Salvatore Laporta / AP, file

Silvio Berlusconi sings during the final rally before electoral runoffs, in Naples, Italy on May 27, 2011.

By Claudio Lavanga, NBC News

ROME – When Silvio Berlusconi refused to step down at the height of Italy’s economic crisis, he was compared to the Emperor Nero, who is said to have watched Rome burn to the ground while playing a stringed instrument.
 
It now looks like somebody else was playing the guitar for Berlusconi; he was just writing the lyrics.
 
On Nov. 22, while Italy’s new prime minister, Mario Monti, and his government are trying to save Italy from economic meltdown, Berlusconi will release “True Love,” his latest CD of love songs.
 
The question is: Is Italy ready to face the music?

‘Stay with me…’
It is hard to say whether the timing of the release is purely coincidental, as the record label claims, or an attempt by the outgoing prime minister to soothe the pain of millions of Italians who will be hit by tax hikes and spending cuts by serenading them with love songs he wrote during the past two years.
 
The CD is the fourth record he has produced with Neapolitan singer and guitar player Mariano Apicella, who since 2003 has been considered the personal minstrel of Berlusconi.
The records never made it in to the billboard charts, but Berlusconi and Apicella’s improvised concerts, some of which were performed in the former prime minister’s summer villa in Sardinia in front of a selected audience of friends, became instant Youtube hits.
 
Playing along with Berlusconi has provided a fast track into his business and political empires. His pianist, Fedele Confalonieri, became the president of Berlusconi’s powerful media empire, Mediaset. But with Berlusconi slowly fading away in the political spectrum, Apicella might have jumped on this bandwagon a little too late.
 
In a curious way, some of the titles on the record seem appropriate for a politician in the dying days of his career.
 
“Stay With Me” sounds like a last, desperate appeal to the electorate, as well as the political allies who eventually lost faith in him.  “Stay with me, hold me tight, shower me with kisses. Stay with me. Fill me with love, please stay,” the song goes. The song “If I Lose You” has a similar refrain.
      
Another song, “Come What May” (Cascasse il mondo), sounds almost like the dignified acceptance of what the future may hold. With three ongoing trials that could lead to long prison sentences, it might not be the brightest of futures.    
 
And yet most are just plain, simple love songs, some sung in Neapolitan, from a man who claims he never lost a sense of joy in life. He certainly never hid his love of sheer hedonism, even while holding the most prestigious office in the Italian parliament.

Full circle
The release of his latest contribution to the world of music represents a full circle in the life of Berlusconi. While he was a young student, he paid for his studies by working as a crooner on cruise ships. (Click to see a good pic from the Guardian). 

Even while he was a successful businessman, and later prime minister, he never missed a chance to show off his vocal skills, entertaining his many guests with his singing. 
 
With more time in his hands and very little prospect of becoming prime minister for the fourth time in the next elections, will Berlusconi go back to his original passion and become a full-time singer?
 
Lucio Dalla, one of Italy’s greatest songwriters, has no doubt: “Nobody can question his skills. He sings very well. He is in tune and very melodic.”
 
As for love itself, in all of its forms, there is no doubt that it has always been at the center of Berlusconi’s life. Whether it be the affection many Italians showered on him for 17 long years, the allegedly sex-fueled parties he hosted in his private villas, or his troubled marriage with Veronica Lario, the beautiful former actress who divorced him recently, claiming she couldn’t live with a man “who consorts with minors.”

“True Love” seems an appropriate soundtrack to a remarkable career – however it ends.  

From Powerwall: Politicians and pundits who love to sing

Francois Lenoir / Reuters

Italy's Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi leaves a Euro zone leaders summit in Brussels on Oct. 27, 2011.

Claudio Lavanga, NBC News Producer

ROME – Italy’s Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi made his name as a businessman. He has, of course, become more famous for a series of sex scandals.

So it is ironic that Berlusconi, who has survived throughout his almost 18 years in power such an unprecedented sequence of embarrassing setbacks that would have seen the demise of any other leader in the democratic world, may end up defeated by what he should have known best: the economy.    

The ultimate survivor
Berlusconi is undoubtedly one of the biggest survivors in the history of Italian politics. Despite facing several legal actions, some of which are still ongoing, for abuse of office, corruption and most recently for allegedly having sex with an underage prostitute, he has been elected four times. In that most recent case, trouble came when he hastened the release from a police station of “Ruby the Heart Stealer” by claiming, falsely, that she was the niece of former Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak (despite the fact that she was, in fact, Moroccan).
 
And yet his biggest achievement to date, perhaps, is the ability to hold together hundreds of notoriously volatile parliamentarians who, in the history of Italian democracy, have swapped sides so many times that governments, usually, wouldn’t last longer than the foam on a cappuccino.
 
Despite his domestic approval rating being at an all-time low, and his credibility in the international scene irreparably undermined by his failure to introduce much-needed reforms to fix the economy, he has so far managed to convince his allies to stand by him.
 
His advocates say his survival can be attributed to his political prowess and his leadership skills. His critics say he simply bought their loyalty by repaying their support with funds and power seats, effectively turning the government into a parliamentarian swap-market.
 
Now it looks like he was beaten in his own game.

Italy: a bankrupt business
Before he entered politics in 1994, Berlusconi was one of the most noted businessmen in Italy, and one of the country’s richest men. After a stint as an entertainer on cruise ships, he became a property mogul, and later founded Mediaset, the first nationwide private broadcasting corporation, which is now a multi-billion dollar empire.
 
When Italy’s politics went through a generational change following a corruption scandal that broke down the government and its political system, he founded a party from scratch in a matter of months, and easily won election. He pledged to run Italy as he run his businesses, and considering his impressive track record, Italians gave him a wild card that lasted almost two decades.
 
It is now clear that if Italy had been one of his companies, it would be close to bankruptcy by now. Its debt, standing at 120 percent of the national GDP, is skyrocketing. There has been no growth for a number of years. And unsurprisingly, Berlusconi’s would be board of directors, the parliamentarians, are quickly abandoning him.  

Related link: Berlusconi denies speculation he is quitting
If Rome burns, US will feel the heat
Have Berlusconi's nine lives expired?

MAINZ, Germany - Germany's reputable Der Spiegel magazine calls Italy's leader a "bizarre archon." The Süddeutsche Zeitung daily writes "Europe is bewildered by Berlusconi".

As Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi faces charges that he paid a teenaged nightclub dancer for sex and later covered it up, have Italy's European neighbors become enstranged by a “bella Italia gone wild“?

"I am very surprised that the family-loving Italians have not gotten rid of Berlusconi yet," says 25-year old Sarah Levy, who is a mass communication major at the University of Mainz. "But this will not stop me from vacationing in my beloved Italy," she said, adding that she spent her family vacation in Italy every year until she turned 18.

Since the 1950s, when vast amounts of war-torn German tourists started flocking over the Alps with a yearning for picture-book summer beach nights with kitchy sunsets, Italian seaside holiday resorts, like Rimini, have been dubbed the "Teutonic Grill."

Today, Germans do not have to travel far to express their love for the (so non-German) laid-back, disorganized and flirtatious lifestyle of their southern European neighbors.

A visit to the Italian-run pizzeria around the corner, with names like "da Bruno" or "da Mario," or simply a scoop of "Straciatella" at one of Germany's Italian ice cream parlors – traditionally run by families from northern Italy during the spring and summer seasons – will often suffice to catch the spirit of "bella Italia."

Yes, in fact, Germans are more Italian than most people think.

The young generation here no longer bids farewell with a good ol' German "Auf Wiedersehen," but commonly uses "Ciao" these days. And a coffee is no longer called "kaffee," but has to be "espresso," "latte machiatto" or "cappuccino" in German street cafes and restaurants.

Yet, something seems to be different about Italy at the start of spring this year.

Suddenly, leading German radio stations have been cracking jokes about Italy's new image and its troubled prime minister, who has repeatedly been described as a “horny old man“ in the German press due to his alleged relations with a woman who goes by the stage name of Ruby the Heartstealer.

Ahead of Silvio Berlusconi's "Rubygate" sex scandal trial, German public radio SWR3 ran a 30-second Italian-German-English song parody that ridicules Berlusconi and feeds only negative cliches.

First Waka Waka, now Bunga Bunga
Inspired by Shakira's World Cup tribute “Waka Waka,“ the tune received new lyrics that read "Bunga with the Grappa / Daddy will pay / Shake Shake with the bottom / that's how Silvio is."

And now “Bunga Bunga“ has become a hit on German radio, and even inspired a lifestyle.

"The Berlusconi scandal is the hot topic when I chat to my German guests," says 71-year old Giuseppe Bruno, who has been running his restaurant Da Bruno in Wiesbaden for more than 38 years.

"Many of my German friends say that Berlusconi's behavior is terrible. But honestly, I don't mind Berlusconi and we usually laugh it all off over a glas of red Italian wine anyway," says Bruno, who has become somewhat of a legend after living 53 years in and around this central German city.

Meanwhile, university students across Germany are catching on to Italy's new party lifestyle and are organizing their very own Bunga Bunga gatherings.

"Celebrate like a real statesmen" read the invitation for a Bunga Bunga party at the law department of Hannover University.

And, students from the economics department in Mannheim designed a stylish and catchy "Silvio Wants You" poster for their Bunga Bunga celebration.

"I would do some intensive research before visiting one of these campus parties," say Sarah Levy. "Bunga Bunga sounds like it is all haywire, pure anarchy, without any rules and morality," Sarah added.

But frivolous Italian entertainment concepts are not all new in Germany.

In the early 1990s, German private broadcaster RTL aired a popular adaptation of Italian erotic game show "Colpo Grosso" (“The Great Coup")which was callled "Tutti Frutti" in Germany.

With some very basic and to the viewer often confusing games – which none of the people who tuned in probably really cared about – candidates on the show scored points that made a group of female striptease dancers in funny fruit costumes take off layers of their already minimal outfits, until they were left dressed with only their panties on.

And to top the cheesy game show concept, candidates could take off their own clothes to score additional points.

"The Berlusconi saga is no more than a modern-day Tutti Frutti show. It will soon be forgotten in both countries," says Albert Knechtel a German filmmaker, who speaks Italian and has shot documentaries in Italy.

Read the latest on Berlusconi's trial here.

STRINGER/ITALY / Reuters

Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi reacts during a news conference at Chigi Palace in Rome on Sept.23, 2010.

By NBC News’ Claudio Lavanga

Did you hear the one about Silvio and the Moroccan belly dancer?

Unfortunately, for the 74-year-old Italian leader, most of Italy has – and the people are not pleased.

A confidential new document containing lurid details about the investigation into the nature of Silvio Berlusconi’s relationship with Karima El Mahroug, an under-aged Moroccan belly dancer nicknamed “Ruby the Heart-Stealer,” could be the final straw for the seemingly indestructible Italian leader.

The 389-page investigation, leaked on the Web this week, contains wire taps of phone conversations full of candid details about backdoor dealings and wild parties that suggest the prime minister has lived a life of unconstrained debauchery aided by an entourage of teenage showgirls, television presenters and talent-scouts.

And it has led to a criminal investigation.

Prosecutors allege that Berlusconi paid for sex with the underage teen and then lied to authorities in order to cover it up.

The lengthy dossier was presented to Italy’s parliament on Monday in order to get special permission to search some of Berlusconi’s properties. Parliament said it will take at least a week to digest all of the information and issue a decision.

Some of the salacious quotes from the leaked wire tap include:

• “There were orgies in there – not with drugs, as far as I know. But they were all drinking, half undressed. Berlusconi started singing and telling jokes. Three [men] and 28 girls. By the end . . . the girls had no bras on and were wearing only those tight knickers.”
- Carlo Ferrigno, a former head of a police intelligence service and anti-racketeering commissioner

• “It’s unbelievable. You don’t know. All of them call him ‘love’ or ‘darling.’ You can’t begin to imagine what goes on there. The papers don’t tell the half of it, even when they’re massacring him.”
-  An unnamed party guest

Antonio Calanni / AP

Karima El Mahroug, an under-aged Moroccan belly dancer nicknamed “Ruby the Heart-Stealer,” whose encounters with Italy's Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi are at the base of a prostitution probe which is rocking Italian politics, is interviewed for a TV show in Milan, Italy, on Wednesday.

•  “[Berlusconi] called me and said, ‘Ruby, I’ll give you whatever amount you want. I’ll pay you. I’ll cover you in gold, but the important thing is to keep everything under wraps. Don’t say a thing to anyone.’”
- Karima El Mahroug, aka “Ruby the Heart Stealer,” to former boyfriend Sergio Corsaro on Oct. 7, 2010

• “I told Silvio I wanted 5 million euros for all this. He said that I should just keep making things up and pretend I’m mad – but not reveal anything and stay quiet.”
- El Mahroug to a friend

• “You either do everything or you take a taxi and leave. It’s a real whorehouse there. Berlusconi is touching all the girls’ bottoms. It’s worse than the papers say.”
-  Unidentified girl who went to party, to a friend

•  “If you do these things in your own bedroom, fine. But in front of everyone else? I ask how [he] can go to work the next day?”
- Unidentified girl who went to party to a friend

•  “I thought he’d put on weight; he looked uglier. Last year, [Berlusconi] was looking fitter; now he’s looking over the hill. And he’s ugly with it. He’s just got to cough up. Let’s hope he’s more generous.”
- Showgirl Imma De Vivo, to her twin sister, Eleonora, on Sept. 25, 2010

• “I’ve been going to the prime minister’s house since I was 16 years old, but I have always denied everything to protect him.”
- El Mahroug to a friend on Oct. 26, 2010

• “She [El Mahroug] said she was very friendly with the Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi. She often went to his house for dinner, to sing, dance, and she had sex with him, for which he gave her lots of money.”
- El Mahroug's roommate, Caterina Pasquina, to investigators

‘The Heart-stealer’
It all started with a minor incident that quickly snowballed into one of Italy’s biggest political scandal: In May of last year, El Mahroug, a runaway teenager, was arrested on suspicion of theft in the northern city of Milan.

While the police looked into the report that she stole thousands of euros and expensive watches from an Italian woman at a beauty parlour she briefly worked for, they thought they were dealing with a minor who got herself in trouble after running away from her family in Sicily. But even before they managed to contact her parents, they received a call from the most unlikely of guardian: Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi.

ALESSANDRO GAROFALO / Reuters

Nicole Minetti smiles during a meeting at the Lombardy regional headquarters in Milan on Jan. 18.

From Paris, he said that she was the niece of Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak and asked for her immediate release in order to avoid a diplomatic incident. The police obeyed without asking questions, and handed the girl over to another shady character in Berlusconi’s entourage: Nicole Minetti, a former showgirl and dental hygienist who treated Berlusconi’s injuries after he was attacked with a marble statue in 2009, and who was elected in the regional elections for his People of Freedom’s Party months later.

When it became clear that El Mahroug wasn’t related to the Egyptian president, and in fact wasn’t Egyptian at all, she was a 17-year-old Moroccan, investigators asked: Why would the prime minister go to such lengths, including lying to the police, to ensure the release of an unrelated teenager?

Cash, diamonds and Bunga-Bunga 
Back in September 2009, El Mahroug wasn’t a heart stealer, but was dreaming of becoming one.

She hit the catwalk at a local beauty contest in a small town in Sicily hoping her Mediterranean beauty would propel her into the world of show business, but only managed to win a minor ribbon.

However, one of the judges at the contest was said to be 80-year-old Emilio Fede, a trusted friend of Berlusconi and a journalist who makes no secret of his staunch support for the prime minister during his newscasts on Italy’s Channel 4.

According to El Mahroug’s testimony, she met Fede through Lele Mora, a show business talent-scout and close aide of Berlusconi, and was later invited to Arcore, Berlusconi’s private residence on the outskirts of Milan.

At first, she told investigators, she was invited for dinner and showered with expensive presents, such as 7,000 euros (about $9,400) and a diamond necklace. During one of her dinners at Berlusconi’s residence, she claims to have attended one of his after-parties, the infamous “bunga-bunga,” an erotic ritual that she says Berlusconi learnt from his friend Muammar Gaddafi, the Libyan leader.

While El Mahroug has always maintained that she never had sex with the prime minister, she told magistrates that the bunga-bunga parties were hardcore orgies with tens of skimpily-dressed or naked aspiring showgirls flirting with the prime minister, who later would choose whom to have sex with.

Nevertheless, the main question investigators are looking into is: Was the  prime minister aware that El Mahroug was underage?

From BLTWY: How to party like Silvio Berlusconi

‘I just wanted to help’ 
When confronted about the allegations, Berlusconi initially downplayed the incident by claiming he took pity on the teenager and simply wanted to help her out. But magistrates following the case believe that his charitable work went beyond giving El Mahroug another shot at freedom and showering her with expensive presents.

Information about her movements, obtained by investigators who monitored her mobile phone, show that El Mahroug downplayed the extent of her relationship with the prime minister.

Instead of attending only a few parties, as El Mahroug claimed, the data revealed she spent whole weekends in Berlusconi’s private residence without leaving the premises, raising questions over the real nature of their relationship.

In Italy, paying for sex with an under-aged woman is a crime punishable with a maximum sentence of three years in prison.  

Is Berlusconi a projection of the average Italian?
When El Mahroug's scandal made headlines at the end of last year, it was easy to believe the prime minister would sail through the latest crisis in his typical defiant fashion. After all, it wasn’t the first time he was accused of having had sex with a prostitute, nor was it the first time his relationship with teenagers was called into question.

In 2009, an escort named Patrizia D'Addario claimed to have slept with Berlusconi at his Rome residence and released secret recordings of their conversations, which seemed to support her claim.

The same year, his wife filed for divorce saying she could no longer be with a man who “consorts with minors” after it emerged he attended the 18th birthday party of an aspiring model, Noemi Letizia. Scores of other women, some claiming to be prostitutes, have since come forward claiming to have attended Berlusconi’s parties.

And yet Italians don’t seem to mind. Most of his supporters have accepted his theory that he is the victim of a plot by “communist magistrates” who are out to get him.

But his apparent invincibility, according to one of sociologist Franco Ferrarotti, comes from the fact he is the projection of what most Italians would like to be.

“They see in him a lot of what they are,” Ferrarotti told msnbc.com. “Italians are hypocrites by nature: In public, they condemn his action. But in the privacy of their own bedroom, they are very, very liberal.”

Can the invincible Berlusconi survive this one?
Everyone is equal before the law.  But is Berlusconi “more equal” than others?

The investigation was announced just hours after Italy’s Constitutional Court ruled as unlawful parts of an immunity law that would have prevented Berlusconi from going on trial.

Faced with mounting pressure and the prospect of prosecution, Berlusconi has defended himself in typical fashion: by appearing on television.

As a media mogul, Berlusconi is credited with both building his wealth and his political fortunes on the exploitation of his three commercial television channels. So it didn’t come to anyone’s surprise when once again he professed his innocence to Italians by broadcasting a video message.

"There's nothing I should be ashamed of,” he said in the pre-recorded message. “I would like to go on trial immediately, but with impartial judges, not with prosecutors who want to use this case as a means of political fight."

The lower house of parliament now has one month to consider the request to search Berlusconi’s premises to find evidence against him.

But one thing is certain: Despite the fact he is the man who introduced variety shows, quiz games and drama serials to Italian audiences, no soap opera can match the twist and turns of his life.