Sound
May 25, 1946
Rome, Italy
Nicola Piovani
Sound
Biography
Nicola Piovani (born 26 May 1946) is an Italian light-classical musician, theater and film score composer. In 1998, he won the Academy Award for Best Original Dramatic Score for Roberto Benigni's film Life Is Beautiful (1997). After high school, Piovani enrolled at the Sapienza University of Rome, receiving his degree in piano from the Verdi Conservatory in Milan in 1967, and later studied orchestration under the Greek composer Manos Hadjidakis. In 1971 and 1973 collaborated for the music of two albums of the songwriter Fabrizio De André: Storia di un impiegato and Non al denaro non all'amore né al cielo. In 2008, after De André departure, Piovani wrote the music for the film Amore che vieni, amore che vai, inspired by a novel of De André himself, Un destino ridicolo. Among his more popular works is the score for the Federico Fellini film Intervista, his second of three collaborations with the famous director, the others being Ginger e Fred (Ginger and Fred in English) and La voce della luna (The Voice of the Moon). Years later, he composed a ballet titled Balletto Fellini. In 2000, his Academy Award-winning score for Life Is Beautiful (La Vita è bella) was further nominated for a Grammy Award in the "Best Instrumental Composition Written for a Motion Picture, Television or Other Visual Media" category, losing to Randy Newman. In 2005, he was a member of the jury at the 27th Moscow International Film Festival. In light of his recent work with French directors, notably Danièle Thompson, Philippe Lioret, and Éric-Emmanuel Schmitt, the French Minister of Culture gave him the title of Chevalier (Knight) of the Ordre des Arts et des Lettres on 21 May 2008 at the Cannes Film Festival. To date, Piovani has over 130 film scores to his credit, including films such as Slap the Monster on Page One (1972), The Perfume of the Lady in Black (1974), Flavia the Heretic (1974), Le Orme (1975), A Leap in the Dark (1980) The Night of the Shooting Stars (1982), and Kaos (1984). The music for the latter is considered by many as one of the best film scores ever done. However, he is reported to believe that "Too many film scores make a composer a hack, but in the theatre music is above all craftsmanship". Accordingly, he continues to work in musical theatre, and also composes concert and chamber music. Piovani also composed the first opera Amorosa presenza on a libretto by Aisha Cerami and Nicola Piovani, based on the novel by Vincenzo Cerami and is performed at the Teatro Verdi in Trieste in January 2022. In 2023, he was awarded the Lifetime Achievement Award from the World Soundtrack Academy. In 2024, Piovani composed the score for Loris Lai's debut feature film, How Kids Roll. Source: Article "Nicola Piovani" from Wikipedia in English, licensed under CC-BY-SA 3.0.
Feature Films (18)
Documentary about the film and theater career of the roman actor, Gigi Proietti, who passed away on 2 November 2020
Luigi Proietti detto Gigi
A director and his crew attempt to make the transition from the small to the big screen.
Boris: The Film
A portrait of Ennio Morricone, the most popular and prolific film composer of the 20th century, the one most loved by the international public, a two-time Oscar winner and the author of over five hundred unforgettable scores.
Ennio
Ferruccio Castronuovo was the only authorized eye, between 1976 and 1986, to film the brilliant Italian filmmaker Federico Fellini (1920-1993) in his personal and creative intimacy, to capture the gears of his great circus, his fantastic lies and his crazy inventions.
Fellinopolis
Television & Series (3)
Gigi Proietti's return to television with a show all his own that will see him perform his best bits, confront himself with unpublished repertoires linked to contemporaneity, duet with many friends and colleagues from the world of entertainment, television, cinema and music who in turn will perform their "warhorses"
Best Bits
Five masters of Italian art and culture give a masterclass inside Rome's MAXXI museum, telling their own story in their own words: the craft, the creative process, and the beginnings, encounters and setbacks behind the work.
