Caterina Caselli

A very successful and popular singer until 1971, then talent scout and recording entrepreneur, Caterina Caselli Sugar is a unique case in the Italian music business. At the height of her success and with over than 10 million records sold, four years after her debut with “Nessuno Mi Può Giudicare” (1966), Caterina Caselli made the decision to retire from performing to pursue the record production activities and dedicate her time and efforts to developing young talent. Starting in 1976 with her label Ascolto through which major artists were launched such as Pierangelo Bertoli, Mauro Pagani, Area with Demetrio Stratos, Enrico Ruggeri, Raf, Francesco Baccini, Sergio Caputo, Paolo Vallesi, while building an International career for the outstanding Paolo Conte. Under the management of Caterina Caselli Sugar, in 1989, a new company emerged. One started from scratch and heavily focused on talent scouting and record production with the label Insieme-Sugar (now Sugar). With little risk aversion and a focus on the international marketplace, Sugar, produced “Notte Italiana” the 1990 anthem to the Football World Cup held in Italy. Written/composed by Giorgio Moroder and performed by Gianna Nannini and Edoardo Bennato, it immediately became an international hit at the topped charts the world over for close to a year.

In the subsequent years, the label developed a growing roster including the world’s most beloved tenor Andrea Bocelli, with almost 100 million copies of pop and opera albums sold; Sanremo Festival winners Avion Travel (in 2000); singer-songwriter Elisa – one of the most popular local female artists to this day; stadium touring band Negramaro (the first italian band to fill Milan’ San Siro Stadium after just five years of career); eclectic pop icon Malika Ayane, known for having one of the most recognizable voices in Italy; Sanremo winner and 2011 Eurovision runner up, pop-jazz artist and composers, Raphael Gualazzi As a publisher SugarMusic is in the top italian and International league with a global catalogue that include popular music but also Edizioni Suvini Zerboni with its fundamental listings of contemporary 1900 composers such as Goffredo Petrassi and Luigi Dallapiccola, Bruno Maderna’s and Luciano Berio’s first works (including the ones they created together at RAI Laboratorio di Fonologia in Milano that Ladislao Sugar deposited at the italian collecting society SIAE under the “magnetic tape” format, a prime in Europe), and those of Aldo Clementi, Franco Donatoni, Ennio Morricone, Ivan Fedele and Alessandro Solbiati. In 2011 Sugar acquired Edizioni C.A.M., a major movie soundtracks catalogue of historic recordings. With over 2,000 original soundtracks, it documents the sound of Italian cinema and captures film history like no other. La Dolce Vita, Amarcord, Mondo Cane, Il Postino, 8½ and Il Gattopardo (The Leopard) are but a few of the works from over 400 music maestros such as Nino Rota, Ennio Morricone, Luis Bacalov, Riz Ortolani, Piero Piccioni, Armando Trovajoli, Piero Umiliani, Stelvio Cipriani, Fiorenzo Carpi, Philippe Sarde, and many more.

Caterina’s recording company Sugar has supported the development of innovative business models and created a variety of special projects including, “One Night in Central Park” (2011), arguably the most extraordinary concert event of Andrea Bocelli’s career, organized in collaboration with Barilla, “La Dolce Vita the music of Italian Cinema” (2014) the international format for great orchestras as well as reaching numerous international milestones including the global chart-topping success of ‘Si’, Bocelli’s most recent studio album, which was nominated for a Grammy and reached number one in both the official U.S. and U.K. album charts and the recent event, “Music For Hope” (2020) from the Duomo cathedral in Milan, the most watched classical music live stream in YouTube history.

In 2021 the documentary “Caterina Caselli – Una vita cento vite” was previewed as Special Event at the 16th edition of Rome Film Fest. The docufilm signed by Renato De Maria tells the story of Caterina Caselli and her bond with the central figures in Italian music: from the big names she has worked with, to the artists she herself made famous, such as Andrea Bocelli, Elisa, Negramaro and many others. A crystal-clear, profound portrait, with original commentary and archive material faithfully bearing witness to the complex nature of Caterina Caselli’s personality , poised between fragility and determination.

For her artistic and industrial activities Caterina Caselli Sugar has received over the years many awards and rewards among which the Marisa Bellisario Foundation’s Golden Apple for Creative Industries in 1998, and the Golden Ambrogino by the City of Milan in 2007.

On March 8th 2006 the President of Italy’s Republic Carlo Azeglio Ciampi awarded Caterina the high onorary title of Grande Ufficiale al merito della Repubblica.