On August 22, the famous Italian singer and composer Toto Cutugno died in Milan at the age of 81.

Toto (Salvatore) Cutugno was born in 1943 in the Italian province of Tuscany. His father knew how to play the trumpet, so the future singer and composer began to study music from childhood, and at the age of 13 he won an accordion competition, beating rivals several years older.

In 1965, he organized the group Toto ei Tati, in which he acted as a drummer. His popularity as a composer and singer began to grow in the 70s of the XX century. It was at this time that the song “And if you did not exist” (Et si tu n’existais pas), which was performed by Joe Dassin, had to be written, and this composition glorified both of them throughout the world.

Cutugno was very popular in the CIS countries. His most famous songs are Lasciate Mi Cantare (another name is L'italiano), Serenata, Solo noi.

15 times he took part in the annual variety festival in San Remo, in 1990 he won the "Eurovision" Song Contest with the song Insieme: 1992

As a composer, Toto Cutugno worked with such cult pop stars of the XX century as Joe Dassin, Mireille Mathieu, Dalida, Adriano Celentano, Ricchi e Poveri. During his life, Toto Cutugno wrote more than three hundred songs and recorded two dozen albums.