The death of Paolo Pietrangeli: from his ‘Contessa’ anthem of ’68 to the G8

The aristocratic world on the one hand, the student and workers’ struggles on the other: all summarized and synthesized in a title, ‘Contessa’, which is also a political anthem of an era, the Sixty-eight, characterized by strong ideological and social contrasts. even moral; all condensed into a piece that is the artistic manifesto of Paolo Pietrangeli, singer-songwriter and television director, who passed away today at the age of 76. The text of ‘Contessa’ – if reread and revisited with today’s eyes and ears – could perhaps even sound ‘subversive’, an incitement if not to violence at least to rebellion. “Comrades from the fields and the workshops, take the sickle, bring the hammer, go down to the square, hit with that, bury the system.” And again: “You good people, what peace are you looking for, peace to do what you want: but if this is the price we want war, we want to see you go underground; but if this is the price we paid for it: no more the world must be exploited! “. Both ‘Contessa’ and ‘Valle Giulia’ are from 1968: the first focused on workers’ struggles, the second on student protests, both symbols of 1968. It is difficult to separate the artist Pietrangeli from the political one. Since his birth, one could say, given that it took place in Rome on April 29, 1945, just four days after the liberation of Italy from the Nazi-fascists. He was the son of director Antonio Pietrangeli and at the age of twenty he joined the Nuovo Canzoniere Italiano for which he composed songs with a strong political and social commitment. ‘and’ Friends of Maria De Filippi ‘for Fininvest. And if Silvio Berlusconi enters politics in 1994 by founding Forza Italia and placing it at the center-right of the parliamentary camp, Paolo Pietrangeli is a candidate in 1996 for Communist Refoundation, without being elected, to then join Sel, the Sinistra Ecologia Libertà movement of Nichi Vendola and finally to the Power to the People party. The latest documentary is dedicated to the days and violence during the G8 in Genoa: he wanted to ‘have his say’, from ’68 to the ‘G8 … (by Enzo Bonaiuto)