"Nella Fantasia" is an Italian

Italian language

Italian is a Romance language spoken mainly in Europe: Italy, Switzerland, San Marino, Vatican City, by minorities in Malta, Monaco, Croatia, Slovenia, France, Libya, Eritrea, and Somalia, and by immigrant communities in the Americas and Australia...

 song based on the theme "Gabriel's Oboe

Gabriel's Oboe

"Gabriel's Oboe" is the main theme for the 1986 film The Mission directed by Roland Joffé. The theme was written by Italian composer Ennio Morricone, and has since been arranged and performed several times by artists such as Yo-Yo Ma, Holly Gornik, and Brynjar Hoff, among others. The theme has been...

" from the film The Mission (1986). With music by famed composer

Musical composition

Musical composition can refer to an original piece of music, the structure of a musical piece, or the process of creating a new piece of music. People who practice composition are called composers.- Musical compositions :...

 Ennio Morricone

Ennio Morricone

Ennio Morricone, Grand Officer OMRI, , is an Italian composer and conductor, who wrote music to more than 500 motion pictures and television series, in a career lasting over 50 years. His scores have been included in over 20 award-winning films as well as several symphonic and choral pieces...

 and lyrics

Lyrics

Lyrics are a set of words that make up a song. The writer of lyrics is a lyricist or lyrist. The meaning of lyrics can either be explicit or implicit. Some lyrics are abstract, almost unintelligible, and, in such cases, their explication emphasizes form, articulation, meter, and symmetry of...

 by Chiara Ferraù, "Nella Fantasia" is popular among classical crossover singers, and was originally sung by Sarah Brightman

Sarah Brightman

Sarah Brightman is an English classical crossover soprano, actress, songwriter and dancer. She is famous for possessing a vocal range of over 3 octaves and singing in the whistle register...

. Other artists have performed the song as well, such as argentinian tenor Javier Fontana, Donald Braswell II

Donald Braswell II

Donald Braswell II is an American actor, classical crossover tenor and composer. Braswell was on a fast track to become an internationally acclaimed opera singer when he suffered a car accident in 1995 that made him unable to speak for almost two years...

, Amici Forever

Amici Forever

Amici Forever is a band of four classically trained singers who mix opera with pop music . The band's first album, The Opera Band , reached number one on the Australian classical charts, number two on the United States classical charts and the top 5 in the United Kingdom classical...

, Celtic Woman

Celtic Woman

Celtic Woman is an all-female musical ensemble conceived and assembled by Sharon Browne and David Downes, a former musical director of the Irish stage show Riverdance...

 (Chloë Agnew

Chloë Agnew

Chloë Alexandra Adele Emily Agnew is an Irish singer who is one of the current members of the Celtic music group Celtic Woman as the youngest member. She comes from Knocklyon, County Dublin where she lived with her mother Adele "Twink" King and younger sister Naomi...

), Garðar Thór Cortes

Garðar Thór Cortes

Garðar Thór Cortes , is an Icelandic tenor of Icelandic and English parentage. A former child actor, Cortes subsequently trained as a singer in Vienna, Copenhagen and London. He has performed various leading tenor roles in operas, as well as a leading part in The Phantom of the Opera in London's...

, Il Divo

Il Divo

Il Divo is a multinational operatic pop vocal group created by music manager, executive, and reality TV star Simon Cowell. Formed in the United Kingdom, they are also signed to Cowell's record label, Syco Music...

, The Celtic Tenors, Katherine Jenkins

Katherine Jenkins

Katherine Jenkins is a Welsh mezzo-soprano. She is a classical-popular crossover singer who performs across a spectrum of operatic arias, popular songs, musical theatre and hymns.-Early life and education:...

, Russell Watson

Russell Watson

Russell Watson is an English tenor who has released singles and albums of both operatic-style and pop songs. The self-styled "People's Tenor" had been singing since he was a child, and became known after performing at a working men's club...

, Amaury Vassili

Amaury Vassili

Amaury Vassili is a French singer and the professional tenor. His debut album Vincerò from 2009 went double platinum in France, and he has had international success with releases in Canada, South Africa and South Korea.-Biography:Amaury Vassili, born Amaury Vassili Chotard, began singing around...

, Jackie Evancho

Jackie Evancho

Jacqueline Marie "Jackie" Evancho is an American child singer described as a classical crossover artist. After entering some talent competitions, issuing an independent album, Prelude to a Dream, and attracting interest on YouTube, she gained wider popularity in 2010 with her performances in the...

, Wendy Kokkelkoren with Guido's Orchestra,vocal group FOURTE and Summer Watson

Summer Watson

Summer Watson is a British operatic soprano.- Background :Watson was raised in East Sussex and Oxfordshire as her parents' only child. She began to play the recorder at the age of four, and continued with the flute and the piano later on. She was also singing hymns from an early age, and took part...

. In 2007, the winner of the first season of the British TV show Britain's Got Talent

Britain's Got Talent

Britain's Got Talent is a British television talent show competition which started in June 2007 and originated from the Got Talent series. The show is produced by FremantleMedia's TalkbackThames and Simon Cowell's production company SYCOtv. The show is broadcast on ITV in Britain and TV3 in Ireland...

, Paul Potts

Paul Potts

Paul Robert Potts is an English pop opera tenor who won the first series of ITV's Britain's Got Talent in 2007, singing an operatic aria, "Nessun dorma" from Puccini's "Turandot". As a singer of operatic music, Potts recorded the album One Chance, which went to #1 in nine countries...

, covered this song on his album One Chance.
Ricardo Marinello–Germany's "Supertalent"–performed the song on his first album The Beginning (2007). In 2006 Australian singer Kane Alexander recorded a version for his debut self titled album. The song features on the album Brand New Day by the group Tenors UnLimited.

Origin

"Nella Fantasia" first appeared on Sarah Brightman's album Eden

Eden (Sarah Brightman album)

Eden is a 1998 album by English soprano Sarah Brightman. It was released under license by Nemo Studios to Angel Records.Like Brightman's later album, La Luna, Eden juxtaposed mostly English pop songs with mostly Italian opera songs. This was a departure from her previous albums which was almost...

(1998). A music video for the song was released on brightman's "Diva- The video collection DVD" in 2006 and the song sold 2 million digital copies in South Korea. On the March 1999 video

Video

Video is the technology of electronically capturing, recording, processing, storing, transmitting, and reconstructing a sequence of still images representing scenes in motion.- History :...

 recording of her "One Night in Eden" concert, when introducing the song she said:
In the liner notes

Liner notes

Liner notes are the writings found in booklets which come inserted into the compact disc jewel case or the equivalent packaging for vinyl records and cassettes.-Origin:...

 of Eden, the lyricist of the song was named as "Ferraù". However, it has been suggested on the fansite

Fansite

A fansite, fan site, or fanpage is a website created and maintained by a fan or devotee interested in a celebrity, thing, or a particular cultural phenomenon...

 Sarahbrightman.co.uk that the Italian lyrics of the song were written by Brightman herself. It is possible that Brightman wrote the lyrics of the song in English and they were translated into Italian by Ferraù. Confusingly, the liner notes of Brightman's subsequent album The Very Best of 1990–2000 (2001), which also featured the song, state that the composers of the song were Berta Ferraud and Ennio Morricone. It may be that "Berta" is a nickname and "Ferraud" a misspelling. In fact, there exists an early version of "Nella Fantasia" called "In Fondo alla Mente" (At the back of the mind) sung by Sarah Brightman. The lyrics of this song differ from those of Nella Fantasia, and it never was released.

Later recordings by Il Divo

Il Divo

Il Divo is a multinational operatic pop vocal group created by music manager, executive, and reality TV star Simon Cowell. Formed in the United Kingdom, they are also signed to Cowell's record label, Syco Music...

 on their self-titled album Il Divo (2004), by Amici Forever

Amici Forever

Amici Forever is a band of four classically trained singers who mix opera with pop music . The band's first album, The Opera Band , reached number one on the Australian classical charts, number two on the United States classical charts and the top 5 in the United Kingdom classical...

 on their album Defined

Defined (album)

Defined is an album by popera group Amici Forever released in 2005.-Track listing:#"La Fiamma Sacra "#"Nella Fantasia"#"The Prayer"#"Aranjuez Ma Pensee"#"So Far Away"#"Nostalgia "#"Core'ngrato "...

(2005), and by Garðar Thór Cortes

Garðar Thór Cortes

Garðar Thór Cortes , is an Icelandic tenor of Icelandic and English parentage. A former child actor, Cortes subsequently trained as a singer in Vienna, Copenhagen and London. He has performed various leading tenor roles in operas, as well as a leading part in The Phantom of the Opera in London's...

 on his album Cortes (UK release, 2007) confirm that the lyricist of the song is a female composer named Chiara Ferraù.

Japanese Classical Crossover singer Kanon (singer)

Kanon (singer)

Kanon is a Japanese singer and song-writer born in Tokyo, Japan on March 9, 1980. She is signed to Sony Music Japan International.Her latest mini album, My Road ~ Songs for Guin Saga was released on August 26, 2009. Her fifth album planned to be released on March 31, 2011 as she stated on her blog....

 recorded the song and included it on her 2007 album "Precious" .

It is also one of the pieces used in the classical music-themed 2008 Korean TV drama Beethoven Virus

Beethoven Virus

Beethoven Virus is a 2008 MBC TV drama in Korea. It was screened Wednesday and Thursday nights on MBC. This show drew attention for being the first drama to depict the lives of classical musicians and orchestra in Korea....

 (Episode 3).

In June 2011, the song was sung by 22-year-old Sung-Bong Choi, a "Korea's Got Talent

Korea's Got Talent

Korea's Got Talent is a Korean reality television show that premiered on 4 June 2011 on tvN Asia. The show is based on the Got Talent series format, which originated with Britain's Got Talent. This is the show's first series in Korea...

" show competitor. The video of his performance has recently gone viral and now has over 14 million views on YouTube.

Lyrics

The lyrics of "Nella Fantasia" are as follows:

Italian

English translation

Nella fantasia io vedo un mondo giusto, Lì tutti vivono in pace e in onestà. Io sogno d'anime che sono sempre libere, Come le nuvole che volano, Pien' d'umanità in fondo all'anima. Nella fantasia io vedo un mondo chiaro, Lì anche la notte è meno oscura. Io sogno d'anime che sono sempre libere, Come le nuvole che volano. Nella fantasia esiste un vento caldo, Che soffia sulle città, come amico. Io sogno d'anime che sono sempre libere, Come le nuvole che volano, Pien' d'umanità in fondo all'anima.

In my imagination I see a fair world, Everyone lives in peace and in honesty there. I dream of souls that are always free, Like the clouds that fly, Full of humanity in the depths of the soul. In my imagination I see a bright world, Even the night is less dark there. I dream of souls that are always free, Like clouds that fly. In my imagination there exists a warm wind, That breathes on the cities, like a friend. I dream of souls that are always free, Like clouds that fly, Full of humanity in the depths of the soul.