Tuscan Sun Festival - AbsoluteAstronomy.com

The Tuscan Sun Festival is an annual music and lifestyle festival that takes place in the small Tuscan

Tuscany

Tuscany is a region in Italy. It has an area of about 23,000 square kilometres and a population of about 3.75 million inhabitants. The regional capital is Florence ....

hilltop town of Cortona

Cortona

Cortona is a town and comune in the province of Arezzo, in Tuscany, Italy. It is the main cultural and artistic center of the Val di Chiana after Arezzo.-History:...

, in the province of Arezzo

Province of Arezzo

The Province of Arezzo or Arretium is the easternmost province in the Tuscany region of Italy. Its capital is the city of Arezzo.It has an area of 3,232 km², and a total population of 323,288 in 39 comuni . At June 30, 2005, the main comuni by population are:- External links :...

. The Independent
The Independent
The Independent is a British national morning newspaper published in London by Independent Print Limited, owned by Alexander Lebedev since 2010. It is nicknamed the Indy, while the Sunday edition, The Independent on Sunday, is the Sindy. Launched in 1986, it is one of the youngest UK national daily...

newspaper in the UK called the festival “One of the Ten Best Summer Arts Festivals in Europe”.

Described by the International Herald-Tribune as "a blend of Mozart and massages, Debussy and Dante, Tchaikovsky and cuisine", the evening musical programme is balanced with daytime events including art exhibitions and workshops with visual artists, discussions with literary figures, wellness sessions like tai-chi and culinary sessions with some of Tuscany’s chefs and winemakers. The Tuscan Sun Festival includes not only international soloists, conductors and chamber orchestras who perform in the intimate setting of the town’s 400-seat theatre, Teatro Signorelli, but also within town squares like Piazza Signorelli.

History

The Tuscan Sun Festival was founded in 2003 by Barrett Wissman, cellist Nina Kotova

Nina Kotova

Nina Kotova is a Russian Americancellist.Nina Kotova was accepted by the cello faculty into an adult class of the Moscow Conservatory at the age of seven, while studying at the Central Music School Pre-Conservatory. Nina gave her first performance as a soloist with an orchestra at the age of 11 and...

and writer Frances Mayes

Frances Mayes

Frances Mayes is an American university professor, poet, memoirist, essayist, and novelist.Born and raised in Fitzgerald, Georgia, Mayes attended Randolph-Macon Woman's College in Lynchburg, Virginia, and obtained her BA from the University of Florida...

, whose bestselling books have made Cortona a popular tourist destination. In its first year, the festival lasted 10 days; in 2004, it expanded to 15. Wissman has since branched the sun festival internationally, with a Festival del Sole

Festival del Sole

The Festival del Sole is an annual music, food, wine, and art festival held in California's Napa Valley. Founded in 2006 by Rick Walker, an arts manager and Grammy-award winning music producer, the festival attracts over 10,000 attendees annually...

beginning in 2006 in Napa Valley and, beginning in 2007, the Sun Festival in Singapore

Singapore

Singapore , officially the Republic of Singapore, is a Southeast Asian city-state off the southern tip of the Malay Peninsula, north of the equator. An island country made up of 63 islands, it is separated from Malaysia by the Straits of Johor to its north and from Indonesia's Riau Islands by the...

.

In 2009, The Singapore Sun Festival

Singapore sun festival

The Singapore Sun Festival is an annual music and life-style festival that runs over ten days and takes place in multiple venues across Singapore...

was awarded Singapore's "Leisure Event of the Year".

Performers

Past festivals have included visits and performances by renowned artists such as Piotr Anderszewski

Piotr Anderszewski

Piotr Anderszewski is a Polish-Hungarian pianist.- Biography :Anderszewski was born in Warsaw, Poland. He attended conservatories in Lyon and Strasbourg, the Fryderyk Chopin University of Music in Warsaw, and the University of Southern California Thornton School of Music in Los Angeles.- Career...

, Joshua Bell

Joshua Bell

Joshua David Bell is an American Grammy Award-winning violinist.-Childhood:Bell was born in Bloomington, Indiana, United States, the son of a psychologist and a therapist. Bell's father is the late Alan P...

, The Bolshoi Ballet

Bolshoi Ballet

The Bolshoi Ballet is an internationally renowned classical ballet company, based at the Bolshoi Theatre in Moscow, Russia. Founded in 1776, the Bolshoi is among the world's oldest ballet companies, however it only achieved worldwide acclaim by the early 20th century, when Moscow became the...

, José Cura

José Cura

José Cura is a prominent operatic tenor known for his intense and original interpretations of his characters, notably Verdi’s Otello and Saint-Saëns’ Samson, as well as for his unconventional and innovative concert performances. He is also able to perform high baritone roles with the extended...

, Stéphane Denève

Stéphane Denève

Stéphane Denève is a French conductor. Born in Tourcoing, France, and a graduate of the Paris Conservatoire, Denève has worked as conducting assistant to Sir Georg Solti with the Orchestre de Paris, Georges Prêtre at the Opéra National de Paris, and Seiji Ozawa at the Saito Kinen Festival...

, Lang Lang

Lang Lang

Lang Lang may refer to:* Lang Lang , Chinese pianist* Lang Lang, Victoria, a town in Australia* Lang Lang River, a river in Gippsland, Victoria, Australia* A character from the Japanese manga Steam Detectives-See also:...

, Danielle de Niese

Danielle de Niese

Danielle de Niese is a lyric soprano. After success as a young child in singing competitions in Australia, she moved to the USA where she developed an operatic career...

, Andrea Marcon and the Venice Baroque Orchestra, Ana Maria Martinez

Ana María Martínez

Ana María Martínez is a Grammy award–winning operatic soprano from Puerto Rico. "The most beautiful voice of Latin America", [Martínez] "requires ranking among the top lyric sopranos of the day...[with] immaculate musicality underpinning every utterance." -Early life:Ana María Martínez was born...

, Gabrielle Montero, Anna Netrebko

Anna Netrebko

Anna Yuryevna Netrebko is an Russian operatic soprano. She now holds dual Russian and Austrian citizenship and currently resides in Vienna. She has been nicknamed "La Bellissima" by fans.-Biography:...

, Antonio Pappano

Antonio Pappano

Antonio Pappano is a British conductor and pianist of Italian parentage.Pappano's family relocated to England from Castelfranco in Miscano near Benevento, Italy in 1958 and at the time of his birth his parents worked in the restaurant business, but Pasquale Pappano, his father, was by vocation a...

, Robert Redford

Robert Redford

Charles Robert Redford, Jr. , better known as Robert Redford, is an American actor, film director, producer, businessman, environmentalist, philanthropist, and founder of the Sundance Film Festival. He has received two Oscars: one in 1981 for directing Ordinary People, and one for Lifetime...

, Sibylle Szaggars, Giuseppe Tornatore

Giuseppe Tornatore

-Life and career:Born in Bagheria near Palermo, Tornatore developed an interest in acting and the theatre from at least the age of 16 and put on works by Luigi Pirandello and Eduardo De Filippo.He worked initially as a freelance photographer...

, Angela Gheorghiu

Angela Gheorghiu

Angela Gheorghiu is a Romanian soprano opera singer. Since her professional debut in 1990, she has sung as soprano leading roles at New York's Metropolitan Opera, Covent Garden's Royal Opera House, the Vienna State Opera, Milan's La Scala, and many other opera houses in Europe and the United States...

, Barry Unsworth

Barry Unsworth

Barry Unsworth is a British novelist who is known for novels with historical themes. He has published 15 novels, and has been shortlisted for the Booker Prize three times, winning once for the 1992 novel Sacred Hunger....

and Pinchas Zukerman

Pinchas Zukerman

Pinchas Zukerman is a world-renowned violinist, violist, and conductor. He is considered one of the greatest violinists of the 20th and 21st centuries, and his ongoing 45-year career has seen him perform with the world's best-known orchestras and record over 100 works...

. Poet Ed Mayes and painter Alberto Alfonso

Alberto Alfonso

Alberto Alfonso AIA is a founding principal and President of Alfonso Architects, an architecture firm located in Ybor City, Florida. Cuban born, Alfonso was educated at The University of Florida where he received his M.A. in 1983. With his brother Carlos and partner Angel del Monte, Alfonso...

have exhibited their collaborative works in 2010 and 2011.

History

Performers

Further reading