He had celebrated his birthday a few days ago Ernesto Assante, on February 12, immediately after the Sanremo festival, which he had followed with the Repubblica team. He left us too soon, at the age of 66, after an illness last night, a stroke and a hasty hospitalization where the treatment unfortunately proved useless. Journalist, critic, blogger, with an inexhaustible passion and curiosity for topics ranging from music, his first love, to new technologies on which he had become one of the leading experts.
What stood out most about Ernesto was his vitality, his ability to foresee and plan new initiatives: he was always able to conceive and start a new project, even if the projects he had already launched seemed to fill his life abundantly. He was informed promptly of all the news, especially music, and there was no way to deceive him by even telling him the name of a minor artist to surprise him, he already knew that, an inexhaustible curiosity guided him . A true and authentic boss, even if after a while at the desk he decided to return to writing.
He started radio in 1975 at a small Roman station, Roma International Sound. Then always In 1975 and until 1982 he led broadcasts on Radio Blu, one of the capital's first rock stations, a real training ground for dozens of radio DJs who, a few years later, found themselves behind the microphones of Rai Stereonotte. In 1980 the switch to Rai Radio 1 e took place In 1983 he came to Stereonotte, where he hosted until 1987. Assante began visiting newspaper editorial offices in 1977, worked with the Quotidiano dei Lavoratori and from 1978 worked as a music critic at Il Manifesto, for which he wrote until 1984. In 1979 he joined La Repubblica, where he worked as music critic and editor-in-chief, creator of the weekly newspaper Musica, together with Roberto Campagnano and Gino Castaldo. He was also the creator of Computer Valley and Computer, Internet and Other, and director of McLink and Kataweb.
In over thirty years of activity, he has contributed to numerous Italian and foreign weekly and monthly magazines, including Epoca, L'Espresso and Rolling Stone. Most recently he was editor of the pop and rock music entries for the Treccani Italian Encyclopedia.
Ernesto Assante in the Repubblica editorial team with Eugenio Scalfari and Gino Castaldo
The collaboration with television is also long: In 1982 he was a consultant for Domenica in. In 1983 and 1984 he became an author for Orecchiocchio, a music program hosted by Claudio De Tommasi and then by Fabio Fazio: first Beat Club, then Doc by Renzo Arbore and Ieri Goggi e Domani with Loretta Goggi. In 1988 he was the author of Notte Rock for RaiUno. Then Cantagiro on RaiDue and Tam Tam Village, RaiUno's musical weekly with Carlo Massarini. He signed the first edition of Pavarotti & Friends in 1992 and many of RaiUno's first evenings with presenters such as Fabrizio Frizzi, Eleonora Brigliadori, Renzo Arbore, Milly Carlucci, Elisabetta Gardini and Loretta Goggi. As creator and author, from 1996 to 2002 he signed seven editions of PIM, the Italian Music Awards broadcast on Italia 1, produced by Repubblica and hosted by Serena Dandini and Linus. Since 2013, together with Gino Castaldo, he has been the creator, author and presenter of Webnotte, live on Repubblica.it and on Facebook and broadcast on Radio Capital Tv. In 2019 and 2020 he is the author of two seasons of Una storia da canto, hosted by Enrico Ruggeri and Bianca Guaccero, on Saturdays in prime time on RaiUno and in 2022 of Ittakes a Flower, hosted by Francesco Gabbani and Francesca Fialdini, in prime time on RaiUno.
Assante has written numerous books over the years, some of which were co-authored with Gino Castaldo, with whom he has held the “Lezioni di Rock” since 2005. Journey to the center of music with the aim of deepening the story of those who became rock legends, also thanks to a guided listening session and the videos shown. From 2003 to 2009 he taught “Theory and Technology of New Media” and later “Analysis of Musical Languages” at the Faculty of Communication Sciences at the University of La Sapienza in Rome.