Tommaso Zanello, aka Piotta, has decided to take legal action against the organization of the Tenco Prize 2024. After the ‘dialect case’, through his lawyers, the Roman artist presented a formal warning to the president of the Prize, requesting access to the documents and the suspension of the award for the ‘Album in dialect’ category. Piotta participated in the Tenco Prize with his latest album ‘Na Notte Infame’, published by La Grande Onda in 2024. The nomination of the album in the ‘Album in dialect’ category – as stated in the warning – was accepted without objections by the organizers. However, to the great surprise of the artist and his staff, the album was not included in the list of finalists. Piotta’s lawyer expressed the artist’s disappointment for the lack of prior communication of the exclusion, which was made known only after the official announcement of the finalists.
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The defense underlines that there is no reasonable motivation to justify this exclusion, which appears “unreasonable, specious and also incongruous from an artistic point of view”. The album ‘Na Notte Infame’, the lawyers write, «is objectively interpreted in Roman dialect», and this «not only in our opinion but that of various institutions and cultural associations» and by experts in the sector, including the Department of Culture Municipality of Rome III, the Lando Fiorini Cultural Association, and various professors of linguistics and music. In particular, Giovanni Vacca of the University of Rome 3 – Dams praised Piotta’s work in an email sent to the Prize Commission while the president of the Accademia della Crusca, Paolo D’Achille, in an interview with Adnkronos said : «Piotta is right, there is a blurred border between Italian and Roman».
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Club Tenco stated that the album would not comply with the requirements of the regulation. According to the lawyers, however, it is not clear why this exclusion was not communicated before the start of voting. «It would undoubtedly have been more correct to exclude the work – if it really did not comply with the regulations – before the jurors opened the voting process. It would have been towards the artist but also as a sign of respect for the precious work carried out by the aforementioned jurors”. In fact, the album was still admitted to the vote and, by the Award organizers’ own admission, received various votes. «In light of this unfortunate situation», the artist therefore requests access to the documents of the voting procedure, including the precise number of votes received by the album and all the resolutions relating to the exclusion of the album and the admission of other recordings in dialect. As a precaution, we request the suspension of all operations connected to the awarding of the Tenco Prize for the «Album in dialect» category, subject to any further legal action, including compensation. The legal dispute continues.
