The WoW Folk Festival has reached its 6th edition and this year will have as a springboard the first course of popular dances which will take place at the San Francesco auditorium every Wednesday from 12 April to 23 May.
The course will be held by Luana Guercio and Erica Morgetta. There will also be a free course on Cantamaggio which will take place every Thursday from 4 to 18 May at the On Stage in Castelfidardo at 21.00. The course will be held by the musicians: Gianni Donnini, Silvano Staffolani and Lorenzo Cantori. During the course you will learn to play cantamaggio and sing the text.
Another novelty of WoW 2023 will be the expansion of the collaboration with TR800 which will take care of traditional workshops and games for children, in addition to the “Cantamaggio” guides. The workshops that will take place range from the construction of percussion instruments for the little ones to basket weaving and cooking workshops.
In addition to the musical aspect at WoWFF this year there will be an exhibition of restored and playing historic accordions curated by Danilo Doninelli and Stefano Fabbroni.
The collaboration with the Paolo Soprani civic music school has also been confirmed, which will organize a series of concerts and essays by the accordion classes.
The diatonic seminar this year will be curated by Simone Bottasso*, a formidable international musician and composer.
The dates of the concerts, workshops and cantamaggio will be 26, 27 and 28 May 2023.
The point of the Councilor for Culture and Tourism Ruben Cittadini
And WoW is also 6 years old, 6 different editions that have seen international musicians play on stage and make the public dance in the square. From Spain to Portugal, from Belgium to Sweden via Brazil and Angola, France and Scotland and obviously Italy’s best tradition of world music and folk. A mixture of sounds and dances that demonstrate the depth of traditional music that encloses the wisdom of peoples and communities in musical research. Ritual dances, roundabouts and courtships are the driving force of the WoW folk festival which, through the folk dance and Cantamaggio workshops, will bring the public closer to this edition. Historic barrel organs on display in the museum, craft workshops and 19th century games will be the setting for WoW 2023 which is a candidate as one of the main folk festivals in Italy.
WoW Folk Festival 2023 Program
May 26th:
4.00 pm – hall of coats of arms – opening of the seminar with Simone Bottasso
18.00 – accordion museum inauguration of the temporary exhibition of historical organs by Danilo Donninelli and Stefano Fabbroni
7.00 pm – accordion museum – conference on the restoration and regeneration of historic barrel organs
21.00 – piazza della Repubblica performance of the dance course with the music of the Duo Acefalo
9.30 pm – piazza della Repubblica – concert by the band “MARCA DA BALLO QUARTET”
May 27th:
10.00 am – piazza della Repubblica – Performance of elementary schools – Orchestrine Mazzini organized by the Paolo Soprani Civic School
11.00 – piazza della Repubblica or opera hall in case of rain – craft workshop by TR800
2.30 pm – coat of arms hall – second lesson of the seminar with Simone Bottasso
4.00 pm – Aleph bookshop – exhibition of young accordion players by the Paolo Soprani Civic School
4.00 pm – piazza della Repubblica or opera hall in case of rain – workshop for the construction of percussion instruments by TR800
5.30 pm – Auditorium San Francesco – Bal Folk organized by the Paolo Soprani Civic School
9.30 pm – piazza della Repubblica – Pizzica concert with the Canzoniere Grecanico Salentino
May 28th:
08.30 – piazza della Repubblica – cantamaggio meeting
09.15 – departure of groups for cantamaggio in the districts
10.00 am – piazza della Repubblica or opera hall in case of rain – egg pasta workshop by TR800
13.00 – return of the cantamaggio
1.30 pm – social lunch (for info and reservations Pro Loco Castelfidardo 0717822987)
3.00 pm – coat of arms hall – last lesson of the seminar with Simone Bottasso
3.30 pm – performance of the traveling groups – they will play a cantamaggio all together on stage
16.00 – exhibition of participants in the seminar with Simone Bottasso
17.00 – Duo Bottasso concert
18.00 – traditional games with TR800
6.30 pm – Mordini Gardens – WoW aperitif concert by the Paolo Soprani Civic School with the students Helmut Cittadini, Nicolas Chiaraluce, Michele Alessandrini and Veronica Ferraioli
Artists:
SIMONE BOTTASSO (professor of the accordion seminar)
Musician, composer, arranger and director, Simone Bottasso began playing the accordion by studying the repertoire of traditional Occitan and French music. In parallel with studying accordion, he graduated in classical flute and then in Jazz at the Giuseppe Verdi Conservatory in Turin, studying improvisation, arrangement and composition with Furio Di Castri, Giampaolo Casati, Emanuele Cisi and Dado Moroni.
In 2013 he moved to Rotterdam where he studied jazz, contemporary and electronic composition with Paul Van Brugge, Renè Uijlenhoet, Robin de Raaf, Oscar Van Dillen, Klaas de Vries and Peter Jan Wagemans, graduating in 2017. As a musician and composer he has explored since At the beginning of his career the possibility of encounter and cross-over between popular music and jazz, funk, rock, electronic and contemporary music, composing and playing with numerous groups including Duo Bottasso, Abnoba, Triotonico, Folk Messengers and Stygiens. In 2012 and 2013 Riccardo Tesi entrusted him with the original creation of the Sentieri Acustici festival in Pistoia in which he conducted the festival orchestra on his own orchestral arrangements of traditional music from the Pistoia mountains. In 2014 Pietro Numico commissioned him “Stella Polare”, a pièce for soprano, accordion, chamber ensemble and choir, which was performed at the Weimar Conservatory (Germany). Since 2015 he has been a member of the “Samurai” project, an international accordion quintet with Kepa Junkera, Riccardo Tesi, Dave Munnelly and Markku Lepistu. In 2010 he collaborated with Paolo Fresu and the Alborada Quartet arranging some pieces from Abnoba’s repertoire for trumpet and string quartet. In 2016 he won the “Best composer under 30” award at the “Giovannini Piano Composition Competition” with his “Sarvan” trio for piano, clarinet and violin. In 2017 he won the first and third prize in the Bruno Serri Accordion Composition competition with two pieces by the Duo Bottasso (Monkerrina, Magicicada). In 2018 he collaborated with Cosenude Media Project for the creation of the music of the documentary Bizerte: spiral story; with New Rotterdam Jazz Orchestra writing a composition for big band and accordion inspired by the book “Q” by Wu Ming; with the Chemnitz Kinderchoor for which he wrote Music by heart, a composition for children’s choir, accordion, violin and live electronics. Together with Nicolò Bottasso and Pietro Numico he is composer, musical director and artistic director of the Folkestra & Folkoro project, an orchestral world music project founded by the Duo Bottasso in 2009 and made up of 40 elements. He combines his musical and compositional career with an intense teaching activity in international workshops and masterclasses.
MARCA DA BALLO
Members:
Gianni Donnini, diatonic accordion
Alfio Vernuccio, acoustic guitar, mandolin
Claudia Gioia Gentili, voice
Special guest Ilaria Mignoni, violin
The rich 2023 edition of the Wow Folk Festival of Castelfidardo (AN) will be opened on Friday evening, May 26, at 9.30 pm in Piazza della Repubblica, by the energy of the “Marca da ballo” in a special quartet formation. The trio of Gianni Donnini on accordion, Alfio Vernuccio on guitar, Claudia Gioia Gentili on vocals, will in fact also be joined by Ilaria Mignoni on violin. What they offer is an engaging blend of European Balfolk and popular music – traditional Italian, all to dance to, with personal arrangements and even original pieces. The Marca da ballo group was born in 2017, but already for previous years, the four musicians have met to play together on various occasions both in Italy and in Europe. They come from different paths and artistic experiences. In addition to the passion for music, they share the desire to transmit a repertoire, that of the Balfolk, capable of combining the beauty of melodies with the light-heartedness of dances. Capable of combining fun, sociability and cultural heritage of the area from which the dances themselves come.
CANZONIERE GRECANICO
Founded in 1975 by the writer Rina Durante, the Canzoniere Grecanico Salentino is the most important Salento folk music group, the first to be formed in Puglia. The fascinating dichotomy between tradition and modernity characterizes the music of the CGS: the group is made up of the main protagonists of the current Apulian scene, who reinterpret in a modern key the traditions that revolve around the famous ritual pizzica tarantata, which had the power to heal through music, trance and dance the bite of the legendary Taranta. The CGS shows are an explosion of energy, passion, rhythm and magic, which take you on a journey from the past to the present on the beating of the tambourine, the beating heart of the Salento tradition.
Led by the tambourine and violinist Mauro Durante, who inherited the leadership from his father Daniele in 2007, the CGS continues to innovate and represent Italian music in the world, collaborating with the likes of Ludovico Einaudi, Piers Faccini, Ballake Sissoko, Ibrahim Maalouf, Fanfare Tirana, Stewart Copeland of the Police, and bringing the voice of a musical territory that has always manifested its identity with the pizzica.
Mauro Durante was musical assistant of the maestro concertatore of the Notte della Taranta Ludovico Einaudi in 2010 and 2011, working on the creation and artistic production of the show alongside the famous maestro. The Canzoniere opens the Concertone della Notte della Taranta in Melpignano in 2010, 2012 and 2015, performing in front of over one hundred thousand people. Acclaimed by audiences and critics with 20 albums and countless international tours, the band has made the history of Italian world music, being recognized as the best world music group in the world at the Songlines Music Awards 2018.
The band is composed by Mauro Durante (vocals, percussions, violin), Alessia Tondo (vocals), Silvia Perrone (dance), Giulio Bianco (bagpipes, harmonica, flutes and popular woodwinds, bass), Massimiliano Morabito (organetto), Emanuele Licci (voice, guitar, bouzouki), Giancarlo Paglialunga (voice, tamburieddhu, percussion), Francesco Aiello (sound engineer).
Best Italian World Music Band, MEI 2010
Babel Med Music 2011
globalFEST NY 2012
WOMEX 2012
SXSW 2013
WOMAD 2013
SZIGET 2014 and 2015
Celtic Connections 2015
WOMADelaide, WOMAD New Zealand 2015
Cambridge Folk Festival 2015
FMM Sines 2015
Off Fest Skopje 2016
Festival Med Loulé 2017
Førde Festivalen 2018
Paleo Festival 2018
SZIGET 2018
DUO BOTTASSO
The Bottasso brothers, Nicolò on violin and trumpet and Simone on accordion, offer a world music show with their own compositions and reinterpretations of traditional songs. The Duo is always looking for a mediation between the delicacy of their instruments and the explosive energy that the two young musicians never lack: all this united by the complicity of two brothers bound by the desire to keep the tradition of their land in constant evolution of origin.
In 2014 their first album “Crescendo” was released, created with the collaboration of numerous guests including Elena Ledda, Mauro Palmas, Gilson Silveira and Christian Thoma. “Crescendo” does not only refer to musical terminology but also reflects the story of two musician brothers who started from the dance music of the Occitan area of Italy to venture into the paths of new composition and improvisation. The disc wins third place at the “City of Loano Award for traditional Italian music”.
In collaboration with the electronic musician Simone Sims Longo, in 2018 they compose and record the soundtrack of the documentary “Biserta. Storia aspira” (Cosenude Media Projects – 2018) merged, together with some pieces of the recent collaboration with the children’s choir Kinder-und Jugendchor Chemnitz and with the tar player Reza Mirjalali, in the album “Bizerte and other stories”. The documentary origin of most of the work gives the album a strongly narrative character, in which the stories are told simultaneously by voices, acoustic or electronic instruments and environmental recordings.
The Duo boasts numerous live performances in national and international festivals including: Rudolstadt festival (Rudolstadt – 2018), Alpentoene Internationales Musikfestival (Altdorf – 2017), Italian Jazz for the lands of the earthquake (L’Aquila – 2017), Turin Jazz Festival ( Turin – 2016) Festival Internacional de Musica de Alturas (Lima – 2016), Folkest International folk festival (Spilimbergo – 2015), Andrea Parodi Award (Cagliari – 2014), Printemps des Arts (Montecarlo – 2014, 2012), Etetrad Festival (Aosta – 2011), Festival International de Luthieres et Maitres Sonneurs (Saint Chartier – 2009).
At the concert and recording level, the Duo has collaborated with numerous artists linked to the Italian world scene including Elena Ledda, Gigi Biolcati, Michele Marini and Youlook Trio.
