Deaths on January 11

Fabrizio De André, Italian singer-songwriter and guitarist (b. 1940)

Fabrizio Cristiano De André (Italian pronunciation: [faˈbrittsjo de anˈdre]; 18 February 1940 – 11 January 1999) was an Italian singer-songwriter.

Considered one of the most important, influential and innovative Italian songwriters, he is also known by the nickname of Faber, given to him by his friend Paolo Villaggio, which, in addition of being Genoese slang for "Fabrizio", is a reference to his predilection for pencils and pastels by Faber-Castell.

In almost forty years of artistic activity, De André recorded fourteen studio albums, plus some songs released only as singles and then reissued in anthologies. Many lyrics to his songs tell stories of marginalized people such as rebels, anarchists and prostitutes, and are considered by some critics to be as high-ranking as real poems, to the point that they have been included in various literature anthology schoolbooks since the early seventies.

Fabrizio De André is therefore also considered one of the greatest Italian poets of the twentieth century as well as a reference figure in the Italian music scene, sometimes referred to as "the singer-songwriter of the marginalized" or the "poet of the defeated". He has sold 65 million records in his career, earning for himself a place amongst the most successful Italian artists. The Italian edition of Rolling Stone magazine included his album Crêuza de mä in fourth place in its list of the best Italian albums. Together with Bruno Lauzi, Gino Paoli, Umberto Bindi and Luigi Tenco. he is one of the exponents of the so-called Genoese School, a group of artists who profoundly renewed Italian pop music. He is the artist who won the most awards from the Tenco Club, with six Plaques and a Tenco Award. In 1997 he was awarded the Lunezia Prize for the musical-literary value of his song "Smisurata preghiera" ["Limitless prayer"]. The popularity and high artistic level of his output led some institutions, after his death, to dedicate streets, squares, parks, theaters, libraries and schools to him. Devoted to anarchist and pacifist ideals, he was also one of the artists who most recognized the value of Ligurian language. He also dealt with other languages to a lesser and different extent, such as Gallurese and Neapolitan. During his career, he has collaborated with cultural personalities and important artists from the Italian musical and cultural scene, including Gian Piero Reverberi, Nicola Piovani, Premiata Forneria Marconi, Ivano Fossati, Mauro Pagani, Massimo Bubola, Álvaro Mutis, Fernanda Pivano and Francesco De Gregori.