JAZZPROFILES lives in the music 2,555 Jazz Artists fully Profiled! Cicci Santucci
Last updated November 9, 2026
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Cicci Santucci (right, flugelhorn) with longtime musical partner and tenor saxophonist Enzo Scoppa, on the cover of their self-released 1996 album *Honey* (catalog CE 1001 CD). Album cover photograph (not a CC-licensed artist photo), used as the fallback because no free-licensed photo is on record. — Discogs, release 13260631 (Honey, Cicci Santucci / Enzo Scoppa self-release, 1996); image downloaded directly from Discogs' image CDN and visually confirmed before use.
Francesco "Cicci" Santucci was born in Lanciano, in Italy's Abruzzo region, on April 21, 1939. He began trumpet lessons at 13 with a local band instructor, and in 1955 his family moved to Rome, where he made his public debut a year later at Italy's first national jazz festival, held at the Teatro Quirino. He kept studying formally alongside his early performing career, earning a conservatory diploma in 1969 from the Conservatorio Umberto Giordano in Foggia, and, in 1971, an arranging diploma from the Berklee College of Music in Boston. In a readers' poll conducted some years later by the magazine Jazz di ieri e di oggi, he placed fourth among Italian trumpet players.
Around 1957, a year after his festival debut, Santucci joined the Modern Jazz Gang, a Roman octet whose recorded work for RCA Italiana, Cetra and the independent label Adventure - including the 1960 releases Modern Jazz Gang, Modern Jazz Gang Quintet and Jazz In Italy N. 6 - is tagged by Discogs as Cool Jazz and Bop. Fellow members across these sessions included tenor saxophonist Enzo Scoppa, altoist and arranger Sandro Brugnolini, and pianists Leo Cancellieri and Puccio Sboto. Two years later Santucci and Scoppa, credited jointly as composers and performers, recorded Poeti Moderni Americani (1962, Istituto Internazionale Del Disco), a spoken-word-and-jazz record built around Allen Ginsberg and Frank O'Hara reading their own poems in English over the duo's original music, with actor Giancarlo Sbragia reading Italian translations - a historically notable document of the Beat-poetry-and-jazz vogue that briefly crossed the Atlantic into Italian recording studios.
In 1969 Santucci won the competition for principal trumpet of RAI's Light Music Orchestra, the Italian state broadcaster's in-house ensemble, a post he held for more than twenty years until he left in 1994 to concentrate on concert work. The role placed him inside RAI's substantial jazz-adjacent broadcasting activity as well as its light-entertainment mainstream: on May 23, 1973, he appeared as both trumpet soloist and one of several conductors on Jazz Concerto, a big-band program of original jazz compositions recorded at RAI's Rome auditorium and issued only for internal broadcast use. A 2009 commercial reissue of that recording, retitled Live In Rome 1973 (Jazz Lips), documents the full personnel: alongside Santucci, RAI Orchestra colleague Attilio Donadio on saxophone, pianist Franco D'Andrea, bassist Giovanni Tommaso, trombonists Dino Piana and Frank Rosolino, saxophonist Gianni Basso, trumpeter Oscar Valdambrini, and visiting Americans Tony Scott (clarinet, also a co-conductor) and Conte Candoli (trumpet).
Outside RAI, Santucci built a parallel and much longer-running identity as a jazz combo leader, almost always alongside Enzo Scoppa. Billed variously as the Quintetto Santucci-Scoppa, the Santucci Scoppa Quartet, the Complesso Santucci-Scoppa and simply "Santucci - Scoppa," the two led a working partnership documented on Discogs from Mondo Operaio and On the Underground Road (both 1971) through Honey (1996), Toward the Peace (2009) and Olimpiade (2025) - more than fifty years of intermittent but continuing recorded activity together. On the Underground Road (1971, Dire, produced by Piero Umiliani), tagged by Discogs as Soul-Jazz, Post-Bop and Cool Jazz, is the pair's best-documented session: it also carries pianist Franco D'Andrea, bassist Bruno Tommaso and percussionist Bruno Biriaco. Santucci also recorded twice with pianist Romano Mussolini: Jazz Allo Studio 7 (1962, Ricordi, issued as the Romano Mussolini All-Stars), which won Italy's jazz critics' prize for 1963, and Soft & Swing (1979, Carosello), on flugelhorn.
A self-released live document, credited "Cicci Santucci with Archie Shepp & Kenny Clarke" and drawn from sessions recorded in Rome in March and October 1975, places Santucci alongside two major American jazz figures at the Discogs credit level - a genuine, if informally circulated, recorded connection distinct from an unrelated and uncited claim, repeated across Italian Wikipedia and other biographical summaries, that Santucci also collaborated with Lionel Hampton, Gato Barbieri and Gil Evans. That broader claim could not be independently confirmed: it appears in no dated, sourced account, and none of the three names turns up among Santucci's own Discogs-documented credits. It is reported here as circulating, unverified biography, not as an established fact. Santucci's own concert history from the era is independently documented, however: he appeared at three major European jazz festivals - Comblain-la-Tour in Belgium (1961), Montreux in Switzerland (1967) and Juan-les-Pins in France (1969).
Alongside his jazz work, Santucci built a substantial career as a session and soundtrack trumpeter, recording for film and television composers including Armando Trovajoli, Riz Ortolani and Ennio Morricone. His best-known credit from this side of his career is the trumpet solo on Morricone's "Playing Love," recorded in July 1998 at Rome's Music Village studio for Giuseppe Tornatore's film The Legend of 1900; IMDb separately credits him to the production's music department. The piece has remained central to his later concert programming - he has performed The Legend of 1900's score repeatedly in Italian theaters into the 2020s - though the specific trumpet-soloist credit for the original 1998 soundtrack recording is not broken out in Discogs' own release data for that album, which lists only Morricone's own production credits.
Santucci remains active. In February 2024 the Cicci Santucci Quintet performed at the Lanciano Jazz Festival in his home city, and in October 2025 he appeared, in his mid-eighties, at Bari's Teatro Van Westerhout with a quintet performing The Legend of 1900's music. The Lanciano-area cultural association Il Frentano d'Oro counts him among its honorees. No death record was found.
Santucci's career runs on two parallel tracks that rarely touch directly. The Modern Jazz Gang years, the Ginsberg/O'Hara poetry record, and the five-decade Santucci-Scoppa partnership sit inside a straight-ahead, largely cool- and bop-descended small-combo idiom, with On the Underground Road (1971) showing a turn toward the contemporary soul-jazz and post-bop vocabulary that several of his RAI-era Italian contemporaries were also absorbing at the time. The RAI Light Music Orchestra post that supported him for a quarter-century, and the film and light-entertainment session work built on top of it, belong to a separate, larger world of Italian broadcast and studio professionalism - the same institutional current seen in Attilio Donadio and Carlo Pes - and it is that studio-trumpet identity, not his jazz-combo one, that produced his single best-known recorded moment, the Morricone trumpet solo. Unlike Pes, whose combo jazz thinned to a late-career postscript, or Donadio, whose jazz period was front-loaded and gave way to library music, Santucci's own-name jazz partnership with Enzo Scoppa runs the full length of his career on both sides of the RAI years, which is the strongest evidence that his jazz identity is a sustained practice rather than an early or occasional one.
- Modern Jazz Gang (1960, RCA Italiana) - Santucci's earliest jazz-combo recordings as a member of this Roman octet; Discogs styles Cool Jazz, Bop.
- Poeti Moderni Americani (1962, Istituto Internazionale Del Disco) - jazz settings, composed and performed by Santucci and Enzo Scoppa, for Allen Ginsberg and Frank O'Hara reading their own poems.
- Trio E All Stars (Romano Mussolini All-Stars, 1962, Ricordi) - YouTube playlist - won Italy's 1963 jazz critics' prize; Santucci on trumpet alongside Romano Mussolini, Enzo Scoppa and Dino Piana. Listen
- On the Underground Road (1971, Dire, produced by Piero Umiliani) - Spotify - with Franco D'Andrea, Bruno Tommaso and Bruno Biriaco; Discogs styles Soul-Jazz, Post-Bop, Cool Jazz. Listen
- "Playing Love," from The Legend of 1900 (1998, Sony Classical, composed by Ennio Morricone) - Santucci's best-known trumpet solo, for Giuseppe Tornatore's film; not confirmed on Spotify under his own credit - see Discogs for the sourcing caveat.
Cicci Santucci: Full Discography
Compiled via Discogs (artist 45765, "Cicci Santucci," real name Francesco Santucci). A Discogs artist-database search for "Cicci Santucci" returns this single unambiguous individual entity plus his own-name group shells (Cicci Santucci E Il Suo Complesso, Cicci Santucci Orchestra, Cicci Santucci Quintet) and his Modern Jazz Gang/Santucci-Scoppa/Living Music/RAI Big Band group memberships - no name-collision risk; a separate "Umberto Santucci" (id 1481785) is an unrelated musician. The entity carries 177 total artist-relationship rows (16 Main, 150 Appearance, 7 TrackAppearance, 4 UnofficialRelease) spanning 1959 to 2025. This file gives the leader/combo catalog in full and the RAI, soundtrack and library-music session work as a dated, genre-labeled sample rather than all ~150 Appearance rows.
Listen/Buy: Where nothing could be confirmed the cell reads "not found" rather than guessing. Buy cells give a Discogs release link where available.
Leader / Co-Leader Combo Work
| Release | Year | Label | Personnel | Notes | Listen | Buy |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Modern Jazz Gang | 1960 | RCA Italiana / RCA | Sandro Brugnolini (alto sax), Carlo Metallo (baritone sax), Sergio Biseo (bass), Roberto Petrin (drums), Leo Cancellieri (piano), Enzo Scoppa (tenor sax), Alberto Collatina (trombone), Cicci Santucci (trumpet) | Discogs styles Cool Jazz, Bop. | not found | Discogs |
| Jazz In Italy N. 6 | 1960 | Cetra | Sandro Brugnolini (alto sax, arranger), Carlo Metallo (baritone sax), Sergio Biseo (bass), Roberto Podio (drums), Puccio Sboto (piano), Enzo Scoppa (tenor sax), Alberto Collatina (trombone), Cicci Santucci (trumpet) | Billed to Modern Jazz Gang; Discogs styles Cool Jazz, Bop. | not found | Discogs |
| Modern Jazz Gang Quintet | 1960 | Adventure | Sergio Biseo (bass), Roberto Petrin (drums), Leo Cancellieri (piano), Enzo Scoppa (tenor sax), Cicci Santucci (trumpet) | Discogs styles Bop, Cool Jazz. | not found | Discogs |
| Poeti Moderni Americani | 1962 | Istituto Internazionale Del Disco | Allen Ginsberg, Frank O'Hara (poets, read by), Giancarlo Sbragia (Italian readings), Maurizio Majorana (bass), Roberto Podio (drums), Enzo Scoppa (flute, tenor sax, music by), Cicci Santucci (trumpet, music by), Mario Cantini (piano) | Discogs genres Jazz, Non-Music; styles Poetry, Free Jazz. Cover art by Guido Crepax. | not found | Discogs |
| Trio E All Stars (billed as Romano Mussolini All-Stars) | 1962 | Ricordi | Gianni Sanjust (clarinet), Romano Mussolini (piano), Enzo Scoppa (tenor sax), Dino Piana (trombone), Cicci Santucci (trumpet), Franco Tonani (drums) | Recorded 21 & 24 April 1962, Studio 7, Milan; won Italy's 1963 jazz critics' prize. | YouTube | Discogs |
| Mondo Operaio (Quintetto Santucci-Scoppa) | 1971 | Fly Record | Cicci Santucci, Enzo Scoppa, personnel not further broken out on Discogs | Own-name quintet leader release. | not found | Discogs |
| Looking Around (Quintetto Santucci-Scoppa) | 1971 | Fly Record | Cicci Santucci, Enzo Scoppa, personnel not further broken out on Discogs | Own-name quintet leader release. | not found | Discogs |
| On The Underground Road (Santucci - Scoppa) | 1971 | Dire | Bruno Tommaso (bass), Joel Vandroogenbroeck (organ), Bruno Biriaco, Gegè Munari, Roberto Podio (percussion), Franco D'Andrea (piano, Fender Rhodes), Piero Umiliani (producer), Enzo Scoppa (tenor sax, music by), Cicci Santucci (trumpet, arranger) | Discogs styles Soul-Jazz, Post-Bop, Cool Jazz, Contemporary Jazz. Recorded Rome, June 1971. | Spotify | Discogs |
| * Povertà* | 1972 | Roman Record Company | Not broken out on Discogs | Discogs genres Electronic, Jazz, Rock, Stage & Screen - library/production music. | not found | Discogs |
| Guerra | 1972 | Roman Record Company | Not broken out on Discogs | Library/production music. | not found | Discogs |
| Easy Lovin' | 1978 | Fly Record | Not broken out on Discogs | Discogs genre Jazz, style Easy Listening. | not found | Discogs |
| Follow Me | 1985 | Beat Records Company | Not broken out on Discogs | Discogs genre Jazz, style Easy Listening. | not found | Discogs |
| Ritmi Di Favola | 1988 | Erreffe | Not broken out on Discogs | Discogs genres Jazz, Pop; style Easy Listening. | not found | Discogs |
| Roma - Fregene | 1990 | Erreffe | Not broken out on Discogs | Discogs genre Jazz. | not found | Discogs |
| Who's Seen Katty Page? | 1993 | Penta Flowers | Not broken out on Discogs | Discogs genre Jazz. | not found | Discogs |
| Honey | 1996 | Not On Label (self-released, catalog CE 1001 CD) | Enzo Scoppa (tenor sax), Cicci Santucci (flugelhorn, trumpet) | Sleeve pictures both musicians; used as this profile's portrait. | Spotify | Discogs |
| Toward the Peace (Santucci Scoppa Quartet) | 2009 | not on Discogs release page beyond title | Not broken out on Discogs | Own-name quartet leader release. | not found | Discogs master |
| Olimpiade (Complesso Santucci-Scoppa) | 2025 | not on Discogs release page beyond title | Not broken out on Discogs | Most recent own-name release found. | not found | Discogs master |
RAI Orchestra Jazz Programming
| Year | Title | Label | Personnel | Notes | Listen | Buy |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1973 / 2009 reissue | Jazz Concerto / Live In Rome 1973 | RAI Radiotelevisione Italiana (1973); Jazz Lips (2009 reissue) | Attilio Donadio, Gianni Basso, Sal Genovese, Santino Tedone (saxophones), Franco D'Andrea, Antonello Vannucchi (piano), Giovanni Tommaso, Giorgio Azzolini, Giorgio Rosciglione (bass), Dino Piana, Frank Rosolino (trombone), Oscar Valdambrini, Conte Candoli, Cicci Santucci (trumpet, also conductor), Tony Scott (clarinet, conductor), Gegè Munari (drums) | Recorded May 23, 1973, RAI's Rome auditorium; original LP issued only for internal RAI use, commercially reissued 2009. | not found | Discogs |
Recorded With Visiting Americans (Self-Released)
| Year | Title | Label | Personnel | Notes | Listen | Buy |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1975 (recorded, undated release) | Cicci Santucci with Archie Shepp & Kenny Clarke | Not On Label (self-released) | Cicci Santucci, Archie Shepp, Kenny Clarke | Two sessions, recorded in Rome March 10 and October 16, 1975; Discogs classifies this credit as an Unofficial Release. | not found | Discogs |
Soundtrack Work (Selected)
| Year | Title | Composer | Notes | Listen | Buy |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1998 | La Leggenda Del Pianista Sull'Oceano (The Legend of 1900) | Ennio Morricone | Santucci performs the trumpet solo on "Playing Love"; not individually broken out in Discogs' own release credits for this soundtrack. IMDb credits him to the production's music department. | not found under Santucci's own credit | Discogs |
| 2004 | Troppo Per Vivere... Poco Per Morire (reissue) | various | Digitmovies reissue of a 1967 Italian genre-film score. | not found | Discogs |
| 2016 / 2023 | La Ragazza Dalla Pelle Di Luna / Pericolo Negli Abissi (remastered reissues) | various | Library/soundtrack reissue-collector interest decades after original recording. | not found | Discogs master 47874 / 386011 |
RAI Big Band and Library-Music Session Work (Representative Sample)
Not a complete listing - see the full raw catalog link below. Selected to show scale and range across roughly 150 Appearance/TrackAppearance credits, most of them RAI-era session, library-music, and film/TV-score work rather than jazz-combo dates.
| Year | Title | Billing | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1970 | La Banda Del Cibo Salutare | RCA Original Cast | Appearance credit. |
| 1976 | Casinha Branca | Horo Records | Appearance credit on a Horo Records release, the label behind the "Jazz A Confronto" series. |
| 1979 | Soft & Swing | Romano Mussolini & His Friends, Carosello | Flugelhorn/trumpet; Discogs styles Latin Jazz, Bossanova, Jazz-Funk, Cool Jazz. |
| 1991 | Jazz At Cinecittà | Liuto Records | Appearance credit. |
| 1999 | My Funny Valentine | Splasc(H) Records | Appearance credit on a dedicated Italian jazz label. |
| 2014 | European Cool Jazz 1951-1959 | Frémeaux & Associés | Historical compilation, Appearance credit. |
| n.d. | & Guests | Enzo Scoppa Quartet, Penta Flowers | Also credited: Eddy Palermo, Marcello Rosa, Riccardo Biseo, Stefano Sabatini, Massimo Moriconi, Francesco Puglisi, Giampaolo Ascolese, Karl Potter; Discogs genre Jazz. |
Full raw catalog at Discogs: Cicci Santucci.
Enzo Scoppa (tenor saxophone) - Santucci's longest and closest musical partnership, running from the Modern Jazz Gang and Poeti Moderni Americani (1962) through a run of co-led groups (Quintetto Santucci-Scoppa, Santucci Scoppa Quartet, Complesso Santucci-Scoppa) documented on Discogs from 1971 to 2025. Scoppa is not yet profiled on JazzProfiles.com.
Romano Mussolini (piano, electric piano) - Jazz Allo Studio 7 (1962), which won Italy's 1963 jazz critics' prize, and Soft & Swing (1979), both confirmed at the Discogs credit level.
Franco D'Andrea (piano) - On the Underground Road (1971) and, in 1973, the RAI Orchestra's Jazz Concerto/Live In Rome 1973 session, both confirmed at the Discogs credit level.
Bruno Tommaso (bass) and Bruno Biriaco (percussion) - fellow personnel on On the Underground Road (1971), confirmed at the Discogs credit level.
Giovanni Tommaso (bass) and Attilio Donadio (saxophone) - fellow RAI Orchestra personnel on the 1973 Jazz Concerto/Live In Rome 1973 session, confirmed via the 2009 reissue's full credit listing.
Archie Shepp and Kenny Clarke - a self-released live recording, "Cicci Santucci with Archie Shepp & Kenny Clarke," documents sessions in Rome in March and October 1975; a genuine, if informally circulated, Discogs-credited connection to both musicians. Both profiled on JazzProfiles.com.
Piero Umiliani (producer) - produced On the Underground Road (1971); Santucci is also a listed member of the Discogs group entity "Piero Umiliani E La Sua Orchestra." Umiliani is not yet profiled on JazzProfiles.com.
Eddy Palermo (guitar) - both credited artists on Enzo Scoppa's & Guests (Penta Flowers, Enzo Scoppa Quartet), a connection also listed in Santucci's discography.
Marcello Rosa (trombone) - both credited artists on Enzo Scoppa's & Guests (Penta Flowers, Enzo Scoppa Quartet), Discogs-confirmed.
Fabio Zeppetella (guitar) - trumpeter alongside Zeppetella on Wilfred Percussion (1983), on which Zeppetella plays guitar, Discogs-credited.
Franco Tonani (drums) - Discogs-credited alongside Santucci on Romano Mussolini's Jazz Allo Studio 7 (1962) and the 1968 single "Mack The Knife / Now's The Time," and on Roberto Nicolosi's Atmosfera (1973). Profiled on JazzProfiles.com.
Franco Piana (trumpet) - trumpet section mate on Manuel De Sica's big-band album Con Alma (1980), confirmed at the Discogs credit level. Profiled separately on JazzProfiles.com.
Giampaolo Ascolese - drummer on Enzo Scoppa Ensemble's To-Day's Jazz (Penta Flowers, 1987) and a billed artist on the Penta Flowers CD & Guests, both alongside Santucci; Discogs-confirmed.
Gianni Basso (tenor saxophone) - credited alongside Santucci on Roberto Nicolosi's Atmosfera (1973), per Discogs; profiled separately on this site.
Giancarlo Schiaffini (trombone, tuba, euphonium) - credited together on Ciao, Rudy (1966) and Desbandes (1975). Discogs-confirmed.
Gianni Sanjust (clarinet) - clarinetist on Jazz Allo Studio 7 (1962), the Romano Mussolini All Stars session on which Santucci plays trumpet; Discogs credits Sanjust on tracks A1 to A5.
Gino Marinacci (flute, bass flute) - Santucci plays trumpet on Piero Umiliani's La Legge Dei Gangsters (Omicron, 1969, recorded in Rome in November 1968), on which Marinacci plays flute and bass flute, and both are credited on the title track in the anthology Jazz At Cinecittà (Liuto, 1991); Discogs-confirmed. Profiled on JazzProfiles.com.
Giorgio Azzolini (double bass) - bassist on the Romano Mussolini Quartet 45 "Mack The Knife" / "Now's The Time" (Miura, 1968), with Franco Tonani and Mussolini; Discogs-verified.
Giorgio Rosciglione (double bass) - bass on Who's Seen Katty Page? (1993), Mario Schiano's My Funny Valentine (1999) and Enzo Scoppa's Ballads (2022, which Santucci arranged and directed); also one of the performers on the RAI Jazz Concerto recording of 1973; Discogs-credited. Profiled separately on this site.
Livio Cerveglieri (tenor saxophone) - bandmate on Giovanni Tommaso's 1970 fusion album La Banda Del Cibo Salutare, alongside Steve Lacy and Gato Barbieri; Discogs-confirmed (a separate 2000 Umiliani compilation, Ode To Duke Ellington, credits both men but on different tracks, so it is not the basis for this connection). Profiled on JazzProfiles.com.
Maurizio Majorana (bass) - fellow credited musician, with Roberto Podio, on the 1962 spoken-word session Poeti Moderni Americani; Discogs-confirmed. Profiled separately on this site.
Oscar Valdambrini (trumpet) - trumpeter alongside Santucci on the RAI Jazz Concerto session of May 23, 1973 (reissued as Live In Rome 1973); Discogs-confirmed. Profiled on JazzProfiles.com.
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See all 554 Italian artists →- Cicci Santucci on Discogs
- Cicci Santucci on Spotify
- Cicci Santucci on Apple Music
- Cicci Santucci on AllMusic
- Cicci Santucci on Italian Wikipedia
- Cicci Santucci on jazzprofiles.com
- r/ItalianJazz
- Discogs, artist 45765 ("Cicci Santucci"), for identity, name variations, group affiliations and the full 177-release history; releases and masters fetched directly for personnel, including 4106368 (Modern Jazz Gang), 7325446 (Poeti Moderni Americani), 2879149 (Soft & Swing), 4515650 (On the Underground Road) and 8853970 (Live In Rome 1973).
- Cicci Santucci - Italian Wikipedia, for the core biographical narrative, education, and the Hampton/Barbieri/Evans claim (uncited in the article itself).
- Cicci Santucci - Saint Louis (Milan jazz school), Archivio del Jazz, for the Modern Jazz Gang, Santucci-Scoppa duo, and RAI Light Music Orchestra details.
- Cicci Santucci - Wikidata (Q3676348), cross-checked against Italian Wikipedia and Discogs; its Rome birthplace value is contradicted by multiple independent Abruzzo-region sources.
- Il Grande Trombettista Cicci Santucci "Torna a Lanciano" - Teatro Fenaroli, for the Lanciano birthplace, career timeline and 1994 RAI departure.
- Cicci Santucci - Associazione Culturale "Il Frentano d'Oro", for his standing in his home region.
- Lanciano Jazz Festival - Cicci Santucci Quintet, 23 febbraio 2024 - Teatro Fenaroli, confirming continued activity into 2024.
- Giornale di Puglia, October 2025, on Santucci's Mola di Bari concert, confirming continued activity in his mid-eighties.
- Cicci Santucci - IMDb, for the Music Department/Composer credit on The Legend of 1900.
- The Legend of 1900 (soundtrack) - English Wikipedia, for the 1998 Sony Classical soundtrack's production details.