Departures of note

Giorgio Bracardi was an Italian musician, singer and comic actor who became a household name through the cult radio show Alto gradimento, created with Renzo Arbore and Gianni Boncompagni. There he voiced a gallery of absurd and surreal characters, including Scarpantibus, the 'bird of Nicaragua', the petulant journalist Max Vinella, and the fascist hierarch Ermanno Catenacci. He began his career as a pianist, performing around the world and accompanying artists such as Maurice Chevalier and José Feliciano, and worked as a composer for RCA in the 1960s, taking part in the Sanremo Festival as an author. He later appeared in numerous television shows, including Quelli della notte and Striscia la notizia, and created further characters such as Professor Aurelio Marcellini. Bracardi also acted in several films, sometimes as a leading man, and in 2008 voiced the comic character Cattivik in an animated series. He died in 2026 at the age of 93.