Music for Life

MUSIC FOR LIFE The Salani Brothers This book is based on the adventures of two brothers, Renato and Giulio Salani, who reaped lots of success in life thanks to their love for music, their persistence, courage, hard work and their faith in God. The main sources used to write this book are: Renato Salani's Diary, the numerous interviews with the leading characters of the book itself and the research carried out by the author, Barbara Salani, over the course of four years. Renato Salani began writing his Diary in 1944, when he arrived as a prisoner at the Fossoli concentration camp, a few miles from Carpi (Modena, Italy). Renato's Diary was written in verses using a typewriter on toilet paper of the concentration camp. Renato and Giulio's life, however, intertwines not only with the dark years of the war, but also with the enthusiasm and optimism of post-war in the early fifties, when Italian songs became the soundtrack of a nation protracted toward emancipation, progress, and well-being. In 1953, Renato Salani wrote a song for the Sanremo Festival, a prestigious international showcase for the new Italy: Italy was stepping out of the shadow of the war and the liberation struggle. This was also the time of the collaboration of Giulio with Bill Coleman's band, an exponent of the jazz music that opened new horizons of freedom and creativity to the young Italian musicians. Later, the Salani brothers joined the Fred Buscaglione's Asternovas Orchestra (one of the most popular icons of Italy at the time) and with this group, they travelled performing in a series of tours in various cities of Italy and Europe. The later chapters of the book relate the years when the Salani brothers founded and worked in their Venezuelan Nightclub Hipocampo, which soon became a landmark of Caracas nightlife. They were the ambassadors not only of Italian musical talent but also of entrepreneurial ability and integration of the cultural texture of other countries.A great leading theme of the book is MUSIC. In this biography, music is really the red thread that links all the episodes together. Music itself is depicted in all its possible meanings: music as passion and choice of life, as a craft, as fun, but also as an extreme resource to overcome the most difficult ordeals in order to preserve the desire to live and fight in the darkest moments of life: through war, deportation and illness. This book is attached to a website where you can enjoy photos, music tracks and some videos of the musical career of the brothers Renato and Giulio Salani. I invite you to read and discover the adventures and commitment of two very special men who have spent ... their Life for Music and enjoyed Music for Life.