Who does not believe in fairy tales So many times we stopped to talk to this man, who lived by their wits in a side Via Torino, and many times we have done by moving his stories, asking if they were the result of imagination or true stories. He had become an event of almost every morning, when one day they told us that he had been "evicted" from his place of luck ... and see where it now! This teaches us once again that stop at the first impression can lead to misconceptions being, although the company Roye was difficult: how can we believe an old homeless man who lives under a sheet? Luckily I have not jumped to conclusions and now I can say I knew Roye Lee, musician, actor, composer ...
"Roye Lee Clochard in the center of Milan. But before Friar Totip in advertising and that of Santa Claus in Coca Cola. And even before winning Telegatto. And before that worked with Carlo Alberto Rossi, Giovanni D'Anzi, Enrico Intra, Franco Cerri. And even before actor Dino Risi and Amedeo Nazzari. And before animator Nashville Nashville when he was the right arm of Elvis Presley and Bill Haley and His Comets. Roye Lee has lived many lives? I do not even know him, probably. What is certain is that another begins, to 74 years with a new album.
The last one, the one just ended, seemed to him broken legs: homeless hobo, via Torino area, forced to live on charity and sympathy that inspires his white homeless. The road was clear and deliberate choice, after the disintegration of his family and some personal and professional disappointments. This choice is usually no return, because Roye, free spirit, he was content just to live: a smile, a chat, a bit or two mites' food, a makeshift shed a few steps from the Duomo, a bike with which carry its precious trinkets, the New York Times read on the sly in some newsstands. But in this case there is a happy ending thanks to a Red Cross workers, who convinced Cristina Mesturino Roye to take a property and to return to his great love, music.
The result is a CD with his greatest hits which is titled Roye 1. His life is a novel, and can not be otherwise if you are born in Nashville, the capital of the country, as grandson of the artistic director of Capitol Records, which enables him, in the fifties, to attend the likes of Dean Martin and Frank Sinatra, to assist the explosion of the Platters, Bill Haley and His Comets (as it were, Rock around the clock) and Elvis Presley and, later, by Bruce Springsteen.
In the sixties Roye lands in Italy, first as a soldier and then as an artist, performing in the March on Rome by Dino Risi, writing Who's gonna break your heart (which is then translated into Italian as five minutes and then, and also sung by Baglioni ) and Where roses grow, which won Telegatto radio as the best interpretation. In the margins of other little things like Chewin'Chewin'Gum, the term high grade with Arbore Boncompagni, a bit 'of commercial jingles for L'Oreal, Alka Seltzer, Baci Perugina, and recitations in some spots, the last one of the leading jeans his name. Then the road. And now back to music, to life. Welcome back. "
(from" Republic ", March 2, 2009)