Toto Cutugno, Singer Whose ‘L’Italiano’ Struck a Chord, Dies at 80

Toto Cutugno, an Italian singer and songwriter whose 1983 hit tune “L’Italiano” turned a worldwide sensation and was nonetheless vastly fashionable a long time later, died on Tuesday in Milan. He was 80.

His longtime supervisor, Danilo Mancuso, mentioned the reason for Mr. Cutugno’s loss of life, at San Raffaele Hospital, was most cancers.

In a profession that started when he was in his late teenagers, Mr. Cutugno bought greater than 100 million albums worldwide.

“He was able to build melodies that remained stuck in the audience’s mind and heart,” Mr. Mancuso, who had labored with Mr. Cutugno for 20 years, mentioned in a telephone interview. “The refrains of his most popular songs are so melodic.”

Mr. Cutugno’s profession started with a stint, first as a drummer after which as a pianist, with Toto e i Tati, a small native band in Northern Italy. He quickly branched out into songwriting.

His expertise for writing memorable songs earned him collaborations with well-known French singers, like Joe Dassin, for whom he wrote “L’été Indien” and “Et si Tu N’Existais pas,” and Dalida, with whom he wrote the disco hit “Monday, Tuesday … Laissez-Moi Danser.” He additionally wrote songs for the French pop star Johnny Hallyday and for famed Italian singers like Domenico Modugno, Adriano Celentano, Gigliola Cinquetti and Ornella Vanoni. International stars like Celine Dion sang his songs as nicely.

But Mr. Cutugno additionally discovered success singing his personal compositions, first with Albatros, a disco band, which took third place on the Sanremo Festival of Italian Song in 1976. He then started a solo profession and garnered his first nationwide recognition in Italy in 1980, when he received the competition with “Solo Noi.”

He returned to the competition three years later with “L’Italiano.” He completed in fifth place, however the tune, a hymn to a rustic straining to rebuild after World War II — marked by symbols of Italy like espresso, the Fiat Seicento and a president who had fought as a partisan through the battle — turned tremendously fashionable. It remains to be one in every of Italy’s best-known songs, performed on tv and at avenue festivals throughout the nation, in addition to a nostalgic reminder of their homeland for expatriates elsewhere.

The tune’s success paved the way in which for a global profession: Mr. Cutugno went on to tour over time within the United States, Europe, Turkey and Russia.

“Russia was his second homeland,” mentioned Mr. Mancuso, his supervisor. “The only Western entertainment that Russian televisions broadcast at the time was the Sanremo song festival, and Toto was often on, and was appreciated.”

He added that Mr. Cutugno’s nostalgic tunes have been paying homage to the musical types of Eastern Europe, and particularly Russia, which made them immediately acquainted to these audiences.

In 2019, Mr. Cutugno’s ties to Russia obtained him into hassle with some Ukrainian politicians, who needed to cease him from performing in Kyiv, the nation’s capital. Mr. Cutugno denied that he supported Russia in its aggression in opposition to Ukraine and famous that he had rejected a reserving in Crimea after Russia reclaimed it in 2014. He ultimately did carry out in Kyiv.

In 1990, Mr. Cutugno received the Eurovision Song Contest. He was one in every of solely three Italians to have performed so — the others have been Ms. Cinquetti in 1964 and the rock band Maneskin in 2021. His profitable tune, “Insieme: 1992” (“Together: 1992”), was a ballad devoted to the European Union and its political integration. That similar 12 months, Ray Charles agreed to sing an English-language model of a tune by Mr. Cutugno on the Sanremo competition; Mr. Cutugno referred to as the collaboration “the greatest professional satisfaction” of his lifetime.

Mr. Cutugno, who was recognized for his emotional guitar taking part in and for shaking his longish black hair when he sang, additionally had a stint as a tv presenter in Italy.

Toto Cutugno was born Salvatore Cutugno on July 7, 1943, within the small city of Tendola, close to Fosdinovo, within the mountains of Italy’s northwest between the areas of Tuscany and Liguria. His father, Domenico Cutugno, was a Sicilian Navy marshal, and his mom, Olga Mariani, was a homemaker.

He went to secondary faculty within the metropolis of La Spezia, the place he grew up, and took non-public music classes that included piano and accordion.

He is survived by his spouse, Carla Cutugno; his son, Niko; and two youthful siblings, Roberto and Rosanna Cutugno.