Who was the first Italian to top the US charts?
In the world of culture, the country of Italy does a lot of heavy lifting.
It’s the birthplace of so many foundational art forms, from the entire Renaissance movement to ballet, or even improv. It leads in the world of opera, but when it comes to contemporary music, Italy’s impact took a little while to break through.
In recent years, the Italian music scene has seen a boost. The moment Måneskin boomed onto the Eurovision stage, the world sat up and paid attention. Often seen as the realm of the camp or the cringe, Måneskin made the competition cool again with their rebellious and classically rock and roll attitude, leading to them having a career far beyond the contest; however, historically, Italy has had a tough time breaking into the big time of global mainstream music, in the same way that a lot of music from countries outside of the UK and US does.
At the Oscars, Korean director Bong Joon-ho said, “Once you overcome the one-inch tall barrier of subtitles, you will be introduced to so many more amazing films”, and the same goes for music as English and American audiences still have a tough time embracing songs in a language other than their own, consistently holding back amazing artists from those big, mainstream chart topper spots.
There are some clear exceptions, though, as recently Bad Bunny topped the Billboard 100 with ‘DTMF’ as the Spanish-language song gained new popularity after his Super Bowl halftime performance, and in 2017, the dual-language ‘Despacito’ was the song of the summer, while throughout history, various Eurobanger hits have broken through. However, as for songs in Italian, the first Billboard 100 number one for the language didn’t come until August 1958, but the man behind it is such a broad, overachieving star that it seemed bound to happen.
So, what was the first Italian number one?
Domenico Modugno earned the first Italian number one on the Billboard chart in 1958 with his track, ‘Volare (Nel blu, dipinto di blu)’, but the achievements didn’t just stop there, as he also represented Italy in Eurovision with the song, coming in third place but helping to establish the competition as a hit-maker for Italian stars.
The accolades also poured in at the first-ever Grammy Awards, where the song won both ‘Record of the Year’ and ‘Song of the Year’, with the track selling well over 18 million copies worldwide, but overwhelmingly, you might know it because the melody became the basis for a whole bunch of football chants.
Even beyond the song, though, the achievements of Modugno kept on coming; in his career, he was also a successful actor, starring in 38 films, and then even taking up a seat in the Italian parliament, where he specifically fought for the rights of disabled people and artists.
In music, thanks to the success of his chart-topping track that spent five weeks at number one, Modugno also held the title as one of the fathers of Italian pop, gaining the nickname, ‘Mr Volare’, or ‘Mr Fly’.
