Pino D'Angiò: An Unexpected Journey from Medicine to Music Stardom

He became famous with a song about conquest strategies that goes like this: "What an idea, can't you see she's not interested?". He is Pino D'Angiò. He says he never thought he'd become a singer, yet he succeeded, becoming very famous and still riding the wave, going around nightclubs making people dance with a Seventies sound. "To be a singer, you don't need anything, just a 20 euro microphone and an amplifier. A singer is someone who sings, that's it, anyone can do it. But regardless, I never thought I'd do this in life," said D'Angiò, born Giuseppe Chierchia, 71 years old from Pompeii, in an interview with "La Ragione". Mahmood: "Tuta Gold is the result of many episodes that occurred during my adolescence..." Pino D'Angiò, how his career began D'Angiò's career, which has sold millions of records in Italy and abroad, began by chance when, just over twenty years old and a medical student, he wrote irreverent songs to play for his friends. Then came producer Ezio Leoni who, after hearing him in a Florence club, decided to launch him. "For me, it was always a game. At 26, I won my first Gold Record, I hung it at home and my father told me 'Yes, nice, but when will you get a real job?'. That phrase has always been in my head, until today," recalls D'Angiò. In the meantime, the Gold Records have multiplied, his hits are still very much listened to, even among the younger ones. The success of "Ma quale idea" in 1981 and this year refreshed with Bnkr44 On social media, his "Ma quale idea", which he brought to the stage of Sanremo 2024 in a strongly revised version together with Bnkr44, is very popular: "It was a fun experience. I got along well with them right away, we are similar in character. Singing at Sanremo a song written forty years ago is something I would have never expected. I can't explain why I am still so successful today: it just happens, without too much talk." In 1981, with a braggart's air and always with a cigarette lit, he sang about a "straightforward" dance floor move in the immortal "Ma quale idea", contained in the still very much sold album 'Balla!': "That song was born as a game, just like all those written at the time. I was a university student who enjoyed playing for friends," he remembers. Arrigo Vecchioni, who was Roberto Vecchioni's son who died at 36 after a severe illness: "It was the collapse of the world. I still feel it inside." Song "Ma quale idea", what it's about In reality, behind that cocky guy who approaches a girl "with a serpent's gaze" hides something else: "It's the story of a loser, someone who goes to the disco and thinks he's going to do who knows what and then ends up doing nothing. But all my songs are about losers. Maybe today's kids get attached to such a character, affectionately pathetic." That song owes him his international success, but Pino D'Angiò is also something else: a radio host, a short story writer, a poet. Also a missed actor: Zeffirelli did a screen test for a film that was never shot. Pino D'Angiò, the illnesses Then came the illness that changed everything: first throat cancer, then lung cancer. One operation after another, the breath that is missing: "Fortunately, I had so much to do in recent years that I didn't have much time to think about it. If it hadn't been like that, I would have stayed at home staring at the wall and maybe depression would have surrounded me." At 71, Pino D'Angiò smiles: "So far in Italy, I was considered a niche product, now I'm famous. This amuses me." And he looks to the future: "Some young singers have proposed a collaboration, let's see what will happen...".