Life in a big city offers a lot of material for song lyrics. A look at millions of songs has produced a ranking of the cities sung about the most.
Image: picture-alliance/Prisma/C. Bowman
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High Five: European cities of a thousand songs
Cities inspire legends - and songwriters too. Thousands of songs have been written about cities all over the world. Here's a ranking of the most sung-about cities in Europe.
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Milan
With its elegant architecture, the creativity of a fashion metropolis and two top soccer teams, there are plenty of reasons to serenade the Italian city. It comes in fifth in the ranking of cities in Europe that are the topic of songs - exactly 3,854 of them were written about Milan, most of them in Italian.
Image: Getty Images/AFP/M. Medina
Berlin
With 6,267 songs, Berlin ranks fourth. Some of the tunes testify to the deep love-hate relationship Germans have for their capital. The band Seeed sings about dire grey winters there in the popular "Dickes B," while Kraftclub shines a light on the hype about the city in "Ich will nicht nach Berlin" (I don't want to go to Berlin). Neither detracts from the city's popularity.
Image: picture-alliance/R. Schlesinger
Rome
Many stars have sung about the eternal city. Elvis Presley warbles about a love affair in Rome in "Heart of Rome," Frank Sinatra immortalizes the famous Trevi Fountain with "Three Coins in the Fountain". And there are many more - Rome came in third in the ranking with 11,859 songs.
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London
The potential playlist for the British capital is even longer: 14,805 songs were written about London, including The Clash's 1979 "London Calling." More recently, Adele has honored her hometown with "Hometown Glory" and in "The City," Ed Sheeran sings about the challenges of being new to London.
Image: picture-alliance/Prisma/C. Bowman
Paris
Paris has inspired even more musicians. Paris-born and bred chanson singer Edith Piaf sang many a song about her hometown. Ella Fitzgerald, Mireille Mathieu and Zaz are also included in the long list of musicians who sing about the city of love and romance. With no less than 20,007 songs, Paris tops the list of European cities that have been sung about the most.
Image: picture-alliance/dpa/P. Kneffel
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It's easy to guess the winner in the worldwide ranking of cities that inspired the most songs: New York, with a whopping 30,867 songs. That's according to a study by a travel agency and a lyrics online platform that scanned 14 million international song texts for city names.
Everyone has heard at least one song about New York, be it Frank Sinatra's time-honored unofficial anthem "New York, New York" or Jay Z and Alicia Keys' "Empire State of Mind" - the new unofficial city anthem. Other favorites include Taylor Swift's "Welcome to New York" and Ed Sheeran with "New York." The study also found that at least a dozen New-York-themed songs join the long list every year.
What follows New York in the ranking?
Two European cities, although a far cry from the top-ranked Big Apple. The High Five ranking of European cities featured most often in songs reveals who came in second and third.
