The Museo di Roma in Trastevere dedicates a major exhibition to pianist and composer Armando Trovajoli

From March 11 to May 14, 2023, the Museo di Roma in Trastevere presents the major exhibition Armando Trovajoli. A Legend in Music dedicated to the great pianist, composer and conductor, on the occasion of the 10th anniversary of his death. Promoted and produced by Roma Capitale, the exhibition is organized and produced by C.O.R. Creare Organizzare Realizzare, and is curated by Mariapaola Trovajoli, Alessandro Nicosia and Federica Nicosia. Official collaborator Rai Teche, technical sponsor European Broker, organizational support of Zètema Progetto Cultura. Gangemi publisher catalog.

An eclectic and versatile musician, Trovajoli recounted almost eighty years of life and customs in music; his melodies were the soundtrack of the postwar generation. Inventor of a new musical method, he treated sound material in his compositions with simplicity and authenticity. Author of unforgettable pieces, his scores, with their immediate and universal language, permeate history, milestones that contributed to the rebirth of Italian musical comedy, reinventing its sound.

He was an academician of Santa Cecilia and Knight of the Grand Cross of the Order of Merit of the Italian Republic, a lover of piano and jazz, he went from musical comedy to cinema, radio, and TV.
A milestone in his long career was his conducting on behalf of RAI in the early 1950s of the first permanent light music orchestra. He was recognized as one of the most relevant personalities in international music, so much so that he represented Italy in 1949 at the International Jazz Festival, in Paris, performing in the famous Salle Pleyel. At that time, and subsequently, he played with the world’s most prestigious jazz musicians, such as Duke Ellington, Miles Davis, Chet Baker, Stéphane Grappelli, and Django Reinhardt.

He wrote memorable comedies, most notably Rugantino, a play by Garinei and Giovannini that premiered at Rome’s Teatro Sistina in 1962. With a strong connotation of Roman-ness, everyone wants to act in this story-which transports one to nineteenth-century papal Rome-and between tradition and modernity still makes one think and enchants with its setting, costumes and music. He is the author of one of the most beautiful songs dedicated to the eternal city, Roma nun fa la stupida stasera.

His relationship with cinema was rich in collaborations, and his film production has few equals on the Italian scene. In fact, he signed more than three hundred soundtracks and collaborated with the greatest directors of Italian cinema, such as Vittorio De Sica, Mario Monicelli, Luigi Magni, Dino Risi, Antonio Pietrangeli, Marco Vicario, Alberto Lattuada and Ettore Scola, whose entire filmography he set to music practically.

He was the author of film scores, including Riso amaro, La Ciociara, Ieri, oggi domani, Una giornata particolare.

A career studded with awards including Nastri d’Argento and David di Donatello. A true artist and a great auteur who, playing with words, explained his philosophy in his relationship with music for cinema in this way: “There are two types of backgrounds, the computer-made one that is of an unbearable squalor and there is the artfully made musical commentary, which requires expertise but which, above all, must know how to find the balance between the importance of the sonority of the music and the word.” “Silence is also valid, but where there has to be an underlining, a feeling, a pathos.... something that makes the viewer vibrate you have to do it with the orchestra...,” Trovajoli asserted.

Singer of Rome, protagonist of a lifelong love affair with his city, eternal and everlasting without emphasis, romantically boundless. He honored Rome with his art and supported numerous initiatives for the city throughout his career. On May 30, 2013, three months after his death on March 1, 2013, Roma Capitale paid tribute to him by naming the Armando Trovajoli Bridge of Music after him.

In the exhibition at the Museo di Roma in Trastevere, it will be possible to retrace, through a rich collection of documents, photos, videos, music, and personal objects, such as his unmistakable glasses, the itinerary of an exceptional life and career that touches the collective memory. Also on display are the script and score he was working on in his last days: he dreamed of making a stage version of Tosca. The idea for the exhibition came from Mariapaola Trovajoli with the aim of recovering a space where to stimulate public interest and relive memories and emotions, with music and beyond. Behind a long search for materials, displayed for the first time, her immense artistic legacy and life is documented.

The exhibition is divided into nine sections: The Beginnings, Jazz, The Piano, Radio, Cinema, Musical Comedies, Television, Passions, The Maestro and Rome.

The exhibition will also be enriched by a catalog published by Gangemi Editore that contains history, images and also a long list of testimonials, from Sophia Loren, Pippo Baudo, Renato Zero, Sabrina Ferilli, Valerio Mastandrea and many more.

Photos by Massimo Sestini.

The Museo di Roma in Trastevere dedicates a major exhibition to pianist and composer Armando Trovajoli

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