The celebrations of the Centenary of the University of Trieste – which will turn one hundred years old this 8th August – will be enriched by an extraordinary cultural event: a classical music concert organised by the University of Trieste in collaboration with the Giuseppe Verdi Opera Theatre Foundation.

The event will take place on Tuesday, 23rd July 2024, at 21:00, in Piazza Verdi, as part of the Trieste Estate 2024 festival.

The concert will be a musical journey through some of the most significant stages of the Italian 20th century, with pieces that reflect crucial moments in the history of the University and the city of Trieste.

The musical programme will begin with “Tramonto” for mezzo-soprano, soloist and strings by Ottorino Respighi, a youthful composition that transports the audience to the melancholic and poetically evocative atmosphere inspired by a poem by Percy Bysshe Shelley. The piece, which dates back to the period before the First World War, outlines the decline of an era of prosperity and cultural vibrancy favourable to the establishment of a university institution.

It will continue with Alfredo Casella’s ‘Concerto per archi op. 40b’, a work coeval with the founding of the University in 1924, which reproposes the national theme in the contextually problematic form of instrumental music.

The evening will continue with ‘Festlicher Morgen’ from Ermanno Wolf-Ferrari’s Venetian Suite, a piece from 1936 that takes us back to the time, troubled by dense shadows, when the foundation stone of what is now the central building of the University of Trieste was laid.

Luciano Berio, with his “Folk Songs”, will then take us into the 1960s through a cultured and innovative reinterpretation of popular songs with the intention of recounting the period of expansion of the University, which was no longer only accessed by the children of the elite, but which became a place where the conditions were created for the social mobility of young people from the middle class and also of those with more humble origins.

Closing the programme will be the “3 unvollendete Portraits” by Fabio Nieder, an internationally renowned composer from Trieste, who with this 2014 work reflects on incompleteness as a characteristic feature of culture and science open to innovation. A reflection that is intended to be the legacy of the Centenary for the future of the University of Trieste, which aims to continue “building the future of knowledge”.

The presentation of the pieces will be given by Riccardo Martinelli, lecturer in Philosophy of Music at UniTS, who will offer the audience a key to better understand the works performed. The orchestra of the Giuseppe Verdi Opera House Foundation will be conducted by Maestro Giulio Prandi. The evening will also feature the special participation of mezzo-soprano Manuela Custer.

“This event,” explains Rector Roberto Di Lenarda, “is part of the numerous initiatives that we have organised to celebrate the Centenary of the University of Trieste, with the aim of creating new opportunities for the University of Trieste to meet the city, also through a greater involvement of cultural institutions. Art, music and culture in general allow us to tell a wider audience about our history and our mission in an original and creative way, enabling us to connect the past with future prospects. The concert also projects us towards the date of 8th August 2024 when we will symbolically celebrate the founding date of UniTS on the campus in Piazzale Europa’.

“We are very happy,” says Giuliano Polo, Superintendent of the Verdi Theatre, “to continue and intensify our relationship at several levels with the University of Trieste and we are honoured to contribute in a significant way to celebrating the Centenary of the University of Trieste with a concert performed by our Orchestra and a musical programme specifically designed to excite with history and culture”.

The Centenary concert is realised thanks to the contribution of the Region of Friuli Venezia Giulia and Promoturismo Io Sono FVG, with the support, in the broader context of the event “Trieste Estate 2024”, of the Municipality of Trieste and Discover Trieste Convention and Visitors Bureau.