Dhaka, March 25 -- Gino Paoli, the singer‑songwriter who helped reshape Italian popular music in the 1960s with poetic, introspective songs such as "Il cielo in una stanza" (The sky in a room) and "Sapore di sale" (The taste of salt) has died at 91, his family said on Tuesday.

Paoli was a central figure in a school of songwriters from the northern Italian city of Genoa, alongside Fabrizio De Andre and Luigi Tenco, who brought literary ambition and emotional realism to Italian pop music in the post‑war era.

In a career spanning more than six decades, Paoli remained an influential presence in Italian music well into old age, with many of his enduring songs recorded by other artists including Ornella Vanoni, with whom he had an...