|
Spoleto festival toasts bitter-sweet 50th birthday
2007-06-29
The Spoleto Festival celebrates a bitter-sweet 50th birthday when it opens on Friday without its legendary founder, Gian Carlo Menotti, who died in February at the age of 95. Even so, the legendary composer's presence will be hard to miss at this year's festival, which runs from June 29 until July 15. It will include special performances of Menotti's most famous works, including Amahl and the Night Visitors and The Consul. His son, Francis Menotti, has dedicated this year's "Two Worlds" festival to the memory of the Italian-American composer. The Umbrian hill town will screen films by actor Andy Garcia as well as directors Terry Gilliam and Paul Mazursky, all of whom plan to attend the festival and will receive special tributes. Garcia will give a talk on Saturday to accompany a screening of his film "The Lost City," set in his native Cuba and starring Garcia, Dustin Hoffman, Bill Murray and Ines Sastre. Seats will be available to anyone who buys tickets to see Garcia's band, the Cineson All-Stars. Despite the recent opening to film, the lion's share of the festival will consist of music performances. Apart from the compositions by Menotti, it will feature, among others: Handel, Schuman, Brahms, Faure, Bach, Gershwin, Nino and Rota. Twelve cellists from the Berlin Philharmonic will provide another musical highlight, performing on 'German Day', July 14. There will be a series of four chamber music concerts at lesser-known locations around Umbria, entitled 'Secret Umbria'. These events will feature ethno-musicology presentations and tasting sessions of local produce. Among the more unusual festival events will be performances by a contemporary dance company and fictional re-enactments of the great trials of historical figures. Ticket prices for different events range from 5 euros ($6.72) to 190. Menotti, affectionately known as "Il Maestro Matto" (The Mad Maestro) by some in Spoleto, almost single-handedly put the medieval Umbrian hill town on the international cultural map and saved it from urban neglect when he started the Festival of Two Worlds 50 years ago. Spoleto quickly joined the ranks of Europe's premier performing arts festivals, attracting tens of thousands of people a year and inspiring countless clones.
| 
