Tony Bennett Photo: CFP

Whenever crooner Tony Bennett returns to the land of his roots, he feels overwhelmed.

"When I sing in Rome or anywhere in Italy, I get a complex," he said.

Bennett, currently on a tour of Europe that will also take him to Spain, Germany, Sweden, Finland, Norway and Iceland before it ends in August, left the Rome crowd stunned that he could still belt out his famous songs with style despite his 85 years.

His mother, who worked in a clothing sweatshop in New York earning a penny a dress, was the daughter of immigrants from the same region of southern Italy. His father died when Tony was 10.

Bennett came up from "complete poverty" and has been a social activist most of his life, taking an active part in the civil rights movement in the US in the 1960s.

Reuters