Festival Villa Arconati: Capossela, Bennato, Pagani, Savoretti...

Festival Villa Arconati: Capossela, Bennato, Pagani, Savoretti…

Late yesterday afternoon, Tuesday 11 June, the press conference to present the Villa Arconati Festival was held at the Spirit de Milan in Milan. The event, which is held in the splendid eighteenth-century villa located in Castellazzo di Bollate, in the immediate Milanese hinterland, was born in 1989 and did not stop even during the pandemic years, reaching its 36th edition this year. A very special edition because it will be the first without the presence of Dario Zigiotto, president and main animator of the festival since the first edition who passed away last January, Villa Arconati 2024 is dedicated to him.

The festival will begin on June 26th and will continue until July 12th. The exhibition will open with the show 'Arturo narrates Brachetti' by the 'transformist' Arturo Brachetti (“Ideal link with the Bollate theater season which started last autumn and closed recently”). We will continue with the concert at dawn for harp and voice by Cecilia. The concert at first light for the festival is a three-year-old tradition (“The harp, however, is new for Villa Arconati, previously the sound of the piano had always been chosen”). This year, to better enter into the magic of an unusual concert, for those who want it will be possible to meet in the darkness of five in the morning in Bollate and Garbagnate and then reach the villa walking along the paths of the Groane Park.

On July 1st Vinicio Capossela will take the stage set up in the garden of the villa.

The German-born musician spoke at a press conference yesterday with a video message in which he explained that he will perform his album “Camera a sud” in its entirety to celebrate thirty years since its publication accompanied by an extended formation complete with wind instruments and strings. Villa Arconati will be the only concert occasion, in addition to Umbria Jazz, in which “Camera a sud” will be celebrated. The following day it will be Mauro Pagani's turn in the evening dedicated to Dario Zigiotto. Pagani, a long-time collaborator of Fabrizio De André, will perform “Creuza de ma” in full, an album which this year celebrated its 40th anniversary, written by Pagani together with the Genoese singer-songwriter who died in 1999. On 7 July the festival program includes something new , or a show at sunset entrusted to the musical theater recital by Massimiliano Finazzer Flory who will pay homage to Giacomo Puccini accompanied by strings and choir.

On July 8th the Anglo-Italian singer-songwriter Jack Savoretti will be on stage in Castellazzo, fresh from the release of “Miss Italia” (read the review here), his first album sung in Italian. On the 10th the concert (“Already sold out”) by Edoardo Bennato who returns to Villa Arconati after 30 years, followed on the 11th by the live solo performance of the former lead singer of Madredeus, the Portuguese singer Teresa Salgueiro. Finally, to close the event, on July 12th the journalist Mario Calabresi brings to the stage 'How a photograph sounds', a soundtracked monologue that tells part of our history through some significant shots.

Calendar:

June 26 – Arturo Brachetti

30 June – Cecilia (dawn concert)

1 July – Vinicio Capossela

2 July – Mauro Pagani

7 July – Massimiliano Finazzer Flory (sunset show)

July 8 – Jack Savoretti

10 July – Edoardo Bennato

July 11 – Teresa Salgueiro

12 July – Mario Calabresi