From 23 to 25 August: walks and concerts in Camerino, Castelluccio di Norcia, Amatrice. Then, on 31 August and 1 September in L’Aquila: 300 musicians, 15 locations in the historic center.
“10 years!!! Italian Jazz for the Earthquake Areas”, the festival’s special production composed and conducted by Andrea Ravizza in collaboration with I Solisti Aquilani, the Conservatorio A. Casella, Moncalieri Jazz, with three special guests: Francesco Cafiso, Eleonora Strino and Nico Gori; Fawda (with Reda Zine, Fabrizio Puglisi, Danilo Mineo and Brothermartino); “Salvation 2332 – The Last Song” – curated by Albert Hera and Michele Degan with the Corale L’Aquila.
Everything is ready for the 10th edition of “Italian Jazz for the Earthquake Areas”, the event that since 2015 has brought—and continues to bring—to the city of L’Aquila and to the regions affected by the 2016 earthquake the most important and numerous representation of Italian jazz, and a concrete testimony of how culture and live performance contribute decisively to building and strengthening local communities.
This is precisely the theme behind the work of the three artistic directors for 2024 (Francesco Diodati, Gabriele Mitelli and Ugo Viola): Living the sound, with the awareness that music becomes exploration and a meeting place, an active guide to (re)discovering the city and its pathways.
For this important anniversary edition there will be more than 300 artists involved, over 60 events and concerts in total, 15 squares, and an expected 20,000 spectators—numbers that reinforce an appointment that renews itself year after year while remaining faithful to its solidarity-driven nature and its role as a major Italian jazz gathering, capable at the same time of continually shifting goals, visions, and artistic perspectives.
“Italian Jazz for the Earthquake Areas” confirms the involvement and organization of the National Federation “Il Jazz Italiano” and the operational coordination of the association Jazz all’Aquila; it is promoted and supported by the Ministry of Culture and the Municipality of L’Aquila, promoted by the Abruzzo Region, with the support of Main Sponsors SIAE and NUOVO IMAIE, the contribution of the Fondazione Cassa di Risparmio della Provincia dell’Aquila, Costruzioni Iannini, the technical sponsor Silent System, and many technical partners. The event also includes co-productions with major local cultural institutions such as MUNDA – Museo Nazionale d’Abruzzo, the Conservatorio Alfredo Casella, the Fondazione MAXXI (MAXXI L’Aquila), the Centro Sperimentale di Cinematografia (Abruzzo branch), and I Solisti Aquilani. A significant collaboration with the Museo del Saxofono and Moncalieri Jazz is also highlighted. Media partnership with Rai Radio 1 is confirmed.
Fakhraddin Gafarov Trio
Author Adriano Bellucci
The 2024 edition will begin on Friday 23 August in Camerino with a musical event launching the Solidarity Walk (organized in collaboration with Musicamdo and Fara Music), with three days of concerts and trekking (23–25 August) moving to Castelluccio di Norcia and Amatrice, touching—as is tradition—the regions involved, before the weekend in L’Aquila. The program includes urban walks and sustainable trekking to discover the territory, and concerts by some of the best new talents of Italian jazz, in collaboration with the association Musicisti Italiani di Jazz. The Walk also contributes decisively to one of the event’s longstanding goals: enhancing architectural and landscape heritage, rediscovering the environment and a “green” cultural experience based on respect for the places involved, and promoting jazz as a tool for social aggregation and cultural integration, as well as a driver of a natural fusion between cultural and tourist activities in the area.
“Italian Jazz for the Earthquake Areas” will arrive in L’Aquila for the great Italian jazz marathon—an eagerly awaited event for the city itself—on 31 August and 1 September. The artistic directors of the 2024 edition, Francesco Diodati, Gabriele Mitelli and Ugo Viola, have presented a diverse program designed to offer the widest possible range of proposals and to reflect the diversity of contemporary musical research in Italy, with a focus on emerging musicians and new productions, and particular attention to interdisciplinarity.
The program, even more so for the decennial, is immersive and in close contact with the city’s most evocative places, including halls and courtyards opened for the occasion, and the much-anticipated street bands that will guide the audience on a path of discovery through the many facets of jazz. Many languages will contribute to an image of “sound”—the central theme of this edition—as a metaphor capable of including contemporary jazz, electronics and crossovers, hybrid songwriting, original reinterpretations, minimalism and sound design, and world traditional musics, always with special attention to audience engagement.