If there is one sound that defines the American West in the global cultural imagination, it is not the banjo or the guitar, but the lonesome, reverb-drenched whistle of a Spaghetti Western soundtrack. This sound was largely the creation of one man: Alessandro Alessandroni, the "Whistler" of Ennio Morricone's masterpieces.
Alessandro Alessandroni (1925–2017) was an Italian multi-instrumentalist and a childhood friend of Ennio Morricone. When Morricone was scoring "A Fistful of Dollars" (1964), he needed a sound that could represent the isolation, ambiguity, and lethality of the "Man with No Name". He wanted something that sounded like the wind, or a bird of prey. He turned to Alessandroni. The resulting theme was a revolution.
Alessandroni's whistling style was distinct from the "Vaudeville" style. It was a new vernacular for the instrument:
- Tone: While traditional whistlers aimed for an operatic tone, Alessandroni was "dry" and piercing. He used a sharp, precise pucker technique that cut like a laser.
- Vibrato Control: He used vibrato sparingly, creating tension rather than resolution. This mimicked the natural sounds of the desert—the wind or a coyote howl.
- FX: The sound was heavily processed, recorded with close-miking then drenched in spring reverb and slap-back delay to create a sense of vast, open space.
Alessandroni whistled on the entire "Dollars Trilogy". The main theme of The Good, the Bad and the Ugly, with its iconic "coyote" motif (often described as Aie-aie-aah), features his whistling as a central voice. His contribution was so vital that Morricone once joked that Alessandroni was "essential" to the success of the films. The whistle became a sonic signifier for the Anti-Hero—cool, detached, and deadly.
Alessandroni proved that the whistle could be menacing, not just cheerful. He turned the instrument of the paperboy into the instrument of the bounty hunter. Today, the whistle is the most atmospheric instrument available to a composer, capable of evoking a landscape with a single breath.
