LINUS: “Don’t be a Grinch, we’re all a little bit Santa Claus”
I found the Christmas songs of when I was a child a deadly bore. Songs like White Christmas – or Bianco Natale, in the Italian version – have never particularly excited me, quite the contrary. Instead, I fell in love with Christmas carols later when I started making radio. There was a period, during the golden age of Disco Music, between 1977 and 1978, when they used some sort of medley that contained all the refrains of the most famous American Christmas songs, because in the United States they have an enormous musical tradition in this regard. And that’s how I discovered them, in this version. Even if the real leap in quality I did when I became a parent: Christmas songs, Christmas movies, at that point I got a culture on the subject.
What then there are not many historical Christmas songs. And if I really have to say what I prefer, I say Sleigh Ride, a piece that everyone sang a bit from Michael Bublé to Aretha Franklin. About ten years ago it was also the Christmas song of Radio Deejay, an Italian version interpreted by Mario Biondi, Tiziano Ferro, Laura Pausini and Giorgia.
Because then in my life the Christmas song has become above all this: the song that we launch every year during the holidays. It is now a tradition, even if in reality it started in a somewhat casual way. The first is from 1994: it was built to help the victims of the flood in Piedmont. We involved all the Italian dance artists – that was Albertino’s heyday – to raise funds for the reconstruction of a school. It was a little sui generis, but a lot of fun, it worked and it sold a lot. Then there was Christmas with the yours with Elio and Storie Tese and an Easter egg with Christmas decorations on the cover. But in those early years the Christmas song wasn’t a tradition yet, we didn’t necessarily have one every year. Things changed in 2004 when we made the Christmas film: from the Christmas song to Zenzero, also by Elio, we have never stopped. I have calculated that we have published 23. And I assure you that it is a grind: because it is difficult to cook every year a dish that is always good but with the limit of always using the same ingredients. Because in the end the Christmas piece must always say certain things, have a certain sound, create a certain atmosphere.
We tried in various ways: for a while we got away with changing the lyrics to famous songs that were already a success (old or new), a few years ago the challenge of involving a testimonial was taken. Sometimes we even tried to make someone else sing them completely, but over time the tradition took shape and now the Radio Deejay Christmas song has its rules: it must be unpublished, the radio DJs must sing it, with the participation of a guest star. And here the list is rich, because almost all Italian singers have passed by us, from Eros Ramazzotti to Marco Mengoni, from Irene Grandi to Lorenzo Jovanotti, from Max Pezzali and Cesare Cremonini, up to the last one with Elodie. There is really a lot of effort behind it and in fact every year I say enough I don’t do it anymore and instead every year I do it the same. Because in the end it is a kind of pact that we have with our most loyal listeners: who are waiting for it, they are asking for it. And who am I to let them down, the Grinch? Merry Christmas to all.
SUGAR: “Silent Night, a universal anthem”
Lmy Christmas song is Silent Night. I appreciate it so much that I even made my own version (changing a few words). I consider this song a universal song of peace and hope, which goes beyond any religious belief.
DIODATO: Everyone agrees with “Let it snow!”
I don’t have a particular passage linked to a memory. During Christmas dinners and lunches, however, two giants of music always play, in a sort of challenge between titans, Frank Sinatra and Elvis Presley. A little ‘one and a little’ the other. If I had to choose only one song, so as not to hurt anyone, I’d say Let it snow! Let it snow! Let it snow! by Dean Martin.
LICIA COLO ‘: “I love Sinatra and traditions”
I am a bit of a traditionalist. For me, Christmas means first of all family, one thing I learned from my parents, my father Giancarlo pilot of Alitalia and my mother Marta and the songs that remind me of my childhood Christmases are all the classic ones, from Christmas to Jingle Bells. Beautiful Christmases, often spent in the mountains because I have always loved skiing and being outdoors: now I try to communicate the same love for nature, for family and for tradition to my daughter Liala, who is 16. But if I have to choose a song that I am particularly fond of, I would say Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas with the inimitable voice of Frank Sinatra: an invitation to forget sadness and difficulties and look forward to the future with joy. (text collected by Maria Berlinguer)
GERRY SCOTTI: “Chris Rea against loneliness”
Without hesitation: my song is Chris Rea’s Driving Home for Christmas. It is the story of someone who is coming home for Christmas and thinks about the emotions he will feel when he arrives. I don’t know why but, even if we talk about “car”, I always imagined that it was a truck driver, one who has been away from his family for a long time. It’s so poignant … It hit the top of my Christmas hit parade many years ago, when I was deejaying, at a time when I felt very lonely for a few Christmases. And it has remained there even when things have changed: because it is far from the usual Christmas cheesy. Immediately after, for the same reasons of style, there is … And now comes Christmas of Adelmo and his Sorapis, that is Zucchero and his friends, Vandelli, Battaglia and company.
GIACOMO PORETTI: “Unreachable Mina who makes Bing Crosby”
I actually have two Christmas songs. One is the classic one, linked to childhood: Bianco Natale. I hum it and it is immediately Nativity and Tree. And I, as a child, opening the presents. It is lost so far back in time that I could not even say among the hundred versions which is the first one I have heard and it buzzes in my head. But then there is the adult Giacomo. And then the song is Mele Kalikimaka: it’s about a Christmas in Hawaii, Bing Crosby had launched it, if I remember correctly, and it’s a bit out of the usual Christmas standards. And we used it in the Banda dei Santas sung by Mina, who in that film signed four songs on the soundtrack. Mele Kalikimaka everyone.
LUDOVICA MARTINO: “I’ve been putting Bublé on the ball since November”
My Christmas song? There is no story, Bublé. I am the right age, 24, to have received a kind of childhood imprint. Any of his Christmas songs: I never get tired. If I have to choose one, however, I would say Have Yourself A Merry Little Christmas so nostalgic, romantic, sugary. I play it in full motion starting November 28th. And I sing over it as well. Too bad that at home they are not too tolerant and after a quarter of an hour they tell me to stop … But Christmas is also Silent Night in the almost punk version of Amasic: it was in the last episode of the second season of Skam, all of us in the cast immersed in the Christmas spirit, gifts, panettone, tree, scarves and coats. In early August. We are shooting 5, but a good memory remains …
FAUSTO RUSSO ALESI: “The time of apples even under the tree”
The apparently incongruous answer is Reality. Blame the memories. I must have been 7 years old. For Christmas, my older brothers had been given the Apple Time record, a film that was banned from me because it was too small. Of course I wanted to see him above all else. Due to my frustration, Christmas and Reality are linked forever. «Dreams are my reality», he says: I still like them today and I think about what unfortunately adolescents lose in a difficult moment like this. But there is also a superclassic, Tu scendi dalle stelle: I sang it as a child and then again at the theater, at Christmas at Casa Cupiello. It combines the beauty and the amazement of birth and the fatigue of living: “You leave the beautiful joy of the divine bosom, to come to penar on this hay”.
LILLO: “The Chordettes with the crib”
I don’t have a Christmas song. Is it because they are all superinflationary? I do not know. I also hate compilations that are so hot. However, I have a song that I connect (also) to this party: it is not Christmas, but at the same time it is. He is Mr. Sandman in the version of The Chordettes, a female vocal quartet with perfect vocal joints. Its author himself at one point changed it: he became Mr. Santa, Santa Claus. And again they sang it The Chordettes. I’ve always known her in the first version. I find it joyful, catchy. If I feel it, it immediately makes me happy. It was the loop soundtrack of when I was making the Nativity scene. A friend who knows about my passion gave me a cassette with all the covers he could find.
NOEMI: “With Mariah Carey a women’s party”
I have two favorite Christmas pieces. One is All I Want for Christmas is You: it was the first Christmas song Mariah Carey wrote and I really like that a woman write a Christmas song – and she’s a very good songwriter.
The second Christmas song for me is Last Christmas by Wham! because my mom always wore it and it reminds me so much when I was little: it makes me think back to Christmas night, the blue snow illuminated by the moon and us waiting for Santa Claus. We always went to Prati di Tivo in Abruzzo and stayed in a hotel called L’Orso bianco, I still remember it today. I think the spirit of Christmas for me is contained in that song.
KEKKO: In the air “Mom I missed the plane”
My Christmas song is Somewhere in My Memory, the soundtrack of the movie Mom I Missed the Plane. It’s not Christmas without that movie.
ROCCO HUNT: “Article 31 for those who are uncomfortable”
One of the most iconic songs that remind me of Christmas is It’s Christmas (but I’m not in it) of Article 31. In the midst of so many Christmas songs, this one manages to express the unease of those who do not live Christmas in a conventional way.
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