Mediagallery:
The singer-songwriter Grazia Di Michele has been appointed as the artistic director of the thirty-ninth edition of Effetto Venezia.
Already announced are Noa, Ziad Trabelsi & Carthage Mosaik, and Eugenio Bennato.
Livorno, March 5, 2024. This morning in Livorno, the artistic direction of Effetto Venezia 2024 was announced in the presence of the Mayor of Livorno Luca Salvetti, the Councilor for Tourism Rocco Garufo, and the Councilor for Culture Simone Lenzi. Along with them, the new artistic director Grazia Di Michele.
However, yesterday marked the handover between the 2023 artistic director Marco Bruciati and the singer-songwriter, symbolizing the shift from cinema, the guiding theme of last year’s edition, to music. This transition is fitting, considering Grazia Di Michele’s rich and diverse artistic journey, during which she has also established herself as a producer, music therapist, teacher, festival creator, and director, with music always at the heart.
Grazia Di Michele states: “World music is that which everywhere healthily contaminates the creation and listening of music. Starting from this, I thought to bring to life a lineup of artists who come from this ‘elsewhere’, but also includes those Italians who have made contamination their very specific stylistic signature. The first names I can announce are Noa, the famous Israeli singer-songwriter, Tunisian artist Ziad Trabelsi & Carthage Mosaik, and Eugenio Bennato, who has named his new tour exactly after the title I chose for Effetto Venezia 2024. This will also be an opportunity for new generations to explore musical fields they are unfamiliar with. But there will be many others, artists coming from abroad, and with them, Italian colleagues who have always paid attention to what happens around them. Music travels in the air, has no boundaries, and sooner or later arrives. When it does, it leaves important seeds and sprouts. This year’s subtitle, ‘Sounds of land and sea’, was inspired by Livorno as one of those places that are on the mainland but have the sea in front of them and therefore are always ready to welcome, to blend and be blended. Those who do my job – the singer-songwriter concluded – usually come to places, work, and leave, knowing little about the place, the culture, the inhabitants, and their rituals. For me, this will instead be a special opportunity to immerse myself in a city and get to know it better than I have before.”
“We wanted to continue working on our longest summer in the world – said Mayor Luca Salvetti – and we did so with the same attention and enthusiasm regardless of the electoral appointment. Thus, whoever lives next summer as mayor will find a quality event, well composed and already structured. Starting from the success of the last edition dedicated to cinema, we decided to entrust another form of art with this edition: namely music, interpreted according to a vision that involves multiple stories and countries. The title of the next edition of Effetto Venezia will indeed be ‘Music from the world. Sounds of land and sea’, which fully reflects the Livornese reality, a multi-ethnic, multicultural, and multi-religious city. Grazia Di Michele is the right choice to direct the next edition of the summer festival par excellence, for her professional and artistic path and for her very clear ideas regarding the realization of Effetto Venezia.”
“The idea of making an Effetto Venezia focused on world music was something we had been working on for some years – says Rocco Garufo, Councilor for Tourism and Commerce. It only took a contact with Grazia Di Michele to embody at least three-quarters of our idea. As in past years, even for the next edition of Effetto Venezia, to offer all merchants the opportunity to work, we will bring the festival to all corners of the district. The link between the world of commerce, tourist attraction, and the summer festival queen of Livorno has been evident for some time.”
Said the Councilor for Culture Simone Lenzi: “Music is a connotative language and the fact that it has this extraordinary power means that it represents a common space where many people from completely different backgrounds, coming from completely different cultures, can somehow find themselves. With the world crossed by tensions like not seen for years, I believe this is the right time to use music as a possible space for dialogue.”
Considering the musical direction that the municipal administration has decided for this year’s Effetto Venezia – states Marco Bruciati, artistic director of Effetto Venezia 2023 – I believe a profile of absolute significance has been identified to maintain the level reached by the event over the years. Personally, I have made myself available to the new artistic direction to take care of a section dedicated to cinema. Furthermore, I will develop a visual storytelling project of forty years of Effetto Venezia, starting from the first editions of the nineties to the documentation of the 2024 one. It will be a narrative that contains the testimonies of people who have been protagonists over the years, documenting what is the soul of the festival.”
It is possible to send proposals relevant to the musical project of Effetto Venezia 2024 to the email address effettovenezia@fondazionelem.it by the next 30th of March.
Grazia Di Michele
Singer-songwriter, music therapist, singing teacher, actress, writer. In over 30 years of her career, she has traversed many artistic and scientific paths, all traceable back to music. Her work has been featured in prestigious festivals – such as Sanremo, Festivalbar, Primo Maggio, Premio Tenco, to name a few – and in significant international contexts (like at the UN in 2005), on successful tours (like the one in 2003 with Toquinho, or the “Cantautrici” tour with Rossana Casale and Mariella Nava in 2022, or “Poesie di carta” in 2023). Her discographic and theatrical activity is intense.
She has written hundreds of songs for herself and other artists and has collaborated with numerous musicians. Among these are Nicolette Larson, Randy Crawford, Eugenio Finardi, Cristiano De André, Pierangelo Bertoli, Rossana Casale, Ornella Vanoni, Mariella Nava, Toquinho, Tosca, Lucio Fabbri, Luca Madonia, Massimo Ranieri, Mario Venuti, Paolo Di Sabatino, Nordgarden, Ivan Segreto, Renato Zero, Mauro Coruzzi, Giovanni Nuti.
Her teaching activity at Conservatories and Academies, as well as in the television school of “Amici”, is well noted. She has published 2 novels, produced young talents, conceived, and directed cultural festivals.
She has participated in the Sanremo Festival four times, securing 3rd place in 1993 with “Gli amori diversi” and winning the “Lunezia” award for the best lyrics and the “Le 100 radio” award for the best interpretation in 2015 with the song “Io sono una finestra”.
In more recent years, she has intensified her activity as a producer (managing the direction of important recording projects, such as “Ritratti d’autore” dedicated to Umberto Bindi and “Sarò Franco” dedicated to Franco Califano, involving dozens of her fellow singer-songwriters, alongside her role as artistic director of significant Festivals and Reviews (2 editions of the singer-songwriter Festival “A tu per tu” and 3 editions of the social cinema Festival “Tulipani di seta nera”).
She has received numerous awards. Among these, the Giuni Russo Prize (2014), the Mia Martini Prize (2018), the Maria Carta Prize (2023).