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SPOLETO FESTIVAL USA (Charleston, SC):
Spoleto Festival USA was founded in 1977 by Pulitzer Prize-winning Italian composer Gian Carlo Menotti, Christopher Keene, and others who sought to create an American counterpart to their annual Festival dei 2 Mondi in Spoleto, Italy.
Looking for a city that would provide the charm of Spoleto as well as its wealth of theaters, churches and other performances spaces, they selected Charleston, South Carolina as the ideal location. The historic city provided a perfect fit: intimate enough that the Festival would captivate the entire city, yet cosmopolitan enough to provide an enthusiastic audience and robust infrastructure.
Each spring, Spoleto Festival USA fills Charleston's historic theaters, churches and outdoor spaces with more than 140 performances by renowned artists as well as emerging performers in opera, theater, dance, and chamber, symphonic, choral and jazz music. Spoleto Festival USA is internationally recognized as America's premier performing arts festival.
PICCOLO SPOLETO (Charleston, SC):
The combination of historic Charleston's old European charm and the world-class Spoleto Festival USA together produce a unique and impacting synergy for all who come to experience this magnificent international multi-arts festival. But what really adds the ingredient of magic to the mix is Piccolo Spoleto, which provides access to the festival for every person, especially children.
Focusing primarily on artists of the Southeast region, Piccolo Spoleto is the perfect complement to the international scope of its parent festival and its 700 events in 17 days transform Charleston into an exhilarating celebration of performing, literary and visual arts. Piccolo Spoleto's traditional program offerings include visual arts exhibits, classical music, blues, jazz, dance, theatre, poetry readings, children's activities, choral music, ethnic cultural presentations, crafts and film.
Under the direction of Ellen Dressler Moryl, Piccolo Spoleto was designed and launched in 1979 by the City of Charleston Office of Cultural Affairs together with a group of volunteers from the Charleston arts community. These arts professionals devoted their time and energy to help produce the various series and presentations, which comprised the Piccolo Spoleto Festival. Their individual artistic taste and judgment manifested into the comprehensive festival program, which is still produced and presented by the City of Charleston Office of Cultural Affairs.
Piccolo's mission is to provide access to the Spoleto Festival experience for everyone, regardless of their economic, social or physical circumstances and to provide the opportunity for excellent local and regional artists, writers and performers to be presented in Piccolo's "local venue." Piccolo Spoleto offers something wonderful for everyone -from classical to contemporary, from traditional to cutting edge. One of the unique aspects of Piccolo Spoleto is the accessibility to the Spoleto Festival experience. Half of Piccolo's events are admission-free, and the rest are offered at modest ticket prices.
FESTIVAL DEI 2 MONDI (Spoleto, Italy):
The Festival dei 2 Mondi was founded by Gian Carlo Menotti in 1958, with the aim of establishing in Spoleto an occasion of confrontation and exchange between the Italian, European and American artistic cultures. Prose, dance and opera, but also concerts, art exhibitions and cinema reviews, make the Festival one of the most prestigious art events at international level.
Among the big names that made the Festival this famous, we remind Luchino Visconti, Eduardo De Filippo, Rudolf Nurejev, Carla Fracci, Thomas Schippers, Romolo Valli, Ken Russell, Nino Rota, Roman Polanski, Ezra Pound, Vittorio Gassman, Luciano Pavarotti, Luca Ronconi.
Spoletoscienza, a series of lectures/debates also occurs in the frame of the Festival. The meetings are open to the public and feature significant characters from the world of science.
The Festival Of Two Worlds is also father and mentor to two analogue events abroad: the Spoleto Festival USA, founded in 1977 and the Australian "Melbourne International Arts Festival", founded in 1986. Both events had M° Menotti himself among the founders, who was also artistic director for seventeen years in Charleston and for three years in Melbourne. These Festivals abroad have now other boards organizing them and no longer refer to the same administration of the Italian edition.
From 2008, the organization of the Festival dei 2 Mondi has passed to the management of the Festival Foundation, established in 1986 to ensure continuity to the event. The Ministry for Cultural Assets and Activities entrusted the Festival's artistic direction onto director Giorgio Ferrara, Director of the Italian Institute of Culture and President of the Forum des Instituts Culturels Etrangers in Paris.
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