Berlusconi revives musical career with new CD

ROME (AP) ― Silvio Berlusconi is reviving his musical career, just a week out of office.

The billionaire media mogul and three-time Italian premier released a new CD with his longtime musical collaborator Mariano Apicella on Tuesday.

Berlusconi ― a one-time cruise ship crooner ― doesn’t sing on the new collection, titled “True Love,” but co-wrote all 11 songs.

The album features love songs and jazz arrangements. It is the fourth CD that Berlusconi and Apicella, a Neapolitan guitarist and singer, have recorded together.

It’s too early to say how sales are going. “I think that with his great experience he will be able to write very good love songs,” said Maria Grazia Merilli, a tourist from Florence near a store in Rome where the CD was on sale. “No, absolutely not, I would never buy it.”

Another passer by was less appreciative of Berlusconi’s musical gifts.

“I don’t like him either as a politician nor as a songwriter. He is disgusting,” said Maria Rossi.

Berlusconi resigned Nov. 12 after failing to come up with economic reforms that could persuade markets and European partners that Italy could escape the continent’s debt crisis.

The twice-married ex-premier has often boasted of his prowess with women. Parties at his residences attended by attractive young women have landed in him trouble with prosecutors, who have charged him with allegedly having paid for sex with an underage Moroccan teen and using his influence to cover it up.

Berlusconi denies the charge. The trial is under way in Milan.