Peppino di Capri

Giuseppe Faiella was born on Capri on 27 July 1939 into a family of musicians. His father Bernardo owned a record and musical instrument shop on the island and played in an orchestra in his free time, while his grandfather was a member of the island's band. As a child he taught himself the piano by ear, reproducing the rhythms of the American music he heard. According to an account that has never been confirmed, by the age of four he was performing with his older sister Margherita for the American soldiers stationed on Capri during the Second World War. ANSA described the scene as a four year old enchanting American soldiers at the piano near the Piazzetta.

In 1953 he began performing with his friend Ettore Falconieri in the nightclubs of Capri and nearby Ischia as the Duo Caprese. At fifteen he made his debut as a singer, standing in for a performer who had withdrawn because of a family bereavement. On 26 August 1956 the Duo Caprese won an episode of the RAI talent show Primo applauso, presented by Enzo Tortora.

At six he began studying classical piano with a German teacher. Capri mayor Paolo Falco said after his death that his own paternal grandmother, Elisabeth Rüdorf, had been Peppino's piano teacher. The teacher reportedly stopped the lessons once she learned the teenager was playing in nightclubs. He attended school on Capri up to the ginnasio. In a 2018 interview with la Repubblica he recalled that in the evenings he toured the island's nightclubs to sing, in the afternoons he took lessons from his German teacher and in the mornings he went to school "like a ghost", weighing 55 kilos.

In 1958 he formed a band with Ettore Falconieri (drums), Mario Cenci (guitar), Pino Amenta (bass) and Gabriele Varano (saxophone). Discovered at Ugo Calise's club 'O rangio fellone on Ischia by Carisch executive Mario Robbiani, the group was renamed Peppino di Capri e i suoi Rockers. Their first records, including the Neapolitan songs "Nun è peccato" and "Malatia", were immediate hits.

In 1960 "Nessuno al mondo", an Italian version of "No Arms Can Ever Hold You", reached number one in Italy, and his modern arrangements of "Luna caprese" and "I' te vurria vasà" became staples. In December 1961 he released the Italian version of "Let's Twist Again", his best selling record, which ANSA reports topped the charts for 32 weeks. In 1962 came "St. Tropez Twist", co-written with Mario Cenci, whose single sleeve featured a young Raffaella Carrà; his "Speedy Gonzales" reached number one early the next year. In 1963 he won Group A of the Cantagiro with "Non ti credo" and released "Roberta", co-written with Luis Bacalov, Luigi Naddeo and Paolo Lepore. On 24 June 1965 he and the Rockers opened for the Beatles at the Velodromo Vigorelli in Milan and joined the later Genoa and Rome dates. His 1966 "Operazione sole" is cited as one of the first Italian songs influenced by ska.

He made his Sanremo debut in 1967 with "Dedicato all'amore", paired with Dionne Warwick. After the original Rockers broke up he formed the New Rockers as his backing band and turned back to Neapolitan song with Mimmo di Francia's "Tu" (1969). In 1970 he won the last edition of the Festival di Napoli with "Me chiamme ammore" and founded the Splash label. He won Sanremo in 1973 with "Un grande amore e niente più" (lyrics by Franco Califano) and released "Champagne" the same year, then won again in 1976 with "Non lo faccio più".

Later highlights included "E mo' e mo'" (1985), "Il sognatore" (1987, written with Toto Cutugno and Depsa), a live album recorded at the Royal Albert Hall on 4 January 1987, and Italy's 1991 Eurovision entry "Comme è ddoce 'o mare", seventh with 89 points. He sang as Trio Melody with Gigi Proietti and Stefano Palatresi at Sanremo 1995, toured with Fred Bongusto in 1996, released Fase 3 in 2001 with Franco Del Prete and James Senese, and made his fifteenth and last Sanremo appearance in 2005 with "La panchina". He wrote the soundtrack for the Rai series Capri (2006) with his son Edoardo, recorded "Fiumi di champagne" with Guè for the film Natale col boss (2015), released his last studio album Mister... Peppino Di Capri in 2019, and in 2024 guested on "Ischia" by Fitness Forever, his final recording. His discography runs to more than 35 albums, and his son Edoardo said he recorded more than 500 songs.

In 1959 he met Roberta Stoppa, an 18 year old from Turin, at a club on Ischia; they lived together and married in 1961, and his hit "Roberta" was dedicated to her. During a crisis in the marriage in the late 1960s he began a relationship with Giuliana Gagliardi, a Neapolitan biology student. During a brief reconciliation with Roberta, his first son Igor was born in 1970. After his divorce he married Giuliana Gagliardi in 1978 and they had two sons, Edoardo (born 1980) and Dario, an actor. Giuliana died on 4 July 2019 aged 68. Roberta Stoppa attended his funeral in 2026. He lived on Capri all his life, at the family villa in Castiglione, where ANSA said he loved to welcome friends.

He spoke often of his bond with Capri and of island life. In a 2018 interview with la Repubblica he said that between islanders and the rest of the world there is always an element of the ungovernable, the irreducibility of the sea, and that nobody on an island is ever truly master of his own time, though the positives outweigh the negatives. He also warned about overtourism, asking how a place of fifteen thousand residents could welcome another fifteen thousand people a day, and argued that arrivals should be regulated.

Critics credit him with making Neapolitan song young and modern by setting it to rock and roll and twist rhythms, and with spreading the new American sounds in Italy at the end of the 1950s. He was sometimes called "the Italian Buddy Holly". ANSA called him an extraordinary innovator of Italian song before he became an elegant chansonnier, noting that the 1960s in Italian collective memory would not be the same without his songs, including "St. Tropez Twist" in Dino Risi's film Il sorpasso. Novelist Orhan Pamuk referenced "Roberta" in Snow and "Melancolie" in The Museum of Innocence. After his death, Tourism Minister Gian Marco Mazzi said the campaign for UNESCO recognition of Neapolitan song as world heritage would be dedicated to him, and Naples mayor Gaetano Manfredi promised the city would find a fitting way to honour his memory.

Winner of the Sanremo Music Festival in 1973 ("Un grande amore e niente più") and 1976 ("Non lo faccio più"), with 15 participations in total. Winner of the Festival di Napoli in 1970 ("Me chiamme ammore"). Winner of Group A at the 1963 Cantagiro ("Non ti credo"). Seventh place for Italy at the Eurovision Song Contest 1991. Commendatore of the Order of Merit of the Italian Republic, conferred by President Carlo Azeglio Ciampi on 26 May 2005. Città di Sanremo career award, presented at the Teatro Ariston in February 2023. Keys to the city of Capri, 24 March 2025. ANSA also reports he was honoured by the Grammy Museum and celebrated 60 years of career at Naples' Teatro San Carlo in 2018.

He appeared as himself in many 1960s musicarelli, including Io bacio... tu baci (1961), Maurizio, Peppino e le indossatrici (1961) and Twist, lolite e vitelloni (1962), and in Pasolini's Comizi d'amore (1965). Later screen appearances included A spasso nel tempo (1996), Terra bruciata (1999), the soap Un posto al sole (1997) and Natale col boss (2015). In 2019 Rai 1 devoted a Techetechete' special to his 80th birthday. On 24 March 2025 Rai 1 broadcast the biographical TV film Champagne, Peppino di Capri, directed by Cinzia TH Torrini, which ANSA said drew very high ratings. Books about him include Geo Nocchetti's Peppino di Capri: il sognatore (2004) and Gianmarco Cilento's Peppino di Capri e i suoi Rockers (2018).

Peppino di Capri died on the morning of 11 July 2026 at his family villa in Castiglione on Capri, after a long illness, aged 86 and sixteen days short of his 87th birthday. No specific cause was made public. He had made his last public appearance on 3 August 2025 at an evening in his honour at the Certosa di San Giacomo on Capri, singing "Champagne" by surprise.

Mayor Paolo Falco proclaimed civic mourning. On 12 July a chapel of rest was opened in the council chamber of Capri town hall, where his coffin was greeted with long applause. The funeral was held that afternoon in the former cathedral of Santo Stefano near the Piazzetta, with mourners including Diego Della Valle, Luca Cordero di Montezemolo, Eugenio Bennato, Pietra Montecorvino, Aurelio De Laurentiis and his former wife Roberta Stoppa. The bars of the Piazzetta closed during the service, and his coffin left the church to "Il sognatore", whose refrain appeared on the funeral notices. He was buried in the family tomb in Capri cemetery. Tributes came from Gianni Morandi, Massimo Ranieri, Caterina Caselli, Orietta Berti, Renato Zero, Carlo Conti, Culture Minister Alessandro Giuli and Campania governor Roberto Fico.