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U denkt ongetwijfeld hetzelfde als ik nu? Die uitgestoken hand van D66 is gewoon theater. Want de ervaring leert dat dit soort politici niet luisteren. Zij wachten geduldig af tot u uitgepraat bent, zodat zij u opnieuw kunnen uitleggen waarom u het niet begrepen hebt. Dat dedain zit bij D66 in alles. In de toon. In de hautaine houding. In de woorden die D66 politici gebruiken die het doen klinken alsof Nederland een project is wat spaak loopt en u, de Nederlandse burger, de reden bent waarom. Zij weten wat u nodig hebt. En terwijl ze u op uw tekortkomingen wijzen mag u dat daarna nog even beamen, liefst zien ze dan dat u er dan ook instemmend bij knikt. En vergis u niet, als u dat niet doet, kunt u erop rekenen dat het uw schuld is dat het land vastloopt. U bent racistisch, islamofoob, extreemrechts, etc. etc. Kortom, u bent het probleem. Niet hun beleid. Niet hun morele zelfgenoegzaamheid. Nee, u luisterde niet goed genoeg. Het ligt nooit aan D66! #D66 #Politiek #Nederland

Εξαιρετικός #paofc για 70 λεπτά, με σωστή νοοτροπία και αγωνιστικό σχέδιο από το πρώτο λεπτό. Περιόρισε τον ΠΑΟΚ σε παθητικό ρόλο και η κόκκινη του Ελουστόντο επέτεινε την πολιορκία. Χωρίς τον πολύ καλό Παβλένκα ο ΠΑΟΚ θα κινδύνευε σοβαρά με μεγάλης έκτασης ήττα, ακόμη κι αν είχε δοθεί το πέναλτι που (κακώς) δεν δόθηκε στον Εντιαγέ. Το πρώτο γεμάτο και πολύ καλός παιχνίδι του Ετιέν Καμαρά απόψε, με τον Κάνγκουα δίπλα του λειτουργεί πολύ καλύτερα και συν τω χρόνω θα γίνεται ακόμη καλύτερος. Ήταν πολύ καλοί και συγκεντρωμένοι σχεδόν όλοι απόψε, μοναδική παραφωνία ο Ντέσερς με την αχρείαστη ενέργεια και την (σωστή) αποβολή του. Ωραία ατμόσφαιρα και αρκετός κόσμος στο ΟΑΚΑ (με χαλασμένο το matrix πάνω από την 1-35) όμορφο ποδόσφαιρο, με εντάσεις και ψηλά μέτρα από τον Παναθηναϊκό μετά από πολύ καιρό. Το αμυντικό δίδυμο είναι λεφτά στην τράπεζα, οι ακραίοι συνεπείς και θα γίνουν καλύτεροι, οι μέσοι κομβικοί για την εικόνα του ματς και οι δυο Αργεντινοί στο πλάι ο καθένας τον οβολό του. Ένα από τα καλύτερα παιχνίδια του Αντίνο ώσπου να κουραστεί, για τον Ταμπόρδα δεν υπάρχει κατάλληλος όρος να περιγράψει την επιρροή και την αύρα του. "Ποδοσφαιροσύνη" βγάζει ο Ταμπόρδα, είναι ποδοσφαιριστής άλλης εποχής, το ακριβώς αντίθετο του μοντέρνου Αντίνο. Και ακριβώς γι' αυτό καψουρεύει την εξέδρα και είναι μέσα σε όλες τις φάσεις. Τεττέη και Λιβάι Γκαρσία δίνουν και δύναμη και ποιότητα μπροστά, κατ' εμέ είναι αδιαμφισβήτητα οι βασικοί φορ του Παναθηναϊκού, ακριβώς επειδή είναι αμφότεροι υβριδικοί και έχουν τη δυνατότητα να φτιάξουν προσωπικές φάσεις - ακριβώς όπως έκανε ο Αντρέας απόψε. Ντεμπούτο για τον Μαροκινό αρτίστα που πρόλαβε και έκανε δυο-τρεις ενέργειες από τις δικές του. Η ποιότητα που θα φέρει στο επιθετικό κομμάτι του Παναθηναϊκού είναι δεδομένη. Ο ΠΑΟΚ πραγματικά πρέπει να βρει έναν τρόπο να φύγει αυτή η καταραμένη χρονιά από πάνω του. Μακάρι να μην είναι μεγάλη η ζημιά του Γιαννούλη, ειλικρινά δεν ξέρω αν θα σηκώσει και αυτό ο οργανισμός. Δεν μπορώ να κατηγορήσω το Λίσι για την εικόνα και την ανισορροπία, κατέβηκε να παίξει με τόσες απουσίες και παίκτες-κλειδιά ωσεί παρόντες. Ένα θετικό δείγμα είναι ο Εντιαγέ που πάλεψε με Φαν Ντρόγκελεν και Ντε Φράι και δεν κατέθετε τα όπλα μέχρι να κουραστεί κι αυτός, ένα δεύτερο που χάρηκα είναι ο μικρός ο Μπαταούλας που μπήκε στη θέση του Πέλκα όταν αποβλήθηκε ο Αρίτζ και το παιδί πραγματικά στάθηκε παραπάνω από αξιοπρεπώς και ξεψάρωτα. Έχει πολύ μέλλον μπροστά του και θα είναι κρίμα να χαθεί. Ο ΠΑΟΚ χρειάζεται ενίσχυση, έχει μια εβδομάδα να το κάνει εάν θέλει να παραμείνει ανταγωνιστικός και υπολογίσιμος. Είναι αδύνατον να μείνει όρθιος και στο επίπεδο που τον έχουμε συνηθίσει και χωρίς Λουτσέσκου και χωρίς Κωνσταντέλια και με περιορισμένη ενίσχυση στο ρόστερ. Όλα μαζί δεν γίνεται. Το ματς με τον Άρη στην Τούμπα το θεωρώ πολύ κρίσιμο για τη συνέχεια, δεν γίνεται να διαρραγεί εντελώς η σχέση εμπιστοσύνης της Τούμπας με την ομάδα, ειδάλλως η σεζόν θα είναι αυστηρά "μεταβατική" και θα συζητάμε άλλα πράγματα και όχι για ποδόσφαιρο. Η αίσθηση που μου έμεινε στο τέλος είναι ότι σε σχέση με τα προηγούμενα χρόνια αντιστράφηκαν εντελώς οι όροι. Ο Παναθηναϊκός και πέρσι κέρδισε εντός έδρας τον ΠΑΟΚ, αλλά σε κανένα σημείο του αγώνα δεν επιβλήθηκε ολοκληρωτικά όπως απόψε. Οι νίκες φέρνουν και την απαιτούμενη ηρεμία και πίστωση χρόνου στον Νίστρουπ - αυτό που δημιουργεί και θέλει να μας παρουσιάσει ο Δανός είναι κάτι πάρα πολύ μοντέρνο και όμορφο στο μάτι. Θα έρθουν και στραβές, υπάρχουν ακόμη νεκρά διαστήματα, αλλά η εικόνα και το projection είναι πολύ ελπιδοφόρα. #ΠΑΟΚ #Παναθηναϊκός #ποδόσφαιρο

The far-right AfD is projected to win 44% in Saxony-Anhalt, more than doubling its 2021 result. The governing CDU collapses from 37.1% to just 18.5%. The AfD is now within reach of an outright majority in the state parliament. They're drinking champagne in the Kremlin. https://t.co/2BUjSN98nr #AfD #SaxonyAnhalt #Elections2023 #DE #RU

Was everyone asleep at the UN Secretariat and at UN missions of European nations? Nobody in France, UK, Germany, Canada, even Latvia, noticed that they are voting not just for a more accurate map projection of Africa but also for a map showing Crimea detached from Ukraine, in https://t.co/C3YJG6o6pm #UN #Ukraine #Crimea #FR #UK #DE #CA #LV #UA

Was everyone asleep at the UN Secretariat and at UN missions of European nations? Nobody in France, UK, Germany, Canada, even Latvia, noticed that they are voting not just for a more accurate map projection of Africa but also for a map showing Crimea as part of Russia, in https://t.co/rCufM7ZDyI #UN #MapProjection #Crimea #FR #UK #DE #CA #LV #RU

Russian president Vladimir Putin had a constructive conversation in the Kremlin with American envoys Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner about the war in Ukraine, during which economic issues and joint projects were also discussed before the envoys traveled to Kyiv for further talks with President Zelensky. (translated)

"GIO FESTIVAL (FOGGIA)" CONQUERS HOLLYWOOD AND ENTERS THE RACE FOR THE “OPERA OSCARS” (BEST RECORDING OF MONTH FOR GRAMOPHONE UK) SOURCE: https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/gio-festival-foggia-conquers-hollywood-enters-race-uk-sardella-ph-d--tlaee/ SOURCE 1: https://hollywoodbeatmagazine.com/2026/09/03/giordanos-marina-journey-nominated-for-international-opera-awards/ SOURCE 2: https://www.instagram.com/p/DcWc0dfjBr4/ There comes a moment in the cultural life of a nation when tradition ceases to be mere memory and once again becomes an event. Such is what is now unfolding with Marina by Umberto Giordano: the long‑lost opera, newly reborn through the “GIO Festival” led by Dino De Palma and Gianna Fratta, and today officially nominated for the “International Opera Awards”, the so‑called “Opera Oscars” that each year celebrate the world’s finest achievements in musical theatre. The announcement — reported by the prestigious Californian magazine Hollywood Beat Magazine — marks a historic turning point: a work that remained in obscurity for more than a century now ascends to the international stage, projecting Italian creativity into the very heart of the global cultural industry. It is not merely a recognition; it is a signal. The Teatro Umberto Giordano, the entire organisational engine of the “GIO Festival”, together with all public and private institutions involved, demonstrates once again that when it chooses to honour its treasures, it still has the power to astonish the world. Marina is not simply a rediscovered opera: it is a journey that begins with the archival papers of the “Frederick R. Koch Collection” at Yale University’s “Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library”, passes through the passion of musicologists such as Andreas Gies, ignites in the production of the “GIO Festival”, and — after attracting the attention of “Broadway World” with its six million monthly global readers — now reaches Hollywood, where the international press celebrates its dramatic potency, its luminous vocal writing, and its striking modernity. In an operatic landscape often dominated by the great repertory titles, the nomination of “Marina (1888)” shows that a work can still be rediscovered, reinvented, relaunched. It can speak to the present — and it can do so with the voice of Foggia and of the people of Foggia across the world. For those who cherish culture, music, and history, this is a moment to remember. For those who believe in the value of research and dissemination, it is a victory to celebrate. For those who live opera as a mission, it is an epoch‑making triumph. And now, with its nomination for the International Opera Awards — the global “Opera Oscars” — the journey of Marina and of Umberto Giordano continues. Towards the world. Towards the future. Towards a new chapter in the great Giordanian tradition. At long last, we may say: Welcome back, Umberto!

The Vindication of the “GIO Festival”: “BroadwayWorld” Celebrates Marina and the Umberto Giordano Theatre of Foggia SOURCE: https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/vindication-gio-festival-broadwayworld-celebrates-sardella-ph-d--8zzce/ SOURCE: https://www.letteremeridiane.org/2026/08/la-rivincita-del-gio-festival-broadwayworld-celebra-marina-e-foggia/ The GIO Festival has been, to put it mildly, overlooked by Rai3 Puglia and several regional outlets. Yet the festival dedicated to Umberto Giordano — promoted by the Chamber of Commerce of Foggia together with the Municipality and the Province, and supported by the Apulia Region and the Fondazione Monti Uniti — has achieved a remarkable vindication, landing on the homepage of BroadwayWorld thanks to the world première of the opera Marina, staged on 5 June at the Umberto Giordano Theatre in Foggia. This is no small feat, considering that BroadwayWorld is among the most influential American platforms devoted to theatre and the performing arts. The transatlantic debut of the opera by Foggia’s great composer did not escape the attention of Luciano Magaldi Sardella, who submitted to the editorial board of Lettere Meridiane an in‑depth and compelling contribution, reproduced below. In the article, the author masterfully reconstructs the extraordinary story of Giordano’s first opera, composed in 1888 and left without a staged production for 138 years, until its historic performance on 5 June at the Giordano Theatre. Above all, he recounts how the inaugural edition of the GIO Festival has restored Foggia to the centre of the international operatic stage, through the rediscovery and valorisation of Marina, the involvement of major musical institutions, and the attention of the American press. It is a stimulating reflection on the cultural and identity‑driven renaissance of a city that, for far too long, bore Giordano’s name on the façade of its theatre without managing to turn it into a lever of international visibility. (g.i.) + + + + + There are moments in the life of a city when past and future clasp hands upon the stage of the present. Foggia experienced one of these moments on the evening of 5 June 2026, when the curtain of the Umberto Giordano Theatre rose upon Marina, an opera composed in 1888 by a young man of twenty‑one — Umberto Giordano — then a student at the San Pietro a Majella Conservatoire in Naples. After one hundred and thirty‑eight years of silence, that score finally found its first scenic breath in the world. “It is not an ordinary event. It is a turning point. A void filled. A story rewritten.” Umberto Giordano, one of the most celebrated verismo composers of the fin‑de‑siècle — born in Foggia, author of masterpieces such as Andrea Chénier, Fedora, Siberia — had remained, until now, the only great Italian opera composer without a festival entirely dedicated to his oeuvre. A paradox that weighed like a historical injustice upon a city that bears his name engraved on the pediment of its most beautiful theatre. This is the extraordinary journey of Marina, Giordano’s first opera, which after 138 years of oblivion received its world première in scenic form on 5 June 2026 at the Umberto Giordano Theatre in Foggia, as the opening event of the GIO Festival — the inaugural edition of the Giordano International Opera Festival. The manuscript, preserved in the Frederick R. Koch Collection at Yale University’s Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library, has travelled an astonishing path: from the elite libraries of America’s East Coast to the beating heart of the Daunia. On the night of 5 June 2026, at the Umberto Giordano Theatre, that silence was finally broken. The GIO Festival was conceived in Foggia as an ambitious cultural project promoted by the Chamber of Commerce, the Municipality, and the Province, with the support of the Apulia Region, aiming to transform the artistic legacy of the verismo composer into a driver of territorial development and cultural tourism. Under the artistic direction of conductor Gianna Fratta and violinist Dino De Palma, the event at last fills a historical void. Its model is explicit and ambitious: a project inspired by the great festivals dedicated to Italian composers — such as the Verdi Festival, the Puccini Festival, the Rossini Opera Festival — while maintaining a strong territorial and participatory dimension. In other words, Foggia formally claims its seat at the table of the greats. And it does so with the credentials required: an unrepeatable world scenic première (parallel to the concert première at Milan’s Teatro Dal Verme, recorded by the prestigious opera label Decca Classics), a high‑quality operatic production, and the support of leading cultural institutions (Teatro dell’Opera di Milano, Fondazione Teatro Petruzzelli of Bari). The festival benefitted from the collaboration of the Orchestra of the Conservatoire and the Chorus of the Fondazione Teatro Petruzzelli of Bari, the Umberto Giordano Conservatoire of Foggia, the Fondazione Monti Uniti, and the Fondazione Apulia Felix. A network of excellence that lent the event national resonance and stature. The Umberto Giordano Theatre is a nineteenth‑century jewel of rare beauty — the oldest functioning horseshoe‑shaped historic theatre in Apulia. Yet for decades it lived in a state of semi‑clandestine cultural marginality, relegated to the periphery of the operatic routes that matter, hindered by long interruptions in its use from 2007 to 2014, including recent fire‑safety compliance requirements. Some referred to it, with a mixture of condescension and provincial resignation, as a “provincial theatre”, destined merely to bear Giordano’s name. That label is now destined to fall. It is precisely in Foggia that this youthful gem received its first scenic staging, placing the city on the international map of opera. A positioning without precedent in the city’s recent history. The Giordano Theatre recorded a full house for the historic première of Marina, welcoming hundreds of spectators, while many more followed the performance from outside via a large screen installed for the occasion. The production met expectations with full artistic dignity: the staging transposed the narrative to the First World War, heightening the opera’s dramatic and realist character. On the podium, the Symphony Orchestra of the Umberto Giordano Conservatoire conducted by Matteo Dal Maso. Sets and costumes by Alfredo Troisi; lighting by Massimo Russo. An ensemble of talents worthy of the name the theatre proudly bears. The definitive seal of this moment’s historical significance arrived from across the Atlantic. BroadwayWorld, the world’s most influential outlet for live performance criticism and reporting — with over 5.5 million monthly views — dedicated exclusive coverage to the event, publishing a complete photographic gallery of the world scenic première curated by Chloe Rabinowitz and a substantial critical review by Rachel Stone. The American article emphasised the historical value of the undertaking and the bond between the composer and his native city, highlighting the musical quality of the score, deemed surprisingly mature for the composer’s age. For the first time, the Umberto Giordano Theatre appeared on the New York‑based site alongside institutions such as the Los Angeles Opera House, Houston Opera, and BBC Classical Music at the Royal Opera House. It is its natural place. It should have been there decades ago. Until now, the world knew Giordano through his Milanese triumphs, not through the youthful opera written between Foggia and the Naples Conservatoire — the lost (and later rediscovered) Marina of 1888. Let us be clear: this is no minor detail. BroadwayWorld does not grant exclusive galleries to provincial theatres. It does so for events that shift the coordinates of musical and theatrical history within the circuits that matter. This time, those coordinates shifted to Foggia thanks to the GIO Festival, in the name of Umberto Giordano. For the record — and for those who may not yet know — the GIO Festival is a new and ambitious biennial event conceived by the Chamber of Commerce of Foggia, with the aim of celebrating the genius of Umberto Giordano and transforming it into a powerful engine of development for the entire Capitanata. Biennial means continuity, planning, vision. It means that Foggia does not intend to be a meteor in the operatic firmament, but a stable and recognisable presence within the international festival circuit. Andrea Chénier, Siberia, and Fedora had already carried Giordano’s name to the Metropolitan Opera House in New York for more than a century, where his works are still performed to great acclaim. Now Foggia itself — not merely its scattered operatic legacy — claims its rightful “place in the sun”. The composer whom his city struggled to recognise in life, and whose name it preserves on its theatre, its square, and its conservatoire, may finally become the lever of an unprecedented cultural, economic, and identity‑driven renaissance. The GIO Festival 2026 is not, one hopes, a point of arrival. It should be the first chapter of a new story for Foggia, for the Capitanata, and for the cultural South of Italy. The Umberto Giordano Theatre is no longer merely an architectural jewel to be preserved: it has now become a place of creation and inspiration, capable of attracting international press attention and hosting events that enter the annals of world opera. To those who still whisper that Foggia is a provincial city, the answer is now written upon the world’s stages: on the evening of 5 June 2026, the periphery became the centre.

“BROADWAY WORLD” OF NEW YORK WELCOMES THE TEATRO MERCADANTE OF CERIGNOLA IN THE NAME OF THE MASCAGNI FESTIVAL SOURCE: https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/broadway-world-new-york-welcomes-teatro-mercadante-sardella-ph-d--i5mbe/ by Stephi Wild, New York City. SOURCE: https://www.broadwayworld.com/italy/article/Photos-Teatro-Mercadante-and-Teatro-Goldoni-Partner-on-SOUNDTRACK-MASCAGNI-20260827 The most influential theatrical portal in the world, with at least six million global visitors per month, consecrates the cultural twinning between Cerignola and Livorno and the historical restitution of a verismo born in Puglia, southern Italy: there exists a moment when a local history ceases to be peripheral and, by the mere fact of being recounted in the right place, becomes universal history. That moment, for the Teatro Mercadante di Cerignola, has arrived. Broadway World, the bible of international theatre read daily by producers, artistic directors and critics from New York to the West End, has welcomed into its pages the cultural pact between the Mercadante and the Fondazione Teatro Goldoni of Livorno, sealed in spring 2026 by Artistic Director Savino Zaba and the Municipal Administration in the person of the Deputy Mayor and Commissioner for Culture, Maria Dibisceglia. The piece is signed by New York editor Stephi Wild, under the title: “Photos: Teatro Mercadante and Teatro Goldoni Partner on SOUNDTRACK MASCAGNI”. It is no mere detail. Broadway World does not review provincial seasons. When it does, it is signalling to the American and global theatrical system that something, down there, deserves to be seen. The heart of this recognition is Soundtrack Mascagni: the music that inspired cinema, the cinema that celebrated Mascagni, the co-production chosen as the closing event of the VII edition of the Mascagni Festival. A hybrid work, a concert-reading for narrating voice, ensemble, images and sounds, with dramaturgy and text by Vittorio Giacci, performed by the Artists of the Mascagni Academy and the Orchestra of the Teatro Goldoni di Livorno “Massimo de Bernart” conducted by Maurizio Colasanti. On stage, in the guise of an imaginary Mascagni, as narrator and guide through his own musical universe, the actor-director Maurizio Nichetti. A production, as the Italian notes record, “born from the synergy between the Teatro Mercadante di Cerignola and the Teatro Goldoni di Livorno”, which will see on stage the great actor and director Maurizio Nichetti and the Orchestra of the Goldoni, conducted by Maestro Maurizio Colasanti, with direction entrusted to Marco Voleri and Savino Zaba. What Broadway World has intercepted, moreover, is not merely a production but also a historiographical thesis that at last forces the international literature to catch up. For decades, Anglophone biographies have dismissed Pietro Mascagni’s Apulian decade as “years of poverty and obscurity”: the documentary truth, preserved in the Polo Museale of Piano San Rocco, is of a different temper entirely. In December 1886, on tour with the Maresca company, Mascagni stopped in Cerignola, where the mayor then in office, Commendatore Cannone, invited him to remain to conduct the newly founded philharmonic. The composer would stay, save for brief absences, in the house in Via Assunta until 1895, composing no fewer than five operas: Cavalleria rusticana; L’amico Fritz; I Rantzau; Guglielmo Ratcliff; Silvano. A third of his entire operatic output, written in feverish poverty, in an agricultural town of the Ofantine plain. It was there, in July 1888, that the verses of Cavalleria reached him by postcard from Livorno, sent by his poet friends Giovanni Targioni-Tozzetti and Guido Menasci. There, on 27 May 1889, he completed the autograph. The envelope, that morning, bore the postmark of Cerignola. The world premiere at the Costanzi in Rome, on 17 May 1890 before Queen Margherita, was an earthquake. As Zaba has synthesised it, in a formula destined to endure: “Livorno gave Mascagni to the world. Cerignola inspired him and kept the deepest part of his soul.” In fact, the productive parabola sanctioned by BroadwayWorld is exemplary in the way it overturns the traditional North-South axis of cultural projects. It begins on 23 August at the Mascagni Festival in Livorno with Soundtrack Mascagni. Then its debut in Cerignola, in the course of the Mercadante’s forthcoming season. Indeed, with a date already fixed: “Soundtrack Mascagni” will be presented in Cerignola on 24 October as the opening production of the 2026/2027 theatrical season of the Teatro Mercadante. An idea as simple as it is revolutionary: cinema as a lens through which to re-read Mascagni. The composer plundered by Scorsese and Coppola, cited by Visconti as a tutelary deity, already possessed in his own writing — dense, symphonic, almost edited by cuts — a cinematic vocation. Soundtrack Mascagni does not merely celebrate that filiation; it interrogates it. That BroadwayWorld should have chosen to capture precisely this — a provincial theatre that does not seek hospitality but co-produces as an equal with a historic theatre such as the Goldoni — says much about the shifting of Italy’s cultural axis. No longer a South that imports, but a South that generates archives, that preserves autographs, caricatures, unpublished letters, and restores them to the international circuit. For Cerignola, accustomed to being narrated as a land of wheat and not of music, this arrival on Broadway World is more than a press clipping. It is the certification that its Mascagni story is no longer a local footnote, but a necessary chapter in the history of verismo. And that the Mercadante, from a provincial municipal theatre, has entered in full right the ranks of those Mascagni theatres upon which the whole world now looks, and with admiration.

From Yale University to Foggia: World Staging Premiere of Umberto Giordano's “Marina” at Foggia's Teatro Umberto Giordano SOURCE: https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/from-yale-university-foggia-world-premi%C3%A8re-scenic-sardella-ph-d--id9de/ SOURCE: https://www.foggiareporter.it/dalla-yale-university-a-foggia-la-prima-mondiale-in-forma-scenica-di-marina-al-teatro-giordano.html (With heartfelt thanks to the distinguished journalist, Dr Christiana Lenoci…) From the Frederick R. Koch Collection of the Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library at Yale University to Foggia. Such is the extraordinary journey of Marina, Umberto Giordano’s first opera, which—after 138 years of oblivion—received its World Première in scenic form on 5 June 2026 at the Umberto Giordano Theatre in Foggia, inaugurating the GIO Festival – Giordano International Opera Festival. This remarkable rediscovery is recalled by Luciano Magaldi Sardella, Contributing Review of Books Critic at the London School of Economics (LSE). The project, conceived by Gianna Fratta and the artistic direction of the GIO Festival, seeks to transform Foggia, the Tavoliere plain, the Monti Dauni and the Gargano into a widespread stage dedicated to the city’s native composer, following the model of the great festivals devoted to Verdi, Rossini and Bellini. The vanished score At the age of twenty‑one, Umberto Giordano entered the Sonzogno Competition in Milan with Marina, a one‑act melodrama. Among seventy‑two competitors, he ranked within the top twelve. The prize was awarded to Pietro Mascagni’s Cavalleria rusticana. Giordano received an honourable mention, withdrew the score, and recycled part of its music in his later Mala Vita (1892). After his death in 1948, the manuscript disappeared and—entirely legally—ended up catalogued and forgotten within Yale’s collection. It was brought back to light by the musicologist and conductor Andreas Gies who, while studying the works of Leoncavallo, identified the autograph score in Yale’s online catalogue. Together with his colleague from San Severo, Emanuele d’Angelo, Gies prepared a rigorous critical edition that restored the work’s readability. Following its absolute première in concert form at the Teatro Dal Verme in Milan in February 2026—the very theatre that witnessed the early steps of Puccini and Leoncavallo—recorded live by Decca Classics with Eleonora Buratto in the title role and Freddie De Tommaso as Giorgio, praised by Gramophone and The Times of London, Marina finally returned home. Foggia reclaims it On 5 June 2026, the Umberto Giordano Theatre hosted the World Première in scenic form. The production was directed by Giandomenico Vaccari, who transposed the action to the era of the First World War; conducted by Matteo Dal Maso, winner of the Donatella Flick LSO Conducting Competition; and featured Valeria Sepe as Marina. A historic event for a city that lends its name to both its Theatre and its Conservatoire, yet until now had been the only among the cities of Italy’s great opera composers without a festival entirely dedicated to its own. The GIO Festival, from 5 to 20 June, unfolded across sixteen days and more than twenty events in seven municipalities of the Capitanata—Foggia, Manfredonia, Peschici, Vieste, Biccari, Roseto Valfortore and Torremaggiore—uniting opera, jazz, cinema and dance. The finale: opera as urban intervention On the evening of 20 June 2026, thirteen lorries arrived in Piazza Cavour in Foggia from Milan. They carried the entire production apparatus of Teatro alla Scala. The square was transformed into an open‑air theatre for Giordano’s Andrea Chénier, conducted by Gianna Fratta and featuring Maria Agresta and Jorge de León, before thousands of citizens. The opera of a revolutionary, erupting into the summer air of the city where Giordano was born. A gesture of proximity theatre demonstrating what a manuscript can achieve: turning a forgotten archive into a driver of economic and touristic development for the region, with Confcommercio’s puzzle‑based itineraries, Giordano‑themed menus, and QR codes featuring a digital avatar of the composer. Marina was lost for 138 years. To bring it back, six months, a library card, and a festival were enough.

THE WORLD PREMIERE OF MARINA AT FOGGIA’S “UMBERTO GIORDANO” THEATRE AND THE GIO FESTIVAL REACH THE STAGE OF NEW YORK’S BROADWAY WORLD SOURCE: https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/world-premiere-marina-foggias-umberto-giordano-gio-sardella-ph-d--fckpe/ SOURCE: https://www.broadwayworld.com/bwwopera/article/MARINA-Umberto-Giordanos-Lost-Opera-Makes-World-Stage-Premiere-in-Foggia-20260816?fbclid=IwY2xjawTvAJtwZG9mAWV4dG4DYWVtAjEwAGJyaWQRMFVieGZUZjlJTHlycjJucmVzcnRjBmFwcF9pZBAyMjIwMzkxNzg4MjAwODkyAAEeb4UykSs2J3TSMIe2ngfG85cNUsT_wKgdcTP_6Qz1gaj8KV8pw8dJ7nU5Fk0_aem_Zewl9iCLWLv80771fs7YOg TITLE: MARINA, UMBERTO GIORDANO'S LOST OPERA, MAKES WORLD STAGE PREMIERE IN FOGGIA. As a native of Foggia, I am profoundly delighted to share my article, published alongside New York City editor Rachel Stone, on the prestigious... BROADWAY WORLD (NEW YORK CITY) — the world’s largest international platform devoted to theatre and opera, with over 5.5 million monthly global visits. The outlet has released an in‑depth feature on the world premiere of Marina by Umberto Giordano, presented in Foggia by the GIO Festival (Giordano International Opera Festival). A RECOGNITION THAT TRANSCENDS MERE REPORTAGE The New York publication describes the revival of Marina as a historic event for global operatic culture, emphasising the artistic, philological, and production excellence of the project, as well as Foggia’s emerging centrality as a locus of cultural innovation. A DECISIVE STEP FOR FOGGIA AS A NATIONAL AND INTERNATIONAL CAPITAL OF OPERA This international coverage: - strengthens global visibility for the Festival and the Umberto Giordano Theatre; - enhances the value of the artists, technicians, and institutions involved; - confirms Foggia’s role as a new international centre for contemporary opera. We are proud to see our territory portrayed from New York as a place capable of generating culture, vision, and future.

From Edicola Fiore to San Severo’s Teatro Edicola: Fiorello’s inspiration wins over the prestigious London Daily News SOURCE: https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/from-edicola-fiore-san-severos-teatro-fiorellos-wins-sardella-ph-d--vqxbe/ SOURCE: https://www.londondaily.news/why-londoners-should-discover-san-severo-where-a-disused-newsstand-became-teatro-edicola-the-worlds-smallest-theatre/ The vision of Rosario Fiorello takes tangible form in the revolutionary project conceived by Francesco Gravino of San Severo, artistic director of Foyer ’97. Fiorello’s brilliant intuition behind Edicola Fiore has found new life in the heart of Apulia. Gravino, who leads the historic theatre company Foyer ’97, has traced directly to Fiorello and his multi‑award‑winning television series the inspiration that led him to transform an abandoned news kiosk into what promises to become the smallest theatre in the world. Edicola Fiore was the first to demonstrate how a space originally intended for selling newspapers could be reimagined as a genuine stage, turning the ordinary rhythms of daily life into performance. That lesson was not forgotten: when Gravino found himself before the shuttered kiosk in Via Matteo Tondi, he recognised the potential Fiorello had intuited years earlier. The result, inaugurated on 27 March 2026 to coincide with World Theatre Day, is Teatro Edicola: a venue with only six seats, where eleven actors rotate a repertoire ranging from Goldoni to Chekhov. Performances of ten to fifteen minutes have already drawn hundreds of curious visitors, attracting the attention of the international press, including the prestigious London Daily News, which has hailed the project as a powerful demonstration that regenerative culture does not depend on large budgets but on ideas capable of bringing a community together. The connection with Fiorello is further strengthened by his links with prominent figures in the city, such as Luca and Daniela Sardella, who have supported the initiative. It is an indirect acknowledgement confirming that the Sicilian entertainer’s vision continues to inspire new forms of theatrical expression in Italy.

“THE BATTLE OF CERIGNOLA (1503)” RETURNS TO THE CENTRE OF EUROPEAN HISTORY: FEATURED IN THE 'LONDON DAILY NEWS' SOURCE: https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/battle-cerignola-1503-returns-centre-european-history-sardella-ph-d--9urse/ SOURCE: https://www.londondaily.news/why-britons-should-recall-the-battle-of-cerignola-1503-the-battlefield-where-guns-killed-chivalry/ The prestigious London-based newspaper London Daily News—a publication exceeding 250,000 monthly readers and more than two million annual contacts—has released the first in-depth historical feature devoted to the Battle of Cerignola (1503), long regarded by scholars as Europe’s first modern battle: the moment when the arquebus and new tactical doctrines heralded the end of heavy cavalry and inaugurated a radically different way of waging war. A TRIBUTE TO PAST AND PRESENT MUNICIPAL ADMINISTRATIONS Due praise is owed to Cerignola’s current "Municipal Administration", including the Mayor and the Councillor for Culture, who in recent years—together with many other civic leaders—have steadfastly championed the valorisation of local history. Their commitment to initiatives, research programmes, and identity-building projects is now resonating well beyond Italy’s borders. A WELL-DESERVED RECOGNITION FOR PROF. MATTEO STUPPIELLO Heartfelt gratitude is extended to Professor Matteo Stuppiello, founder and president of Cerignola’s Centro Studi Torre Alemanna, who has devoted decades of archival, archaeological, cultural, and educational work to the Battle of Cerignola. His tireless scholarship has played a decisive role in restoring this event to the international historical debate. His contribution is now acknowledged not only within Foggia and Apulia, but across the national and European sphere. CERIGNOLA AT THE HEART OF EUROPEAN AND GLOBAL HISTORY The battlefield of 1503—where the Spanish forces of the “Great Captain”, Gonzalo Fernández de Córdoba, defeated the French army of Louis d’Armagnac, Duke of Nemours, through innovative strategy and the extensive deployment of arquebusiers—is today recognised by military historians worldwide, particularly in Spain, as a true turning point in global military history. Thanks to the synergy between institutions, scholars, and the local community, Cerignola is finally receiving the international visibility it has long deserved.

SAN SEVERO CONQUERS LONDON: 'TEATRO EDICOLA' BY FRANCESCO GRAVINO/FOYER ’97 FEATURED IN THE PRESTIGIOUS 'LONDON DAILY NEWS' SOURCE: https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/san-severo-conquers-london-teatro-edicola-francesco-sardella-ph-d--zh43e/ SOURCE: https://www.londondaily.news/why-londoners-should-discover-san-severo-where-a-disused-newsstand-became-teatro-edicola-the-worlds-smallest-theatre/ A fragment of San Severo now speaks to the world. The city’s 'Teatro Edicola'—shaped by the artistic vision of Francesco Gravino and the long‑established company Foyer ’97—has just been celebrated in the pages of the distinguished 'London Daily News', a publication with thousands of monthly views and an increasingly international readership attuned to Europe’s cultural excellence. INSPIRED BY ROSARIO FIORELLO' S INGENIUOS " EDICOLA FIORE" A newsstand turned into a theatre: the enchantment of an idea that inspires: San Severo’s project emerges from a singular tradition—the celebrated 'Edicola Fiore' created by Italy-renowned TV and radio celebrity Rosario Fiorello, which transformed an everyday urban space into a stage for pure TV creativity and entertainment. In San Severo, that intuition has become community, artistry, identity: a micro‑theatre that tells stories, welcomes people, and generates beauty. SAN SEVERO ON THE WORLD STAGE: LUCA AND DANIELA SARDELLA The London Daily News also highlights how San Severo is a land of talents capable of speaking to Italy and beyond. Among them stand Luca and Daniela Sardella, well‑known figures in environmental and cultural communication, who have long carried the city’s name across national borders. A SUCCESS SHARED BY ALL Publication in an international outlet is not merely an artistic accolade: it is an invitation to discover San Severo—its creative energy, its capacity for reinvention: it proves that even the smallest places (such as a disused newsstand) may become cultural giants when passion, vision, and community stand behind them. Congratulations to Francesco Gravino, to Foyer ’97, and to all who believe in the transformative power of theatre! Today, San Severo shines a little brighter.

The “Edicola Teatro” of San Severo (Francesco Gravino / Foyer ’97) Captivates La Repubblica News Outlet SOURCE: https://medium.com/@ingnucllms/the-edicola-teatro-of-san-severo-francesco-gravino-foyer-97-captivates-la-repubblica-news-d0683cdbf515 In the very heart of Via Matteo Tondi, San Severo, Puglia, southern Italy, where an old news kiosk has been granted a second life through the vision of artistic director Francesco Gravino and the San Severo theatre company Foyer ’97, we celebrate today a distinction imbued with culture, courage, and a profound sense of belonging. The smallest theatre in the world — born of an idea that once seemed impossible and now standing as a symbol of Apulian creativity — has been featured in the pages of La Repubblica. It is, in truth, a declaration of love for San Severo: for its artistic vitality, for the memory of Andrea Pazienza, and for all those who believe that beauty may blossom anywhere, even within the modest frame of a tiny kiosk. This project demonstrates that culture does not require grand stages; it requires grand visions. Warm congratulations to Gravino, to Foyer ’97, and to all who sustain this urban jewel which continues to astonish Italy!