Biography

As a singer/songwriter, musician and producer, Dolcenera (born as Emanuela Trane) is a unique and original artist for the contemporary Italian music scene. Her stage name Dolcenera takes origin from a song of Fabrizio De André, who was an inspiration for her, especially regarding the importance of poetry in a song. Dolcenera is also the union of two words: “Sweet and black”, which are totally well suited to her music approach, her naturally skilled voice which ranges from being powerful and soulful to sweet and gentle, her own way to play the piano and to her concept of music as an overextending crossover. She rose to fame in 2003 winning the Sanremo Festival with her breakthrough hit “Siamo tutti là fuori” and from that moment forward, her knack of blending classic pop conventions with new trends plus, her strong belief in the concept of songwriter as someone who has to give a vision of the contemporary world speaking about social and political issues, made her the new female icon songwriter in Italy. She is an extraordinary live performer, especially at the piano in very intense moments, always unpredictable and surprising with her acoustic versions of up-time songs: in a way very similar to Lady Gaga’s piano approach. Born as Emanuela Trane, Dolcenera played piano since she was a child, she wrote her first song at age 13 and, while attending the university of mechanical engineering, she met her first producer Lucio Fabbri, violin player in the popular rock progressive band PFM. They worked together to her first album “Sorriso nucleare” (Nuclear smile) released by BMG Italy after her victory of Sanremo Festival in 2003 with her breakthrough hit “Siamo tutti là fuori” (Everybody is out there), a song about young people dreams. In that occasion, she also won the Press-Radio-Tv award. This first album takes its name from the song “Sorriso nucleare” which talks about children born with “Labiopalatoschisis” (Cleft lip and palate syndrome) due to the Chernobyl disaster. In 2005, after winning the national tv-music show “Music Farm” -- a kind of forerunner broadcast of the upcoming music talent shows -- with the song “Mai più noi due” (Never two of us anymore), she released her second certified platinum album “Un mondo perfetto” (A perfect world), which stayed on top of italian album chart for a year and takes its name from a song, included in this album, which talks about violence against women. The album contains three cover versions of Italian hits that Dolcenera performed during the Music Farm show: “Sei bellissima” by Loredana Bertè, “Pensiero stupendo” by Patti Pravo, which become then soundtrack of a famous car advertising and “Lulù e Marlene” by Litfiba. In 2006 she released her third album “Il popolo dei sogni” (People of dreams), certified platinum, from which the first-extract single, “Com’è straordinaria la vita” (How life is extraordinary) performed at Sanremo festival, became an evergreen. Very impressive is her authorized cover of the song “A wolf at the door” by Radiohead, that, Dolcenera renamed “Il luminal d’immenso” as a pun between the antidepressant drug “luminal” and the poem by Ungaretti “Mattina” (M’illumino d’immenso) to express depressive disorders’ issues. After releasing “Il popolo dei sogni”, Dolcenera hit the road and she toured heavily for the following two years, not only in Italy, where she also opened the show of the great Italian rock-star Vasco Rossi, but in Gemany, where “Un mondo perfetto” and “Il popolo dei sogni” were also published, in Austria, where she performed opened Zucchero’s show, and Switzerland, as well. After her participation to Sanremo Festival in 2006, she felt overexposed, especially on tv. She wished to have her private life out of gossip and, right in the moment in which music was changing due to its more frequent exposition on tv related of the new music shows’ birth, Dolcenera decided to take a private period out of tv and media. So she spent the following three years out of the scenes, coming back in 2009 with a new album “Dolcenera nel paese delle meraviglie” (Dolcenera in wonderland), entirely recorded with a 70’s attitude: all the musicians recording at the same time. The first single of the album, “Il mio amore unico” (My only love), which in Italy reached number one in sales and radio charts, was also broadcast on English radios in the remix version, and in South America in the Spanish version, titled accordingly “Único”, sang by Alejandra Guzman. In 2011 the release of the album “Evoluzione della specie” (Evolution of mankind), written and arranged by Dolcenera, full of hits like “Il sole di domenica” (Sunny sunday), a song about defending minorities, “L’amore è un gioco” (Love is a game) and “Read all about it (Tutto quello che devi sapere)” in duet with the English rapper Professor Green, certified gold, marked a music change for Dolcenera: she went from piano to synthesizers. In 2012 Dolcenera released a very successful song “Ci vediamo a casa” (I’ll see you at home), performed at the Sanremo Festival. This song was eventually certified platinum and it was the most transmitted one on the Italian radio for over two months. A love song about the right of every citizen to have a house and build a family. The great success keeps Dolcenera in tour for two years. In 2016, after ten years away from tv, she decided to come back in the famous singing competition The Voice as one of the four celebrity judges, with Max Pezzali, Raffaella Carrà, Emis Killa. She revealed surprising aspects of her personality, her knowledge of music, her contagious smile, and she was one of the first female coach to win The Voice in the world. In the same year, she released the album “Le stelle non tremano” (The stars do not tremble) entirely arranged and produced by Dolcenera. The album was preceded by the release of three singles: “Niente al mondo” (Nothing in the world), which has been the song of a woman singer most transmitted on radio in 2015, inspired by the speeches about the value of dreams of two great italian personalities: Pier Paolo Pasolini and Mario Monicelli, “Un peccato” (A shame) and “Fantastica” (Amazing). All of them topped the radio charts together with the song “Ora o mai più” (Now or never) performed at the Sanremo Festival.