corea.

Non calpestare i fiori nel deserto, released in Spring 1995, is an attempt to revive inspiration through African and Ethnic influences, and sold more than 800,000 copies. The subsequent tour ended with a double date with Jazz guitarist Pat Metheny.

In 2002, after a collaboration with Eros Ramazzotti, Daniele sang and toured with two other famous Italian singers, Francesco De Gregori and Fiorella Mannoia. His latest album containing previously unpublished songs is Passi d'autore of 2004.

After his divorce from Dorina Giangrande, who had sung in the chorus on Terra Mia and gave him two sons, Daniele currently lives with Fabiola Sciabbarasi. The two have a daughter, Sara, to whom Daniele dedicated an eponymous song on the album Medina.