IL COMMISSARIO PEPE

Quartet Records, in collaboration with GDM and EMI General Music Publishing, presents an expanded and remastered edition of Armando Trovajoli’s infectious score for the Ettore Scola film noir IL COMMISSARIO PEPE (1969), starring Ugo Tognazzi and Silvia Dionisio. The film is about Pepe (Tognazzi), a police commissioner in a little town in the Italian Venetian province who investigates a prostitution ring run by two pensioners. During his investigations he also learns that a former manicurist has shacked up with ten students, the prefect’s daughter prostitutes herself to keep her pimp, a famous doctor has sex with his young patients, a headmaster has his eyes on the pupils, a noblewoman organizes orgies in her villa, the local convent is run by a lesbian and his own girlfriend poses for a hardcore magazine. He wants everything to come out in the open, but his superior put obstacles in his way.

The collaboration between Armando Trovajoli and Ettore Scola has been one of the most celebrated in Italian cinema during their four decades together, producing classics such as L’ARCIDIAVOLO, BRUTTI SPORCHI E CATTIVI, DRAMMA DELLA GELOSIA, LA TERRAZZA, LA FAMIGLIA and PASSION D’AMORE, among others. For Scola, Trovajoli’s music was the voice of his films, the single element that really completed them. In IL COMMISSARIO PEPE, he contributed one of his most celebrated scores, with the famous song “We’ll Keep Trying,” performed by Lydia McDonald, as well as several urban and bittersweet themes to showcase the world of moral decay depicted in the film. The recording also featured other prestigious collaborators such as I Marc 4, Edda Dell’Orso, and Alessandro Alessandroni, making this score even more iconic.

A selection of 10 cues from IL COMMISSARIO PEPE was released on LP in Italy by RCA at the time of the film’s premiere. The same program was released on CD in the 1990s as part of a compilation dedicated to Ugo Tognazzi by Point Records. An extended 18-track version was released in Japan in 2006 in a limited edition. This is the first time the complete score has been released. Produced by Claudio Fuiano, restored and mastered by Chris Malone, the booklet includes a detailed essay by Miguel Ángel Ordóñez on the film, the score and the relationship between Trovajoli and Scola.

The Original Album

1. Theme 3:37

2. Beat for a nun 2:06

3. A lonely man 3:34

4. We’ll keep trying (Vocal: Lydia McDonald) 2:57

5. Masquerade 3:39

6. Love is a woman 2:32

7. Surrender 2:45

8. Waltz theme 1:48

9. Love theme 2:24

10. Final 2:59 

Film Versions

11. Theme (# 2) 3:44

12. We’ll keep trying (Instrumental) 3:36

13. Theme (# 3) 1:16

14. Il commissario Pepe (Jazz lounge) 3:57

15. Theme (# 4) 1:26

16. Il commissario Pepe (Shake) 1:17

17. Surrender (# 2) 2:42

18. Theme (# 5) 2:40

19. Beat for a nun (#2) 1:01

20. Walz theme (#2 – fast) 0:39

21. Theme (# 6) 1:47

22. Surrender (#3) 1:46

23. Theme (#7 – organ) 1:08

24. Final (#2 – alternate) 2:13

Total Disc Time: 58:25