Giorgia - singer-songwriter

Sanremo victory first of multiple successes

Giorgia has become one of Italy's
most popular performers

The popular singer-songwriter Giorgia Todrani, who performs simply as ‘Giorgia’, was born on this day in 1971 in the Monteverde Vecchio neighbourhood of Rome.

Giorgia, whose vocal ability has seen her compared to the American superstar singer Whitney Houston, rocketed to fame after winning the prestigious Sanremo Music Festival in 1995, less than a year into her recording career.

She has since sold more than 25 million records worldwide. Of her 12 studio albums, five have reached No 1 in the Italian charts, as did a greatest hits compilation released in 2002.  Giorgia has also topped the Italian singles chart on five occasions.

Her 1995 Sanremo winner, Come saprei - How would I know? - which she co-wrote with three others, including the best-selling Italian male star, Eros Ramazzotti, was the first entry to win both the main competition and the critics’ award at the annual festival.

Thirty years later, in 2025, she was strongly tipped to win Sanremo again with La cura per me - The cure for me - from her No 1 album G. Ultimately, the song finished sixth, a result that sparked boos from the audience at the Teatro Ariston, the theatre in the Ligurian resort that has been home to the competition since 1977.

Giorgia was born into a musical household in that her father, Giulio Todrani, was half of the singing duo Juli & Julie, which enjoyed some success in the 1970s and ‘80s. Giulio is said to have chosen the name, Giorgia, for his daughter after a favourite Ray Charles song, Georgia on My Mind. 

After the Juli & Julie duo - in which he partnered with the female singer Angela Bini - went their separate ways in 1989, Giulio formed a soul and rhythm-and-blues group under the name Gli Io Vorrei La Pelle Nera. Giorgia is said to have performed on stage with the group.

Giorgia had some formal singing lessons from the lyric tenor, Luigi Rumbo, who was a member of the Sistine Chapel choir, but it was at Roman jazz clubs such as the Alexanderplatz in Prati, Big Mama in Trastevere and La Palma in Pigneto that she honed her vocal style.

Since winning Sanremo in 1995, Giorgia's
record sales have topped 25 million

The Sanremo Music Festival would play a significant part in her professional breakthrough in the early 1990s.

In 1993, she entered and won Sanremo Giovani, a section of the competition for young artists, with a song called Nasceremo, the prize for which included entry for the Newcomers section in 1994. The bonus for Giorgia was that the 1993 edition of Sanremo Giovani was the first to be televised.

Although her 1994 song, E poi - And Then - finished only seventh in the Newcomers section, it gained enough attention to become a hit single, reaching number two in the Italian chart, matched by the album from which it came, entitled simply Giorgia, which made No 2 in the album chart, selling 180,000 copies in Italy.

That success sparked an invitation to appear with the opera superstar Luciano Pavarotti on one of his famous Pavarotti & Friends charity concerts in Modena as part of a celebrity line-up that included Sting, Bryan Adams and the rising tenor Andrea Bocelli, who had won the Newcomers section at Sanremo in which she had finished seventh.

Giorgia and Bocelli then appeared together at a Christmas Eve concert at the Vatican in front of Pope Paul II, their performance creating enough interest for them to release a single together, Vivo per lei, in 1995.

Of course, it was winning the main Sanremo contest in 1995 that provoked the biggest surge in Giorgia’s popularity. Her second album, Come Thelma & Louise, which included Come saprei, sold eight million copies worldwide and remains her biggest-selling individual album. No less a star than Elton John described her voice as “one of the most beautiful in the world” and invited her to appear as a guest on his upcoming tour of Italy.

A particularly proud moment for her father, Giulio, came in 2000 when Ray Charles, the iconic American soul singer, invited Giorgia to sing Georgia on My Mind at one of his concerts, having heard the story of how she came to be named.

Over time, through collaborations with artists such as Pino Daniele and Herbie Hancock, Giorgia was able to broaden her repertoire away from the ballads of her early success to more up-tempo and experimental music, allowing her to explore the full range of her vocal skills and bring comparisons with some of the most versatile singers in jazz-pop history.

Away from performing, Giorgia has been in a relationship since 2004 with Emanuel Lo, a dancer and teacher on the TV talent show, Amici di Maria De Filippi. The two met during one of the singer's tours and have a son, Samuel, who was born in 2010. 

A previous relationship ended in tragedy when the singer Alex Baroni, her partner of four years, was killed in a motorcycle accident.

She still lives in the Monteverde district of Rome, not far from where she grew up. 

The Villa Pamphilj, with its surrounding park,
is one of the attractions of the Monteverde district

Travel tip:

Monteverde, the area of Rome where Giorgia was born and still lives, can be found to the southwest of the central part of the city, within the Municipio XII rione. It borders Trastevere to the north and sits across the Tiber from Testaccio. Divided into the older Montevecchio Vecchio, characterised by elegant early‑20th‑century villas, and the mainly post-war Monteverde Nuovo, the area is historically middle‑class and artistic, with a long association with musicians, actors and media professionals. Small theatres and music venues abound. Known as a green area, it is home to the Villa Pamphilj, Rome’s largest landscaped park, popular for jogging, walking and relaxing, as well as the smaller park around Villa Sciarra. To the north, the Gianicolo - Janiculum Hill - offers panoramic city views.  The film director Pier Paolo Pasolini often chose the neighbourhood for location shots. Though quieter than neighbouring Trastevere, its restaurants are popular in the evenings and an increasing number of visitors chose to stay in the area, picking it as a quiet escape from the crowds in central Rome, yet close enough to be a base for exploring.

Monteverde hotels from Hotels.com

The Teatro Ariston in Sanremo, which has been
home to the Sanremo Music Festival since 1977

Travel tip:

The resort of Sanremo in Liguria, which has figured prominently in Giorgia’s career, can be found 146km (91 miles) southwest of Genoa as the Italian Riviera extends towards France. Sanremo enjoyed particular prestige even before the music festival, first staged in 1951, put it on the cultural map. The town expanded rapidly in the mid-18th century, when the phenomenon of tourism began to take hold among the wealthy. Several grand hotels were established and the Emperor Nicholas II of Russia was among the European royals who took holidays there. The Swedish chemist Alfred Nobel, who bequeathed money in his will to establish the prizes that take his name, was so taken with the elegance of the town after his holiday visits that he made it his permanent home. Known as the City of Flowers, it is characterised by its Stile Liberty architecture (the Italian variant of Art Nouveau), of which the Casinò di Sanremo in Corso degli Inglesi is a beautiful example.  The Casino, in fact, was home to the music festival until 1977, when its closure for renovations obliged the organisers to find an alternative venue. They chose the Teatro Ariston, the town’s largest theatre in Via Matteotti, which is where it has remained.

Choose Expedia for accommodation in Sanremo

More reading:

How Mina became Italy’s all-time top-selling female music star

Laura Pausini, Sanremo winner and first Italian woman to land Grammy

The history of the Sanremo Music Festival

Also on this day:

1538: The birth of painter Gian Paolo Lomazzo

1575: The birth of Maria de’ Medici

1925: The birth of chocolatier Michele Ferrero

1977: The birth of astronaut Samantha Cristoforetti 

1993: The birth of rugby player Tommaso Allan

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25 April

Giacomo Boni - archaeologist and architect 

Venetian best known for his discoveries at the Forum in Rome

The archaeologist Giacomo Boni, who was director of excavations at the Forum in Rome for 27 years until his death in 1925, was born on this day in 1859 in Venice.  His work within the ancient Roman site led to significant discoveries such as the Iron Age necropolis, the Lapis Niger, the Regia, and other monuments.  Boni had a particular interest in stratigraphy, the branch of geology concerning subterranean layers of rock and other materials, and was among the first to apply the principles of stratigraphic excavation in the field of archaeological research.  The methods he employed in his work at the Forum still serve as a reference point today.  Boni was also an architect. In that area of his work, his masterpiece is considered to be the restoration of the Villa Blanc, a Roman house that represents a unique example of eclectic art, a harmonious blend of elements and styles of different ages and cultures.  Read more…

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La Festa della Liberazione

Date of radio broadcast chosen for annual celebration

Today is a public holiday in Italy as the whole country joins together to celebrate the anniversary of the end of the Fascist regime with la Festa della Liberazione.  Every year on this day, the end of the Nazi occupation of Italy is commemorated with parades and parties and many public buildings are closed.  La Festa della Liberazione (Liberation Day) marks the day when Allied troops were finally able to liberate Italy.  The date for the national holiday was chosen in 1946. It was decided to hold the Festa on 25 April, the date the news of the liberation was officially announced to the country on the radio.  The marches and events customarily held on the day provide an opportunity for Italians to remember their fallen soldiers, in particular the partisans of the Italian resistance who fought the Nazis, as well as Mussolini’s troops, throughout the second world war. Read more…

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Giovanni Caselli - inventor

Priest and physicist who created world’s first ‘fax' machine

Giovanni Caselli, a physics professor who invented the pantelegraph, the forerunner of the modern fax machine, was born on this day in 1815 in Siena.  Caselli developed a prototype pantelegraph, which was capable of transmitting handwriting and images over long distances via wire telegraph lines, in 1856, some 20 years ahead of the patenting of Alexander Graham Bell’s telephone in the United States. It entered commercial service in France in 1865.  The technology was patented in Europe and the United States in the 1860s, when it was also trialled in Great Britain and Russia, but ultimately it proved too unreliable to achieve universal acceptance and virtually disappeared from popular use until midway through the 20th century.  Caselli spent his early years in Florence studying physics, science, history and religion and was ordained as a priest in the Catholic Church when he was 21. Read more…

Leon Battista Alberti - Renaissance polymath

Architect with multiple artistic talents

The polymath Leon Battista Alberti, who was one of the 15th century’s most significant architects but possessed an intellect that was much more wide ranging, died on this day in 1472 in Rome.  In his 68 years, Alberti became well known for his work on palaces and churches in Florence, Rimini and Mantua in particular, but he also made major contributions to the study of mathematics, astronomy, language and cryptography, wrote poetry in Latin and works of philosophy and was ordained as a priest.  He was one of those multi-talented figures of his era, along with Leonardo da Vinci, Michelangelo and, a little later, Galileo Galilei, for whom the description Renaissance Man was coined.  Alberti was born in Genoa in 1404, although his family were wealthy Florentine bankers. It just happened that at the time of his birth his father, Lorenzo, was in exile, having been expelled by the powerful Albizzi family.  Read more…

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Ferruccio Ranza - World War One flying ace

Fighter pilot survived 57 aerial dogfights

Ferruccio Ranza, a World War One pilot who survived 465 combat sorties and scored 17 verified victories, died on this day in 1973 in Bologna, at the age of 80.  Ranza, who also saw service in the Second World War, when he rose to the rank of Brigadier General, was jointly the seventh most successful of Italy’s aviators in the 1914-18 conflict, and would be placed third if his eight unconfirmed victories had been proven.  In all, he engaged with enemy aeroplanes in 57 dogfights.  The most successful Italian flying ace from the First World War was Francesco Baracca, who chalked up 34 verified victories before he was killed in action in 1918.  Ranza served alongside Baracca in the 91st Fighter Squadron of the Italian air force, the so-called ‘squadron of aces’.  Ranza was born in Fiorenzuolo d’Arda, a medium-sized town in the province of Piacenza in what is now Emilia-Romagna, in 1892. Read more…

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Book of the Day: The Roman Forum, by David Watkin

There are few more historic and evocative places in the world than the Forum of Ancient Rome. Caesar was cremated there. Charles V and Mussolini rode by it in triumph. There Napoleon celebrated his festival of liberty. In this radical reappraisal David Watkin teaches us to see the Forum with new eyes in a book which is as stimulating to the armchair traveller as it is useful as a guide to the Forum itself.  The Roman Forum helps us rediscover the Forum's rich history during and since antiquity, and that of the remarkable buildings which later centuries have added to this evocative place. 

David John Watkin was a British architectural historian. An emeritus fellow of Peterhouse, Cambridge, and professor emeritus of history of architecture in the Department of History of Art at the University of Cambridge.

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24 April

Luigi Lavazza - coffee maker

From a grocery store in Turin to Italy's market leader

Luigi Lavazza, the Turin grocer who founded the Lavazza Coffee Company, was born on this day in 1859 in the small town of Murisengo in Piedmont.  He had lived as a peasant farmer in Murisengo but times were hard and after a couple of poor harvests he decided to abandon the countryside and head for the city, moving to Turin and finding work as a shop assistant.  The Lavazza brand began when Luigi had saved enough money to buy his own shop in Via San Tommaso, in the centre of Turin, in 1895.  He sold groceries and provisions and where other stores simply sold coffee beans, he had a workshop in the rear of the store where he experimented by grinding the beans and mixing them into different blends according to the tastes of his customers.  He travelled to Brazil to improve his knowledge of coffee and his blends became an important part of the business. Read more…

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Giuseppe Marc’Antonio Baretti – author

Dramatic life of the ‘scourge’ of writers

Literary critic, poet, writer, translator and linguist Giuseppe Baretti was born on this day in 1719 in Turin, the capital city of Piedmont.  His life was often marred by controversies and he eventually had to leave Italy for England, where the drama in his life continued and he was tried at the Old Bailey for murder in 1769.  Baretti’s father had intended him to enter the legal profession but when he was 16 he fled from Turin to Guastalla in Emilia-Romagna where he worked in the import and export business.  His main interest was studying literature and criticism but, after he became an expert in the field himself, his writing was so controversial that he eventually had to move abroad.  Baretti was the writer, editor and proprietor of the fearlessly sarcastic periodical La frusta letteraria, which means Literary Scourge, in which he castigated bad authors.  Read more…

Alessandro Costacurta - long-serving footballer

AC Milan defender played in Serie A until 41 years old

Former Italy and AC Milan defender Alessandro Costacurta was born on this day in 1966 in the town of Orago, near Varese.  Costacurta retired in May 2007, 25 days after his 41st birthday, having played more than 660 matches for AC Milan over the course of 21 seasons.  He is the oldest outfield player to appear in a Serie A match.  Milan lost his final game 3-2 at home to Udinese but Costacurta marked the occasion with a goal, from the penalty spot.  It was only his third goal in 458 Serie A appearances for the rossoneri, but made him Serie A's oldest goalscorer.  He could look back on a career laden with honours, including seven Serie A titles and five European Cups, two in its traditional knock-out format and three more after the inception of the Champions League.  He also won 59 caps for Italy and was a member of the team that finished runners-up in the 1994 World Cup. Read more…

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Giuseppe Panza - art collector

Businessman amassed more than 2,500 pieces

The art collector Giuseppe Panza di Biumo, whose fascination with postwar art, particularly American, led him to build up one of the world’s most important collections, died on this day in 2010 in Milan.  A businessman who succeeded his father in making money from wine and property, Panza acquired more than 2,500 pieces in his lifetime, many of which he sold or donated to museums and art galleries.  Some he parted with for millions of dollars, although he always insisted that his motivation was never financial gain but the love of art.  Approximately 10 per cent of his collection remains in the 18th-century Villa Menafoglio Litta, his family home at Varese, north of Milan, where he created 50,000 square feet (4,600 sq m) of exhibition space.  He had an astute eye for talent, often identifying unknown artists who would go on to become collectible. Read more…

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Book of the Day: Espresso: The Art and Soul of Italy,  by Wendy Pojmann

It is not an exaggeration that espresso is at the core of Italian culture and history. Millions of espresso drinkers around the world attempt to capture a special "made in Italy" feeling in their coffee cups each day. But few are aware of how Italy became the world's leading espresso country or why the Italian espresso bar is so difficult to replicate elsewhere. In Espresso: The Art and Soul of Italy, Wendy Pojmann explores the history of coffee and espresso in Italy, studying the transformation of Enlightenment-era coffee houses into 20th century espresso bars. Through analysis of the history of several famous and lesser-known coffee bars in Rome, Turin, and Naples, Pojmann invites readers to close their eyes and imagine the sights, sounds and, above all, the aroma of an Italian espresso bar.

Wendy Pojmann is Professor of History at Siena College in Albany, New York. She is the author of two monographs, Immigrant Women and Feminism in Italy (2005) and Italian Women and International Cold War Politics, 1944-1968 (2013). She holds dual citizenship in the United States and Italy and drinks an average of five espressos per day.

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23 April

Gaspara Stampa – poet

Beautiful sonnets were inspired by unrequited love

Gaspara Stampa, the greatest female poet of the Italian Renaissance, died on this day in 1554 in Venice at the age of 31.  She is regarded by many as the greatest Italian female poet of any age, despite having had such a brief life.  Gaspara was born in Padua and lived in the city until she was eight years old. Her father, Bartolomeo, had been a jewel and gold merchant, but after he died, Gaspara’s mother, Cecilia, took her three children to live in Venice. They were accommodated in the house of Geronimo Morosini, who was descended from a noble Venetian family, in the parish of Santi Gervasio and Protasio, now known as San Trovaso.  Along with her sister, Cassandra, and brother, Baldassare, Gaspara was educated in literature, music, history and painting. She excelled at singing and playing the lute and her home became a cultural hub.  Read more…

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Stefano Bontade - Mafia supremo

Well-connected Cosa Nostra boss had links to ex-premier Andreotti

Stefano Bontade, one of the most powerful and well connected figures in the Sicilian Mafia in the 1960s and 1970s, was born on this day in 1939 in Palermo, where he was murdered exactly 42 years later in a birthday execution that sparked a two-year war between the island’s rival clans.  Known as Il Falco – the Falcon – he was said to have close links with a number of important politicians in Sicily and with the former Italian prime minister Giulio Andreotti.  He was strongly suspected of being a key figure in the 1962 murder of Enrico Mattei, the president of Italy’s state-owned oil and gas conglomerate ENI, and in the bogus kidnapping of Michele Sindona, the disgraced banker who used the Vatican Bank to launder the proceeds of Cosa Nostra heroin trafficking.  Born into a Mafia family, Bontade controlled the Villagrazia area in the south-west of Palermo. Read more…

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Renata Viganò - writer and partisan

Resistance-inspired novel hailed as masterpiece

The writer and partisan Renata Viganò, whose 1949 novel L’Agnese va a morire - Agnes Goes to Die - was considered a masterpiece among literary works inspired by the heroics of the Italian Resistance movement in World War Two, died on this day in 1976 in her home city of Bologna.  L’Agnese va a morire, Viganò’s second novel, won the Viareggio Prize, a prestigious literary award, and was translated into 14 languages and subsequently turned into a film. Viganò, who had volumes of poetry published as a teenager and became a prolific contributor to the news and editorial pages of a number of newspapers, wrote L’Agnese va a morire from the viewpoint of a newspaper reporter, which placed it in the neorealist genre that became popular with film-makers in the postwar years. Born in Bologna in 1900, Viganò’s father, Eugenio, was a socialist but ran his own business. Read more…

Ruggero Leoncavallo – opera composer

Writer and musician created one of the most popular operas of all time

Ruggero Leoncavallo, the composer of the opera, Pagliacci, was born on this day in 1857 in Naples.  Pagliacci - which means 'clowns' - is one of the most popular operas ever written and is still regularly performed all over the world.  Leoncavallo also wrote the song, Mattinata, often performed by Enrico Caruso and still recorded by today’s tenors.  Leoncavallo was the son of a judge and moved with his father from Naples to live in the town of Montalto Uffugo in Calabria when he was a child.  He later returned to Naples to be educated and then studied literature at the University of Bologna under the poet Giosuè Carducci.  Leoncavallo initially worked as a piano teacher in Egypt but then moved to Paris where he found work as an accompanist for artists singing in cafes.  He then moved to Milan where he taught the piano and started to compose operas.  Read more…

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Milva - singer and actress

Popular star of five decades

The singer and actress known as Milva died on this day in 2021 in Milan at the age of 81.  Born Maria Ilva Biolcati in Goro, a fishing village on the Po delta, her popularity was such that she sold more than 80 million records. Her output was extraordinary, running to 126 singles and a staggering 173 albums in a career spanning more than half a century. No Italian artist has recorded so many albums.   For a time she bestrode the pop world, earning the nickname La Pantera di Goro  - The Panther of Goro - as recognition by the Italian media of her status as one of the three best-loved female performers of her generation, alongside Mina - dubbed the Tiger of Cremona - and Iva Zanicchi, who found herself labelled the Eagle of Ligonchio.  Yet Milva was equally at home with the musical theatre of Bertolt Brecht and the operatic works of Luciano Berio.  Read more…

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Gianandrea Noseda - conductor

Milanese musician has achieved worldwide acclaim

Gianandrea Noseda, who is recognised as one of the leading orchestra conductors of his generation, was born on this day in 1964 in Milan.  He holds the title of Cavaliere Ufficiale al Merito della Repubblica Italiana for his contribution to the artistic life of Italy.  Noseda studied piano and composition in Milan and began studying conducting at the age of 27.  He made his debut as a conductor in 1994 with the Orchestra Sinfonica di Milano Giuseppe Verdi. He won the Cadaques International Conducting Competition for young conductors in Spain the same year.  In 1997 he became principal guest conductor at the Mariinsky Theatre in St Petersburg and during his time there became fluent in Russian.  In 2002 he became principal conductor of the BBC Philharmonic and in this role led live performances in Manchester of Beethoven’s nine symphonies. Read more…

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Book of the Day: Gaspara Stampa, Selected Poems, Edited and Translated by Mary Prentice Lillie and Laura Anna Stortoni

Gaspara Stampa (1523-54) is considered the greatest female poet of the Italian Renaissance, and she is regarded by many as the greatest Italian female poet of any age. A highly skilled musician, Stampa produced some of the most musical poetry in the Italian language. Her sonnets of unrequited love speak in a language of honest passion and profound loss. They look forward to the women writers of the 19th century and are a milestone in women's literature. Gaspara Stampa: Selected Poems is a dual-language edition which presents, along with the Italian original, the first English translation of Stampa's work. It includes an introduction to the poet and her work, a note on the translation, and provides the reader with notes to the poems, a bibliography, and a first-line index. 

Laura Anna Stortoni and Mary Prentice Lillie have collaborated on a number of books, with a particular focus on poets of the Italian Renaissance. 

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