We look forward to 2021 with hope and optimism. In 2020 we were supposed to launch our Piano Summer Salento Festival. Like many other events, we had to cancel it due to the health crisis that continues to this day.

This crisis has touched us all. It has taken the lives of many people, it has ruined the economy and it has destroyed many “non-essential” aspects of our lives, especially in the cultural field. But it has also unleashed a wave of solidarity and people have sought solace in music and art.

In these difficult times, we all need hope, and we hope that the first edition of the Piano Summer Salento will take place in one way or another in early September 2021. The world needs art and beauty to heal, and Salento, a region that depends a lot on tourism, will need activities like ours to recover from the economic damage left by this crisis, as well as the artists who have been badly affected by the cancellation of all their activities and have lost all sources of income. This is why we are planning our festival, even if we are not sure of the future.

So let me tell you how this project came about….

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Piano Summer Salento was born long before the moment it first saw the light, on a random day in 2010 in a kitchen in Munich, where the friendship between the founders was born.

When Zoran Imširović told me that he was looking for a venue for the international expansion of his Piano Summer Festival, which he has established as the leading festival of piano music in Southern Europe since 2014, I immediately thought of Salento, the region I have fallen in love with since I first came there in 2013 and where I have become an adopted Salento resident.

With its rich cultural and architectural heritage and its natural beauty, Salento is the perfect place to host a music festival with internationally renowned artists from all over the world. Indeed, the region has always been a crossroads of races and cultures, and almost all have left their mark, making Salento a cultural melting pot that today manifests itself in attracting tourists and new residents from all over Italy and abroad. In this sense, the Piano Summer Salento aims to unite people from different horizons who have in common the love of music and the beauty of this place. As the saying goes: music unites!

This first edition would not have been possible without the help and support of so many people and institutions, all of whom have welcomed this initiative as an opportunity to strengthen the attractiveness of the region for citizens and tourists. To all these people we owe our thanks.

As a sign of our gratitude to the town of Nardò, we invite citizens and visitors to a series of free events during the festival: an open-air concert in Piazza Salandra, a special concert for children that we will organise in collaboration with TerramMare Teatro, and a series of mini-concerts in some of the courtyards of the historic houses in the historic centre of Nardò.

May this festival take place in September 2021 and may it be the beginning of a long friendship between Salento and piano music!