Peppino Di Capri

Peppino di Capri (born Giuseppe Faiella in Naples, Italy on July 27, 1939) is an Italian popular music singer, songwriter and pianist. Peppino began singing and playing the piano at age 4, entertaining the American army troops stationed on the island of Capri with a repertoire of American standards. After 6 years of classical studies and playing at nightclubs around Capri, Peppino and his group The Rockers released their first single, with the songs Malatia (Illness) and Nun ? Peccato (It's not a sin), sung in Napoletano in 1958.

Peppino began singing and playing the piano at age 4, entertaining the American army troops stationed on the island of Capri with a repertoire of American standards. After 6 years of classical studies and playing at nightclubs around Capri, Peppino and his group The Rockers released their first single, with the songs Malatia (Illness) and Nun ? Peccato (It's not a sin), sung in Napoletano in 1958. The single was an instant hit, and Peppino spent most of the following year touring. A string of hit singles soon followed, usually alternating between Italian versions of American rock'n'roll and twist songs (with some verses sung in English), and originals in Italian and Napoletano, and Peppino became one of the top acts in the country.

After performing as the opening act for The Beatles in their 1965 tour of Italy, Peppino and his group attempted, with moderate success, to break out of the Italian market. Their work was very well-received particularly in Brazil, thanks to the large Italian immigrant community in the country.

The 70s saw Peppino veer toward a more adult contemporary style of music, with a new band, the New Rockers. He won the prestigious Festival della canzone italiana (Festival of the Italian song) in 1973, with the song Un grande amore e niente pi? (A great love and nothing more). The same year, he released the song that would accompany him through the rest of his career: Champagne was a big hit in Italy, Germany, Spain and Brazil. He won the Festival della canzone italiana again in 1976, with the song Non lo faccio pi? (I won't do it anymore). In 1991, he represented Italy at the Eurovision song contest, coming in 7th place with the song Comme ? Ddoce 'O Mare (How sweet is the sea), sung in Napoletano.

As of 2006, Peppino di Capri is the performer with the most appearances at the Festival della canzone italiana, his last appearance being in 2005, singing La Panchina (The little park bench).


Eurovision Song Contest 1991 - Rome
Entry for Italy

Performer: Peppino di Capri
Song title: Comme E' Ddoce 'o Mare
Song writer(s): Giampiero Artegiani
Song composer(s): Marcello Marocchi

Sang in Position: 22
Final Position: 7
Total Points: 89

The 1991 Eurovision Song Contest was supposed to be held in the seaside resort San Remo which is known for its annual festival of Italian music, but host broadcaster RAI moved it to Rome at a very late stage. The moving of the show meant that RAI was not completely ready for the show and on the day of the contest, there were still works on the set to be done.

For the second time since the very first Eurovision Song Contest in 1956, the Netherlands decided to withdraw from the contest due to the country's Rememberance Day. Malta took the open spot which meant that the country was back for the first time since 1975. The winner of the previous year and the co-host of this year, Toto Cutugno, had big difficulties with the pronunciation of the song titles and names of the artists and conductors. The other host was Gigliola Cinquetti, Italy's first Eurovision winner from 1964.

The postcards to present the different national singers were very special this year: the singers were asked to sing a known Italian song which would then be used as a short clip for the postcard. Yugoslavia's entry Brazil by Baby Doll only managed to get one single point from Malta but the extravagant performance created a cult following among Eurovision Song Contest fans.

At the end of the voting procedure, both Sweden and France had 146 points each. Because of that the the newly-created rule of 1989 was put in effect giving the victory to Swedish entrant Carola who got more '10 points votes' than France. Both Sweden and France had an equal amount of '12 point votes.' Carola had already participated in 1983 with the song Fr?mling which ended up 3rd in Munich. She had already tried to enter the 1990 contest in Zagreb but lost out in the Swedish national heats. In 2006 though, she would re-appear on the Eurovision stage in Athens, performing Invincible which came 5th.