"Zecchino d'oro" (Golden Sequin) is a children's songs festival broadcasted in Italy for a long time. Although having been criticized for putting children into a competition, it was always stressed that the one awarded are the authors of the songs, and not the children themselves. Anyway, I think that these songs could help learners of Italian language, because, having been addressed to children they are easy to understand and, moreover, they are quite catchy.
The songs are about various topics: some of my favourite ones are about cats - give a listen to "Volevo un gatto nero" (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z_aVNv_gNdM), "Quarantaquattro gatti" (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2jDOj0Xhcc8) and "Il gatto puzzolone" (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OXrU2ECBH-E). Over the years the festival turned toward more international themes, so you could find songs about international characters, fictional ones like in "Il topo Zorro" (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Sk42ScNFw0I), or real as in "Napoleone va in pensione" (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TIlx_ILVEhQ). Russians might enjoy "Popoff" (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aOtqox2uB3Y), a song which shows us how being a Tsar's soldier with a physical aspect far from canonical standards can't be that bad, after all. Two other songs that pop up in my mind are one about a weird coffee recipe, "Il caffè della Peppina" (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-xL2Y2HKEI8), and another that suggest pasta as a sort of remedy for stress, "Le tagliatelle di Nonna Pina" (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nM_brCXj10I).
Feel free to vote your favourite!
Years ago an Italian rock band published a song and, as usual, along with the song a video was released. Actually it was nothing special, just a camera filming the path a girl follows to go from home to a club in which the band is performing:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gvhycbsyX8k
It happened that even if not broadcasted as much as the one above, actually another version of the video was shot, this one starring not an actress but the real girl who inspired the song:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9D4dHIP1gLk
Some time later another similar video was released by another band, but this time the focus is on a man who walks after the girl:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sMySFMKbIDw
(Italian learners could find this song a bit rude and childish - hope you won't mind, the band is well known for its humorous tones, maybe you can get a better idea of them by listening to their famous "La canzone mononota" / "The One-Note Song" here: https://www.dailymotion.com/video/xxlncm).
Finally, even a rapper released another video in the series. Here the action is on him doing a sort of search to find clothes for a surreal costume. Obviously he walks the same path, but after the man who is after the girl:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ktNAzte2MmI
Hope you enjoy the songs!
This i a curious tradition of Italy. Today, the President of the Republic hosted the Italian association of the parliamentary journalists and, as usual, got a fan as a gift. Every year, three fans are given as gifts to the President of the Republic, the President of the Senate and the President of the Chamber of Deputies. This tradition dates back to 1893, when Giuseppe Zanardelli, the President of the Chamber at the time, during a meeting with journalists which took place in a hot summer day like these ones, noticed that some of them held a fan and, jokingly, expressed his envy towards them. So the journalists gave him a signed fan as a gift. Nowadays the fans are artistic fans, chosen through a contest in which students of arts academies take part. Unfortunately there isn't a gallery of all the fans, but you can get an idea by looking at google images:
http://images.google.com/search?tbm=isch&q="cerimonia del ventaglio"
