A Neapolitan song as UNESCO heritage? Some in the city say: ‘Aìzame ’a mesata’
The government is putting forward traditional songs as a candidate for inclusion on the Intangible Cultural Heritage list. But in Naples, there is still no associated industry linked to the genre
In Naples, few things are taken as seriously as football. By a strange twist of fate, just a few days before the start of the 2026 World Cup, the third consecutive tournament without the Azzurri on the pitch, the Italian government has decided to launch the nominationof classical Neapolitan song as UNESCO Intangible Cultural Heritage, at an event featuring Milly Carlucci, Placido Domingo and Patti Smith (sic), emphatically titled ‘World Champions. Italia loves UNESCO’.
The Minister for Tourism Gianmarco Mazzi explained it as follows: ‘Someone asked me whether this name is provocative or ironic because of our exclusion from the World Cup. I reply that it is neither: we want to assert that Italia is world champion’ in other fields, as well as ‘in other sports’. Meanwhile, irony of ironies, the event is being held in Verona, a city that doesn’t exactly have the warmest of feelings towards Naples and the Neapolitans.
We can already picture the talking point in the bars of the Rione Sanità district. Won’t Gigio Donnarumma (born in Castellammare di Stabia) be crossing gloves with the likes of Vinicius, Lautaro and Dembélé? Ma, who gives a shit! We have 61 UNESCO World Heritage Sites and a further 20 intangible cultural heritage sites recognised by UNESCO, the latest of which is Italian cuisine. What use are the four stars on the Azzurri shirt to you? Now let’s nominate Neapolitan song as well; if recognised, it will join the art of the Neapolitan pizzaiolo (recognised in 2017) and the search for and harvesting of truffles (2021)...
Irony aside, let’s stick to Neapolitan song. It is absolutely right to celebrate it, but it would be even better to study it. Starting from the very beginning: when Guglielmo Cottrau, scion of a French family who had moved to Naples in the wake of Joseph Bonaparte, published Passatempi musicali (1824), a collection of little songs heard in real life and rearranged ‘with piano accompaniment’. Reading (the two essential volumes of Storia della canzone napoletana by Pasquale Scialò, for example, published by Neri Pozza) reveals interesting insights into the birth of this ‘folk song written by a composer’, a genre that cuts across social classes, much like the Neapolitan language itself, which has managed to be both literary (Lu cunto de li cunti) and working-class.
You’ll come across masterpieces such as Fenesta ca lucive (1842), set to music by Vincenzo Bellini, and ’A vucchella (1892), with lyrics by Gabriele D’Annunzio. Discover the success of Enrico Caruso, the world’s first recording star, and fall in love with the duality between the man of the salons (Roberto Murolo) and the man of the people (Sergio Bruni). Neapolitan song has spanned the centuries, influencing and being influenced: it has become swing (Renato Carosone) and blues (Pino Daniele), it has been dub (Almamegretta) and today it is urban (Geolier and Luchè) yet also looks back to tradition (Sal Da Vinci, winner of the latest Sanremo Festival). It has survived the demise of the Neapolitan Song Festival, originally older and more prestigious than Sanremo, yet left to its fate amid general indifference. In short: the Neapolitan song is a living thing.
