Creative Team

Art Director: Niny Comolli

Stage Director: Laura Marcora

Conductor: STEFANO BARZAN

Introduction

The Choir “I Piccoli Cantori di Milano”was founded in 1964 due to the intuition and strong will o fNiny Comolli, a musician with Master degree from the Conservatory of Music in Milan and also an appreciated pianist at the RAI Orchestra for 25 years. She dreamed of creating a cultural association designed to attract children to music. Today, with around one hundred children, aged from 5 to 12 years, the choir is directed by Laura Marcora, her niece, who took the lead after Niny Comolli retired.

The choir participated at the Expo Milano 2015 Opening Ceremony performing in the Open Air Theatre. Eighty children shared the stage with three different Alpine choirs with nearly 100 singers to perform Mameli’s Hymn in a new and original vocal arrangement by Stefano Barzan. The choir then repeated the performance at the closing ceremony in front of the President of the Italian Republic, Sergio Mattarella, fascinating the audience with a unique arrangement of “Vapensiero” from Giuseppe Verdi's Opera Nabucco. Both Expo events were broadcasted live all over the world.

I Piccoli Cantori are proud of their excellence and long history : they have performed concerts in a variety of locations and have taken part in major TV broadcasts, also recording album songs for various Italian and foreign artists, such as Enrico Ruggeri, Ivana Spagna, I Pooh, Roberto Vecchioni, Jovanotti, Zucchero Fornaciari, Michael Jackson, Celentano, Sergio Endrigo, Gianna Nannini, Ornella Vanoni and Anna Oxa.

On the international scene, Michael Jackson invited the choir on stage in 1992 to join his own chorus singers performing the song “Heal the world” during the “Dangerous World Tour” at the Brianteo Stadium in Monza (Milan). In 1999 the choir recorded with Phil Collins for the soundtrack of Walt Disney's "Tarzan". Here in Europe, I Piccoli Cantori di Milano have stepped on the prestigious stage of the European Parliament in Brussels, holding a concert for the closing ceremony of the 2003 European Year for People with Disabilities. A CD and a DVD were recorded and distributed after the event.