PERUGIA – The case of the‘Umbria that Rocks it is an exception to the rule in many ways. That of content, first of all, because a festival like this, with guests of this caliber, and of this kind of size, would not even be conceivable if its artistic director were not one of the most important musicians on the Italian rock-pop scene. When Aimone Romizi he picks up the phone and more or less everyone answers him, and more or less everyone, faced with his proposals, turns out to be willing not to raise the stakes too much. This is also why in the next few days you will be able to hear in Perugia, for example, Mahmood, Colapesce and Dimartino, Nada, Salmo, Fulminacci.
Then there is the institutional dimension: everyone loves Umbria che Spacca, also because an event capable of attracting thousands of young people aged thirty – let’s say thirty-five – and under is a kind of golden goose, and almost no one, among those involved in politics in our parts, resists the temptation to be included in the souvenir photos of the increasingly large presentation press conferences. Finally there is the social dimension, which then, also tying in with what has just been said, inevitably has a formidable fallout in political terms, because Umbria che Spacca is a small world that moves all year round involving the best youth energies of the city, and which in the days of the actual festival – for this eleventh edition from next Wednesday to Sunday – is supported by work of three hundred and fifty people. Professionals, workers, and many volunteers.
The crowd at this morning’s press conference at Palazzo Donini was usual, but with a couple of new elements compared to the recent past. First of all, the one holding the reins was not Aimone Romizi, who was still sitting in the front row, but the new president of the association Roghers Andrea Mancini Staff. And next to Mancini, among the representatives of the institutions, there was Vittoria Ferdinandimayor of Perugia for less than a week.
“The emotion, as I climbed the stairs, was very great. I feel an enormous sense of belonging towards L’Umbria che Spacca. The roles change, but the intentions and stories that unite us are always the same,” she said. Because Ferdinandi, practically the same age as the organizers, saw the festival born and grow. And because over time, with his Number zero, has entered into a collaboration which, beyond the clear ethical and, once again, social and political implications, in some ways is the paradigm of the relationship between the event and the neighborhood in which it has taken root for some time now, that of Borgo XX Giugno. “We didn’t come to invade it, but to work together,” Mancini said. It’s obvious. The Frontone, the spaces of the Faculty of Agriculture, the T-Trane which this year from Friday to Sunday will host the Deejays for BreakfastThe bulk of it is there.
Ferdinandi stole the show from Donatella Tesei, the landlady who has never failed to support Umbria che Spacca, and from the representatives of the University, University for Foreigners, National Gallery of Umbria and the Perugia Foundation. All fundamental partners, for the economic bases that they contribute to creating and – in the case of Gnu and universities – in the development of contents. This time there are eight stages, more than two hundred guests, and numerous sold out concerts. It’s difficult to find a seat at the Gallery, impossible for Mahmood in Salmo in Noiz.
Il plan it is however boundless, and if you want advice take a look at what Stranieri has in store with its series of debates with a markedly social flavor (gender violence, accessibility of culture, exploitation of work and discrimination in the music business), or throw yourself into Colapesce and Dimartino (Wednesday evening, with Giovanni Truppi) or Fulminacci (Thursday), on the Main Stage of the Frontone.
Also on Thursday, at 7pm at the Unipg Stage in the Agraria parking lot, there is a champion on July 4th like Frankie hi_nrg MC. Free, in collaboration with the Festival Free Ram – Random Access Music, organized by Vivoumbria.it with the support of MiC and SIAE as part of the “For those who create” program, which will see 5 bands and 3 DJs under 35 perform. Tomorrow, at 11 am in the Sala Fiume of Palazzo Doinini, there will be the presentation press conference. Another painful sold out is that of Micah P. Hinson, on Saturday at dawn at the botanical gardens: the American folksinger’s concerts are always a bomb.
The declared model is that of the large European festival-campuses such as the Sziget in Budapest: people arrive (“especially from Lombardy, Lazio and Tuscany”, said Romizi) and find a community welcoming them, and five days dotted with events almost around the clock twenty-four hours a day. Perugia in a size that fits her very well. Perugia that refuses to reflect too much on itself. And from now on, with the installation of the new municipal administration, it will be called upon, by virtue of the small revolution implemented by Vittoria Ferdinandi, to make an inevitable change of pace. In a few days the council will see the light of day, and before and after the conference it was all a question of who will be responsible for culture. The kids from Umbria that Spacca have clear ideas about the characteristics that the next councilor will have to have. Aimone Romizi, as always, very clear: “Contemporaneity. A culture councilor must know what is happening in the world. The world is elusive, and keeping up to date is a full-time job. Like that of the artistic director. What is good today may not be good next year: you have to study, search, continually reinvent yourself.” Speech fully endorsed by Andrea Mancini: “But I say that freshness will also be needed. We will need a person who has a vision and knows how to think in perspective.” Meanwhile, the music.
