PRESS RELEASE (07/23/2014)
Thursday, July 24, despite the announced bad weather the City of Loano National Award for Italian Traditional Music, does not turn off the spotlight and outdoors or at an indoor venue (to be announced later today) will celebrate its 10th birthday with two new events.
At 6:30 pm, on the waterfront, in the Nassiriya Fallen Gardens, Enrico de Angelis e John Vignola will take the audience into the female universe between “The Voices of Cities” represented by Milly, Laura Betti, Gabriella Ferri. Through audio and video documents they will recall some significant “urban” performers of modern times. Voices that will comprehensively reveal the peculiar expressive potential of women. Compared to the male, women, in music and poetry, have expressed themselves mainly through the anonymous oral tradition. Writing and signing songs have almost always been men. The woman has tended to be a singer rather than a songwriter.
At 9:30 pm, on the waterfront in Maccagli Garden, will resound the mandola of Mimmo Epifani, an internationally renowned musician who, with his “barbershop” technique, will revive the echoes of the barbershop salon in San Vito dei Normanni (Brindisi), where Maestro Costantino, a barber and musician, taught to play the mandola. He has always been linked to the traditions of his land, Mimmo Epifani, a great Apulian artist and virtuoso mandolin player, appreciated all over the world, will star in a concert marked by a strong dose of irony and talent.
Mimmo's long human and musical journey, which started from the barbershop in San Vito Lo Capo, where he learned the art of mandolin and the pizzica (also known as Ballo di San Vito), he arrived on the stages alongside important artists such as Eugenio Bennato, with whom he founded the Taranta Power movement, Roberto De Simone, Ambrogio Sparagna, Caterina Bueno, Matteo Salvatore, and many others.
His curiosity about “other” cultures, which has always driven him to search for new musical and expressive languages, makes him an artist of international scope.
It was in Maestro Costantino's barbershop that Mimmo Epifani, at a very young age, learned the art of making music, discovering a passion for popular traditions passed down orally. The characteristic instruments of popular culture such as the mandola, beating guitar and tammorra contribute to the creation of an acoustic sound at the same time modern and syncopated, closer to certain peaks of rock music than to worn-out stereotypes of mannered folk revival.
Later he perfected the technique of the instrument, contaminating it with the most diverse musical experiences: jazz, reggae, ska rhythms. Graduated from the “C. Pollini” Conservatory of Padua with highest honors under the guidance of Maestro Ugo Orlandi.
July 20 to August 20, on the occasion of the tenth anniversary of the festival is set up the exhibition “10 Years of Traditional Music, a photographic journey that winds along the city streets. Shots recalling the most significant moments experienced in different corners of the city were taken by photographers Silvio Massolo e Martin Cervelli.
The City of Loano Award, under theartistic direction of music journalist John Vignola, is organized by the’Society of the Curious Association in collaboration with the’Department of Tourism and Culture of the City of Loano, with contributions from the Liguria Region, A. Foundation De Mari and the sponsorship of the Savona Province, of the’ANCI and the MEI.
The event is organized with the contribution and collaboration of Double J Ltd. Supermarket Management, Grand Hotel Garden Lido and Excelsior Hotel, Technique.
