Passing of Daniela Shualy: Love, Music, and Tribute

Daniela Shualy has died after a long illness, wife of the singer and actor Raiz, frontman of Almamegretta. The music group announced it with a post on Facebook on Easter day: "Shocked and lost, we stand by Raiz for the disappearance of his sweet wife Daniela. We will miss her". Hundreds of messages from fans: "May she shine next to the sun. You are a great family full of love", writes, among others, Sebastiano. Condolences also from many of Raiz's colleagues, from Clementino to Paola Turci. Daniela's death has painfully made evident the sense of a dedication full of love that Raiz, real name Gennaro Della Volpe, 57 years old next April 22, had published a few days ago on social media on the occasion of the last episode of the fourth series of Mare Fuori, the record-breaking Rai fiction in which the singer participated by signing some tracks of the soundtrack, as well as acting in the role of the Camorra boss 'don' Salvatore Ricci, father of two of the young protagonists, Ciro and Rosa. Raiz had written: "Quanno 'o veco, nun 'o credo, nun me pare overo ca 'a cchiù bella d''e Quartieri fa ammore cu' mme. Tonight on #rai2 at 9.00 pm season finale for #marefuori4. My personal dedication goes to @danielashualy, mother of my rose Lea and love of a lifetime". The first sentence is a verse from "Fa' ammore cu' me", a song from 1999 by Almamegretta. Daniela Shualy, like Raiz-Gennaro, had Jewish origins. And it was also through his wife, from whom six years ago he had a daughter Lea, that the singer, known for his constant spiritual search, converted to Judaism. The grandparents of Daniela were Hungarian Jews, who after surviving the Nazi concentration camps married and then returned to Israel. At Tel Aviv, in the house that had been the grandparents of Daniela, the couple spent long periods. In 2022, Raiz told in an interview with The Wom that he had dedicated the song Make it Work, contained in the just-released album of Almamegretta, precisely to his wife who was fighting against cancer: "Make it Work is encouragement for my wife and for all the people who are facing the same situation, the ugly disease... No one has the courage to call cancer by its name: ugly disease, as if there was a good disease. Like diabetes or the common cold, it is right to call it by its name to know well who you are dealing with. It is the first thing they teach to cancer patients as soon as they become aware of the disease". "In the song I address the topic of cancer in a very optimistic way, to exorcise it - the artist continued - what is broken, fix it. What is cancer? It is something that is not a virus and is not a bacterium... it is something that you generate. Perhaps one day we will discover that the genesis of cancer has a lot to do with the psyche".