July 23rd – 31st 2011

Great expectations for the fourth edition of the Venice Jazz Festival, scheduled July 23rd to 31st 2011. In addition to such a major international event as the presence of Sting with the Philharmonic Orchestra of La Fenice, which will play in the unique setting of Piazza San Marco on July 29th, also some other concerts by some other important musicians of the international jazz scene: the Cape Verdean singer Cesária Évora, to be hosted on July 26th at the Teatro La Fenice (Venice Opera House); the double concert to be performed by percussionist Trilok Gurtu, solo, on July 27th; and the quintet of the Cuban pianist Omar Sosa, in his tribute to “Kind of Blue” by Miles Davis.

And in addition, we remind you that during that week the whole of Venice will come alive with live jazz and aperitifs, lunch & dinner, in exceptional location like the city’s main museums (i.e. Palazzo Grassi, Punta della Dogana, Peggy Guggenheim Collection) and other picturesque and popular places, such as the area of the Rialto Bridge and different campi (i.e. squares) throughout the city.

Here is the PROGRAMME OF THE 4 MAIN CONCERTS:

Tuesday, July 26th – at 9:00 pm
Teatro La Fenice (Venice Opera House)
CESÁRIA ÉVORA

Born on August 27th 1941 in Mindelo, on the island of São Vicente, Cape Verde, Cesária Évora is the best known performer of “morna”, a singing style that combines West African percussion with Portuguese fado, Brazilian music and British sea songs. Nicknamed the “barefoot diva” because of her habit of performing barefoot, longing, pain and joy of life blend together in her unforgettable voice.

Wednesday, July 27th – at 9:00 pm
Teatro La Fenice, Double concert
TRILOK GURTU – solo
OMAR SOSA 5TET / Kind of Blue

Trilok Gurtu, a percussion master and composer, started from the Indian classical music to approach rock, pop, and only later jazz music. He can boast numerous collaborations with musicians from all origins and musical backgrounds, from Jan Garbarek to Dave Holland – winner of no less than 5 Grammy awards for best musician / percussionist for the BBC World Music Awards.

Omar Sosa, nominated for three Grammy Awards, is a true piano virtuoso who plays with an incredible technique, sometimes spectacular, some other times sensitive and light, blending his Guajiran sensitivity with a deep knowledge of classical, jazz and electronic music. Together with a high-level quintet he presents a special project dedicated to “Kind of Blue”, proposing a version with electric nuances, rearranged and reinterpreted in a personal and original way.

Friday, July 29th – at 9:30 pm
Piazza San Marco (St. Mark’s Square)
STING and the PHILHARMONIC ORCHESTRA OF LA FENICE

After the sold-out concerts in North America, Europe and Australia, in the framework of Symphonicity tour Sting will be performing his greatest hits, re-proposed with the symphonic arrangement.

Saturday, July 30th – at 9:30 pm
Peggy Guggenheim Collection
FRANK MAROCCO and DANIELE DI BONAVENTURA

Accordion and bandoneón join in this show housed in one of the temples of modern art: throughout his career, the American Frank Morocco, one of the main representatives of this instrument, has performed with the biggest ones, including Frank Sinatra and Louis Armstrong, not to mention pop stars and show performers, such as Pink Floyd, Prince, Madonna, Luciano Pavarotti and Liza Mannelli. Daniele Di Bonaventura, one of the few Italian bandoneón players, already side by side with many jazz musicians, is also considered one of the most fascinating performers of this instrument belonging to the musical tradition of Argentina. TD

Venezia Jazz Festival

The Venezia Jazz Festival, which will be held in the Laguna from the 23rd to the 31st of July, 2011 is one of the most important festivals in Italy and combines a rich and exclusive program with the unique beauty of the locations. This year, one of the highlights of the event will be Sting, accompanied by orchestra and band, on July 29th, 2001 in Piazza San Marco . The Symphonicity Tour will include Sting’s biggest hits presented with symphonic arrangements, all-time greatest pieces, as well as those from The Police, such as “Every Little Thing She Does Is Magic”, “Roxanne”, “Every Breath You Take”, and of course the most famous songs from his solo career like “Englishman in New York”, “Fragile”, “Russians”, “If I Ever Lose My Faith in You”, “Fields of Gold”, and “Desert Rose”. The tour will, in fact, touch base in Europe with three dates in Italy, one of which is precisely scheduled for the Venezia Jazz Festival.

The program for the music festival in Venice, now in its fourth edition, will also include a number of other prestigious concerts in Piazza San Marco and in the Fenice Theater, as well as many other events. These include live cocktails and jazz lunches & dinners in alternative spaces, like the most important museums in the city (Palazzo Grassi, Punta della Dogana, Peggy Guggenheim Collection), and other evocative and popular locations, such as the area around the Rialto Bridge and various other similar spots throughout the city.

The city of Venice will not only be bursting with entertainment and music events for an entire week, but much more: the festival will be enriched by varied programs related to art, literature, photography, and culinary experiences, which will involve the spectators during all hours of the day and night.

The Island of San Servolo, a peaceful haven just 5 minutes from the city center, will host international workshops in jazz dance, digital photography in entertainment, and Moog. At the Fenice Theater, literary meetings will be held, in collaboration with the International Book Fair of Turin, where contemporary writers and musicians will come together. Many of the events will then end with the tasting of regional wines and products.

This year, in occasion of the twentieth anniversary of the death of Miles Davis (1926 – 1991), the festival presents the most important exhibition ever held on the artist. A multimedia event that encompasses the entire discography of this icon of history, and not only of music history, along with many more matters of interest. TD

From 9th to 10th June 2011

The lead acts for the 2011 Heineken Jammin’ Festival have finally been announced: 9th June COLDPLAY, 10th June NEGRAMARO and on 11th June VASCO.

As in past years the kermesse musical event will take place in the striking location of Parco San Giuliano, a large green space over looking the Venice Lagoon.

The base concept is that of big rock gatherings over several days, with lots of artists following each other on the one stage for the entire afternoon as well as acclaimed headliners for the long evening concert.

Heineken Jammin’ Festival is not only music but also 360 degrees entertainment. Soccer fields, volleyball courts, basket ball courts, ice rings, areas dedicated to fine food and entertainment, a cinema and many world music stands, will all be installed ad hoc in Parco San Giuliano.

Tickets for the Venice Heineken Jammin’ Festival can be purchased from 16th February 2011 from TicketOne and other certified places for 55 euro + presale for a single day, 100 euro + presale for 2 days ad 150 euro + presale for 3 days.

The names of the other bands and artists that will be added to the Line Up will be announced over the course of the next few weeks. TD

31st December 2010
Venice, St.Mark Square

At last it was announced the timetable for the New Year’s Eve 2010 in Venice, which includes the installation of a wonderful Cassarmonica, designed by Mariano Light, famous worldwide for its lights, a brilliant carousel- shaped stage topped by a cupola, which will provide a perfect acoustic amplification so that the sound is audible from anywhere in the Square, where the show “Love 2011” will start from 10.30 p.m., presented by the speaker Mauro Marino and the ever pleasant Prince Maurice. The romantic and bright setting created by the resonance will be enhanced by thirty blown glass balls from Murano, having different diameter and colours, arranged in such a way as to create a subtle play of lights and reflections.

From 11.00 p.m. everybody will be offered aperitifs by Bellini Cannella, which, for this occasion, has created a lightweight aluminum brand new bottle which is absolutely unbreakable that will be distributed only for the Venetian New Year’s Eve. The Bellini will be also offered in Piazza Ferretto in Mestre, where they will be entertaining music by Sergio Labruna and Tarozzo Roberto, both of Radio Italia.

Immediately after the countdown for the arrival of midnight, which will be punctuated by the inevitable collective kiss, there will be a stunning show with fireworks organized by the Parente Fireworks, already appreciated in Venice for its amazing performances created for the Feast of Redentore in the last three years. The show will represent the first moment to celebrate the 150th anniversary of the unification of Italy and thus the Italian flag will be the leitmotif.

Then, whereas in Mestre people will go on dancing with disco music until 2.00 a.m., in St. Mark’s Square DJ set by Paolo Negri will start with a lot of soft and romantic music which will envelop the most famous square in the world in order to let everybody dance until 1.30 a.m. TD

From 23rd to 28th December 2010
St. Mark’s Square

This year Venice Marketing and Events will contribute to divulgate “Winter in Venice”, a rich and detailed proposal of events that will take place in Venice from 8th December 2010 to 8th January 2011 including also the event “Lights and music in St. Mark’s Square“: five absolutely free classical music concerts that will take place between Christmas Eve and the Boxing Day, in the incredible scenery of the most romantic square in the world.

The perfect stage for the musical event will be the Cassarmonica realized by Mariano Light, namely a company that is famous all over the world for its bright sceneries, which will be prepared in St. Mark’s Square starting from Christmas time in order to be used as background at the New Year’s Eve LOVE 2011. The Cassarmonica will host five events of classical and traditional Christmas music, presented by students of the Conservatory of Music “B. Marcello” in Venice, and will host the artists who will enliven the New Year’s Eve.

Calendar of “Lights and music in St. Mark’s Square”

Thursday 23rd Dec. – at 5.00 p.m.

Friday 24th Dec – at 12.00 a.m.

Sunday 26th Dec. – at 5.00 p.m.

Monday 27th Dec. – at 5.00 p.m.

Tuesday 28th Dec. – at 12.00 a.m.

Malibran Theatre
6th -14th November 2010

From the prestigious stage of the Malibran Theatre the fourth edition of “Veneziaindanza’’ organized by the Venetian company Tocnadanza e by the Municipality of Venice, under Michela Barasciutti’s artistic direction, will start on 6th November 2010.

Three are the events proposed. The first one, on 6th November, is a national exclusive: “Talents of dance in Venice” will, in fact, feature dancers and soloists of some of the most prestigious Italian dance schools, including Aterballetto, the Balletto of Milan, Verona Arena and the Classical Ballet of Reggio Emilia, which will perform on the stage in passages of the most beloved classical ballet repertoire, from “Romeo and Juliet” to the “Swan Lake”, from “Don Quixote” to “Giselle” until authors of our time such as Mauro Bigonzetti.

The second event, entitled “Trilogy”, will take place on the following day 7th November 2010, with the exhibition, in a regional exclusive, of one of the most popular and well-known Italian companies: the Ballet Theater of Turin. The new production that the ensemble of Turin brings to Venice, after the success got at the Festival Ballet of Miami, sees as a choreographer Matteo Lavaggi, namely one of the most important choreographers of the Italian scene.

Veneziaindanza will end on Sunday, 14th November 2010 with another regional exclusive: “Carmen”, a show presented on the stage by one of the most important South American dance companies, the Ballet Teresa Carreño in Caracas (Venezuela). It is a representation in a classic-modern version of one of the most enigmatic and attractive female characters, a myth-character who, inspired by a real event, then re-launched by literature and the Nineteenth century French operetta, has gone through the screens and stages of all the world, shared between music and dance. TD

12th September – 23rd October 2010
Various locations

“The sites of Baldassarre“, Galuppi and Music Festival, presents, for 2010 too, a rich program, divided into the usual two sections of oratorio and concerts.

The Rare Instruments Section will be enriched, this year, with the presentation of an unusual instrument: the Alphorn (or Swiss horn), usually used as a bird call in alpine pastures or for folk music, but in this context it will be presented in its concert capacity in texts written just for such instrument of which Alessio Benedettelli is the most well-known player.

Also the locations where the concerts will take place will be always various and different. Among them, Burano Island as a fair homage to Galuppi, with an organ concert dedicated to the artist from this island and his entourage.  An absolute new event will be also the concert in St. Michele Church on the Island, which has been just restored, a jewel of the Sixteenth Century facing the lagoon with its white and harmonious façade. In this site you will have the opportunity to listen to the music by Igor Stravinski who, in this island rests and to whom it is right to pay homage on this occasion.

This year the Venezia Segreta Project will start: it wants to explore an invisible and at times unexpected world existing in Venice, which is that of its gardens. The Antonio Lotti Vocal Group will sing in the garden of Palazzo Minelli, Casa Cardinal Piazza. The Festival, then, in its usual locations of the Sale Apollinee, La Fenice Theatre and the Sala Superiore of the Scuola Grande di San Rocco, will host outstanding concerts such as the Auryn Quartet, the Ensemble Arte dell’Arco and the Quartet of Venice ones, which will celebrate the 250th anniversary of Cherubini’s birth, of the revival of Galuppi’s Miserere, already proposed as an unpublished piece several editions ago and a world premiere of the Oratorio ‘Il Sacrifizio di Jephte’, an unpublished work by Galuppi, with the Orchestra Barocca from Bologna directed by Paolo Faldi. TD

3rd September 2010

On September 3rd 2010 the Great Hall of Palazzo del Cinema host the ceremony to John Woo’s for Golden Lion Lifetime Achievement at the 67th International Exhibition of Cinematographic Art in Venice.

The ceremony was followed by screening the world premiere of Jianyu (Reign of Assassins), the film by Su Chao-Pin, produced by Terence Chang, John Woo’s signature in the supervision and direction. Jianyu (Reign of Assassins), boasts of a variegated cast composed of, beside the protagonist such as the queen of Asian action films Michelle Yeoh, the Korean superstar Jung Woo Sung, and the Chinese and Taiwanese stars Barbie Hsu, Wang Xueqi, Kelly Lin and Angeles Woo.TD

30th August,
Arena Campo San Polo,
screening of ‘Vittorio tells Gassman’

The 67th International Film Festival of Venice will pay homage to Vittorio Gassman, one of the most extraordinary personalities of Italian cinema, on the tenth anniversary of his death, with a special programme consisting in a world premiere screening on the 1st September (Gassman’s birthdate) in the Sala Perla, of ‘Vittorio tells Gassman’, Una Vita Da Mattatore (80’) a ‘confession-film by Vittorio Gassman’ full of unknown sequences, realized by Giancarlo Scarchilli with the collaboration of Alessandro Gassman and the projection – on 31st August at the Arena di Campo San Polo – of a restored version of Dino Risi’s Scent Of A Woman (1974) with Vittorio Gassman (Best Actor Prize at Cannes and the David di Donatello ), Alessandro Momo and Agostina Belli,  as a production of the National Film Archive. TD

From 23 july to 1 august 2010

The  jewel in the crown of the Veneto Jazz calendar is the  Venice Jazz Festival in its third season scheduled for  July 23 – August 1, 2010.
The line-up includes a series of concerts in the prestigious  Teatro La Fenice, in Piazza San Marco and in other significant areas around the city, with a carnet of collateral events that will take place in locations  and in the public “campi”  around Venice, using a formula of audience involvement  in varying hours of the day and night.

Artists of international fame, emerging talent, innovative offerings of the jazz scene alongside top headliners, Venice Jazz Festival is the high point of the city’s cultural programs, having already hosted stars. The appeal of the locations and above all, the outstanding program encompassing the best of national and world jazz have already crowned this as one of  the top global engagements of its kind.  Among  the artists on tap for the latest edition are:

Pat Metheny Group
Norah Jones
Paco de Lucia

From the showcase of selected record labels at Teatro La Fenice to aperitivo-time, live at Rialto, to  jazz lunch & dinner in selected Venetian hotels, from concerts in traditional theaters, to late night DJ sets in nightclubs and  learning  workshops.  The artistic offerings aren’t limited to music , but are enhanced by art exhibits, readings, themed conferences and culinary experiences to climax in spectacular events in one of the most stunning piazzas on the planet.TD