Barga Musicians showing the way

Two of the musicians in Barga have been out strutting their stuff in front of new audiences and making a name of themselves, and of course for Barga .  Andrea Guzzoletti and his trumpet have been in Miami Florida appearing at the annual Winter Music Conference. He is becoming something of a regular at this event. This year he is playing with some other old friends of barganews … Pio Marasco and Gretchen Rhodes from Haiku in Hawai  – both of whom have played here in Barga in a spontaneous concert at Artisto’s back in January (article here)

Questo è il programma del party che si terrà mercoledì 25 marzo 09 allo Shelborne Lounge, Miami Beach, durante la Winter Music Conference 2009, suonerò insieme a Gretchen Rhodes con la quale ho inciso il nuovo singolo ” I’ve Got Soul” insieme a Roberto Cecchetto alla Chitarra e Stefano Onorati al Piano. Si tratta di un Live Set con il DJ Pio Marasco – Andrea Guzzoletti – his site is here

The very same evening another musician who has featured on barganews a number of times,  La Francesca was wowing the judges and moving up from the semi finals to the finals for the chance to open this years Summer Festival in Lucca.

Francesca who works during the day in the Gelateria was as the night fell, magically transformed into Francesca de Martin – charismatic singer fronting the band Acoustic Groove. This time it was not with her full band but a more quiet, reflective set with just an acoustic guitar as accompaniment.

Last year we published an article about her concerts here in Piazza Annunziata in Barga Vecchia saying;

For over three hours she held the piazza in her hand with her soaring voice perfectly matched by the cello of Lara Vecoli and the twin guitars of Michelangelo Tozzi and Piero Pellicano. Some very minimal lighting, one or two scattered flowers and handwritten messages on all the tables all added to the intimate atmosphere in Piazza Annunziata. Is this the way forward for the festa del centro storico ?

Smaller acoustic events in each of the piazzas and less “stadium like” concerts ? It certainly felt like it last night. A great evenings entertainment and one which the organisers of the events in other parts of Barga Vecchia should maybe look at and evaluate closely to see if it could not be duplicated in their own piazzas ? main article can be seen here

By the looks of things, the Summer Festival think that she has a good chance of doing just that in the piazzas of Lucca.

Fingers crossed for Francesca.