Golden throat, sinewy physique, deep gypsy eyes. We all know who Angelina Mango is and from whom she inherited that beautiful voice. From mom Laura Valente and dad Pino Mango. Music is part of her DNA; it grew up with her. Suffice it to say that when she was only 6 years old she wrote her first song. From a very young age she followed her father on tour with the whole family. It is not hard to imagine that in the Mango household music was talked about practically all the time.
But as frequently happens in families of artists, last names become cumbersome and more than a free pass they turn into cages, often gilded, but still cages. People think they know the truth and have the right to tell it to everyone, a truth that sounds something like this, “She got into Amici because she is the daughter of - she did Sanremo because she is the daughter of.”
Angelina, however, doesn't go for it and shows it.
After winning Sanremo 2024 and participating in the Eurovision Song Contest in Malmo, she is exploding artistically. Her single Melodrama is among the most listened to on the radio, and in the fall she will start her first European tour. And not only that. The New York Times has voted her a rising star on the international scene while Italy hails her as a new pop phenomenon.
But why do we like Angelina Mango so much? There are two main reasons.
- The first is because she has suffered. You can see it in her eyes, the dark part of her is there and you can see it when she stares into the lens. She can shake her ass like Shakira, gyrate around herself like a flamenco dancer, sing with a booming accent and scream like there's no tomorrow but her eyes don't lie, she's angry. Very angry. She is suffering, she has suffered, and she has not only done so in silence. Angelina Mango wins Sanremo not so much with the song La noia but with her father's cover: La rondine.
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To Vanity Fair she declares, “If you look at the cover night at the Ariston today, what emotions does it arouse in you?”"I was no longer Angelina Mango, I was no longer Pino's daughter. I was The Swallow, I was his song, I was a voice. If I hadn't done it, I would have regretted it.”
Impossible not to have been moved by an interpretation like hers, and the reason is simple. It was a performance chock-full of pain and she empathized perfectly with the audience. A performance that was hard to ignore.
- The second reason is because she is imperfect and consequently true. She is not beautiful, she is not ugly, she does not like herself that much, she claims to be insecure and to have paranoia and fears: insects, airplanes, the dark. “I am not a champion of self-esteem, so it is difficult. However, I have the intelligence to face the limits I set for myself. I'm not a resolved young woman, I don't know if I ever will be, but I'm working on it with the support of as many people as I can,” she tells Vanity Fair again. Although she holds the stage with a professional precision and arrogance, Angelina has her feet on the ground. She wants to honor and cultivate the naturalness she senses every time she performs but she doesn't exaggerate, she remains polished.
Angelina is totally far from the canons of today's Italian female pop that becomes the Giamburrasca of the charts, the summer scugnizza, the girl next door and the mermaid winking at pirates.
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One thing is certain: Pino is rooting for her. That is why we like Angelina, because she is real.
Illustration by Gloria Dozio - Acrimònia Studios
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