Iva Zanicchi

Iva Zanicchi was born in Ligonchio, in the province of Reggio Emilia to Zefiro (1909–2004) and Elsa Raffaelli (1914–2010). Her career began in 1962 at the Castrocaro Music Festival, where she earned third place. She won the Sanremo song festival in 1967 with Non pensare a me, in 1969 with "Zingara" and again in 1974 with "Ciao cara, come stai?". Zanicchi remains the only woman singer to have won that festival's prize three times. In 1969, she represented Italy in the Eurovision Song Contest in Madrid with "Due grosse lacrime bianche", finishing 13th. She represented Italy in the V Festival Internacional da Canção in Rio with Tu non-sei più innamorato di me in 1970. A concert at the Paris Olympia and a tour (United States, Canada, South America and the Soviet Union) followed. Zanicchi later also toured Australia and Japan. Has worked with Mikis Theodorakis, Charles Aznavour and Luigi Tenco, and has made numerous recordings. Has performed at Madison Square Gardens, New York (1974) and the Teatro Regio (Parma). In total, Zanicchi released 14 albums during the 1970s, including a Christmas-themed, Neapolitan and Spanish language recordings.

From 1987 to 2000 Zanicchi hosted the television game show OK, il Prezzo è Giusto!, the Italian version of The Price Is Right as the only female host in the history of the game show worldwide (since then, other countries have had versions of the show hosted by a woman).

In 2004 she was one of Forza Italia's candidates at the European Parliament elections, polling nearly 35,000 but not enough to be elected. However, as the highest-polling among the candidates failing to be elected, Zanicchi took up her seat in Strasburg in May 2008, representing Forza Italia, when EuroMP Mario Mantovani left to become a PdL senator. She was confirmed in her post at the European elections of June 2009.

In 2009, a band called I VazzaNikki was started, the name being a clear reference and tribute to Iva Zanicchi. The idea of the group came during a conversation between the Italian comedians Valerio Lundini, who is one of the singers and the keyboard player of the band, and Greg, who suggested the name. The objective was to play rock'n'roll and rockabilly music, inspired by the American 1950s. The band characterizes for ironic and nonsense songs, and even performed in the TV broadcast Una pezza di Lundini, hosted by Lundini on Rai Uno.

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