The Italian megastar Zucchero (which means Sugar - his real name is Adelmo Fornaciari) was born in Roncocesi, a village in the Italian region of Emilia Romagna, the 25th September 1955. After learning how to play the organ in the local church, at the age of 13 he was introduced to black music by an American student. Soon he began to set up his first band, Le nuove luci (The New Lights). Later he was a member of two other bands Sugar & Daniel and Sugar & Candies with whom he travelled Italy playing Blues.

He is a great Italian singer, musician and songwriter and his style runs from R&B to love ballads. After winning in 1981 the Castrocareo Festival with the song Canto Te, he made his first appearance at Sanremo Festival in 1982 singing Una notte che vola via.

In 1983 he entered the competition again with Nuvola, and recorded his first album Un po' di Zucchero .

Two years later he went to USA in order to make his first bluesy album Zucchero & the Randy Jackson Band, with the great bass player Randy Jackson and other guests such as his present producer Corrado Rustici, well known in USA for his guitar sessions with stars such as Aretha Franklin. In this record there was his very first success Donne.

1986 is the year of Rispetto, where again Randy Jackson with Narada Michael Walden and other big musicians played. "Rispetto" sold more than 250,000 copies in Italy and was 7th in the '86 yearly chart. However it's 1987 the year of Zucchero's "explosion": the album Blues became the best seller Italian record in the history with 1,200,000 copies! His name spread all over Europe where he carried on a succesfull tour. But that was not enough. In 1989 Oro, Incenso & Birra sold more than 1,500,000 copies in Italy and other 2 millions abroad.

He reached the top of UK and European charts with the single Senza una donna (Without a woman) in duet with Paul Young in 1991. Moreover, his 1991 Greatest Hits in English Zucchero was in the UK top 20 and he played several concerts at the Royal Albert Hall (London) together with Eric Clapton. In 1992 he's invited by Brian May to perform Queen's Las Palabras de Amor on the Freddy Mercury Tribute's stage in London. He has also collaborated with stars such as Miles Davis, Joe Cocker, Bono, Ray Charles, Sting and also Luciano Pavarotti with whom in 1992 he recorded the duet Miserere, taken from an other best seller album (Miserere), entering the UK charts.

In 1994 he's the only Continental Artist to take part at Woodstock '94. In 1995 his album Spirito DiVino reached the charts in several countries such as Germany, Switzerland, Belgium, Netherlands and France where sold more than three million CDs. The European tour was sold out everywhere and he also played in London with special guest Brian May. There is also an English version of Spirito DiVino published by London records in UK and by A&M in America (where he carried on a sold out tour in April 96 playing in Los Angeles House of Blues, New York, Chicago, San Francisco, Toronto and Mexico City) and a Spanish version as well.

The 21st November 1996 was the publishing day of "The Best of Zucchero's Greatest Hits", a collection of his major hits + 3 brand new tracks. This album has sold over 3,000,000 million copies to date and is out in the US too. During 1997 he carried on a long tour in USA, Canada and Latin America to promote this album. He also played in New York during the benefit show for the Rainforest Foundation.

The following album, Blue Sugar, was released all over the Europe on the 5th November 1998 and sold more than 1 million copies in Italy. It includes the hit single Blu the English lyrics of which were written by Bono. A duet with Sheryl Crow is included in the album Overdose d'amore released in 1999 just for the US market. The new album, entitled Shake was released on the 14th September 2001 including the hit single Baila (sexy thing). It's a huge success all over Europe entering the charts of several countries.