EUROPEAN MUSIC FESTIVAL 2024 “ELISA’S HEART IN THE HEART OF AFRICA”: Event to support the creation of the “Elisa Claps” medical clinic in Goma, Democratic Republic of Congo organized by Pro Loco Potenza, the “Carlo Gesualdo da Venosa” State Conservatory of Music of Potenza and the “Dinu Adamesteanu” National Archaeological Museum, with the patronage of the Municipality of Potenza-
AFTERNOON (first part)
Friday 21 June 2024, 6.30pm
MAN of Basilicata – Palazzo Loffredo
FREE ADMISSION
EVENING (second part)
Friday 21 June 2024, 9pm
Piazza Matteotti, Potenza
ENTRY BY INVITATION*
(access to seats starting from 8.00 pm)
Potenza – When in 1982 Jack Lang and Maurice Fleuret gave life to the first edition of the Music Festival, perhaps they did not know that they had organized a sort of instrumental flash mob ante litteram, inviting all amateur and professional musicians to take to the streets, “appropriate” the kiosks, stations and play freely anywhere for thirty minutes.
Perhaps they did not imagine that, starting from their slogan: “music everywhere, concerts nowhere”, but above all the idea of ”highlighting the multiplicity and diversity of musical practices, for all genres of music” (art. 2 of the Budapest Charter) the opportunity for this art to be a concrete expression of democracy would have flourished again. Of equality and equal dignity.
The June 21st, deliberately coinciding with the summer solstice, also in Italy as in more than 120 countries since ’97, music spreads across streets, squares and courtyards.
In urban contexts that are not usually used to stage shows.
The desire is to celebrate every musical genre.
The beat is about the universality that this art possesses. The upbeat is about the power to carry out the function of integration and social cohesion.
The Music Festival peacefully “invades” hospitals, prisons and places of social hardship where the need for a melody that touches and consoles the heartstrings becomes stronger.
For this strong thread of connection between the ideals of the Music Festival and Elisa’s dream of choosing the mission of medicine to practice in Africa, the 2024 edition in Potenza becomes an opportunity for a competition for the construction of the “Elisa Claps” medical clinic in Goma, Democratic Republic of Congo.
This is an event of national importance which will be held through the collaboration between the Pro Loco of Potenza, the “Carlo Gesualdo da Venosa” Conservatory, the “Dinu Adamesteanu” National Archaeological Museum and with the patronage of the Municipality of Potenza, because the world of culture and civil unite in a single chorus in favor of the cause.
How many obstacles and barriers would this very young girl have to overcome to realize a dream that was instead shattered by inhuman violence?
How much is the entire city of Potenza indebted to Elisa and her family’s pain?
A strong sound that many would have liked to remain heavy. A sound that today becomes transfigured into beauty, into the future, into the generosity of an idea despite everything.
If from some of the lyrical works beyond the tragedy we perceive the presence of the germ of hope and if that same powerful sprout is born from a family tragedy, then we cannot help but water it together.
To help Elisa Claps realize her dream for others.
The “Music Festival” 2024 – We are the first Orchestra – is dedicated to musical bands.
They will spread wonderful music two moments, one in the afternoon at 6.30 pm at the “Dinu Adamesteanu” Archaeological Museum (Free Entry) and one in the evening at 9.00 pm in Piazza Matteotti (Entry by invitation with access to seats from 8.00 pm) which will be presented by journalists Angela Di Maggio and Nico Basile.
The afternoon appointment will see the performance of “Siate solo giovani”, organized by the DRM-Basilicata in collaboration with Metamorfosi and Orchestra Maldestra.
For the evening event, the protagonists will be Wind Orchestra of the “Carlo Gesualdo da Venosa” Conservatory of Potenza and the Potentino pianist Donatello Giambersio directed by Maestro Rocco Eletto, with the collaboration of the singers Giusi and Paola Telesca.
The event will begin with the performance of “il Fiore Bianco” (composition by Matteo Buzzanca for the opening theme of the Rai drama dedicated to Elisa Claps) which will be performed by the piano soloist Donatello Giambersio and the singers Giusi and Paola Telesca.
The Orchestra’s musical program will open with “The pines of the Appian Way”, the fourth movement of the Symphonic Poem “The pines of Rome” by Ottorino Respighi, depicting the pines along the ancient Roman consular artery Via Appia.
On a foggy dawn, a legion advances along the Appian Way in the brightness of the newly risen sun.
Respighi wanted to make people feel the earth tremble under the footsteps of an army; this piece requires the use of buccine (ancient trumpets currently represented by the flugelhorn).
The piece ends with a triumph of trumpets of the legions on the Capitoline Hill.
This will be followed by the Overture from “Light Cavalry”, an operetta by Franz von Suppé set in the 19th century in an Austrian village where the events of the dramaturgical plot are accompanied by the arrival of a regiment of Hussars.
It will then be the turn of “In a Persian Market” by Albert William Ketelbey which is a typical example of program music, in which oriental sounds and melodies are mixed with the symphonic writing of the European tradition, to describe a Middle Eastern market scene.
This will be followed by the “Slavic March”, written by Tchaikovsky in September 1876 on the occasion of a charity event in favor of the Slavic soldiers who had been injured during the Serbo-Turkish war of those years.
The main theme, taken from a Serbian folklore song, begins the introduction which then, little by little, develops with perfect orchestral design, concluding the work with festive tones and with a splendid march in which the old hymn is increasingly highlighted national “Bože, Zarja chrani!”, the tsarist anthem.
At the heart of the program, we will find at this point Rhapsody in Blue which is one of the most famous works by the American composer George Gershwin and which will have the Potentino pianist Donatello Giambersio as soloist.
This fuses two musical genres, jazz and classical music.
The musical culture from which Gershwin comes certainly leads him to insert jazz or blues sounds and arrangements into a classical genre, hence the title of the composition.
The Rhapsody is strongly representative of the New York metropolitan reality and more generally of American culture.
In fact, the original title conceived by Gershwin was American Rhapsody; the author himself declared: «… I heard it as a sort of multicolored fantasy, a musical kaleidoscope of America, with our mixture of races, our incomparable national panache, our blues, our metropolitan madness.».
Following “Danzón n. 2” by Arturo Márquez: very famous piece, includes solos for clarinet, oboe, piano, French horn, trumpet, flute and piccolo; thanks to Oliver Nickel’s arrangement, it has earned an important place in modern concert orchestra literature.
The concert will conclude “Tico-Tico no Fubá” (“Rufous-collared Sparrow in Cornmeal”) which is a Brazilian choro song written by Zequinha de Abreu in 1917.
Its original title was “Tico-Tico no farelo” (“sparrow in the bran”), but since the Brazilian guitarist Américo Jacomino “Canhoto” had a work with the same title, Abreu’s work was given its current name in 1931.
ENTRY is by invitation.
*INVITES are available while supplies last at Punto Service, Via Messina 223, Potenza. (Text by the organizers)
