Italian singer Gianmaria Testa (1958-2016) came to success late in life, first in France, after working as a stationmaster in Cuneo, Piedmont. His first album, Montgolfières, appeared in 1995, when he was thirty-seven. Over the next twenty years, he produced seven albums of jazz-tinged songs influenced by South American rhythms. First signed to the tôt Ou tard label with the album Extra-Muros in 1996, he only gained recognition in his own country with the following album, Lampo (1999), while Il Valzer di un Giorno (La Valse d'Un Jour), released in 2000, was aimed at his two favourite countries. In 2006, the collection Da Questa Parte del Mare took on a more committed tone, preceding his first live album, Solo dal Vivo (2009). A final original album, Vitamia, was released in 2011, before his death from cancer on March 30, 2016, at the age of 57.
