Geolier the Neopolitan rapper storms Italy in his native tongue

The song that made a rapper called Geolier a favourite at Italy’s most popular song contest was called I p’me, tu p’te (Me for you, you for me). Yet only a minority among the millions who watch the Sanremo music festival would have had a clue who the “me” or “you” were that he was talking about. Geolier won 60 per cent of the phone-in vote despite, as one commentator pointed out, most of his admirers having no idea what Geolier said, since he sticks firmly to rapping in Neapolitan: a lush dialect packed with French and Spanish words dating to the 18-century Bourbon reign in Naples. Geolier only qualified to compete at the Sanremo music festival because a rule insisting that competing songs are in Italian was relaxed FRANCESCO PRANDONI/GETTY IMAGES Neapolitan, which is acknowledged as a language in its own right since it has its own grammar, Related articles