GENOA - The first winter edition of this year's Rolli Days in Genoa, scheduled from 19 to 21 January with extraordinary openings at the UNESCO buildings, pays homage to the great singer-songwriter Fabrizio De Andrè, whose 25th anniversary this month marks the death.
The theme of the event is 'Sacred and Profane-Ballad for Genoa', dedicated to the historical-artistic beauty of the Ligurian capital and its contrasts, also discovered through the most famous songs of the Genoese singer-songwriter.
The historic center of the Ligurian capital is characterized by its contrasts: richly decorated churches and buildings on monumental streets that intersect humble streets with poor, simple buildings.
These discrepancies are witnessed by the chronicles of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries and reported by writers such as Dickens, Mark Twain, Stendhal and many others who visited it during the nineteenth century, marveling at the decadence of some alleys, flanked by the gold and shining marbles of the palaces and churches.
The first winter edition of the Rolli Days tries to tell precisely about these social, urban and artistic contrasts, capable of creating an evocative meeting of the beautiful and the terrible, the sacred and the profane, inspired by the exceptional poetic and musical vein of Fabrizio De Andrè.
With the guided tours of the scientific communicators of the Rolli Days you can discover squares, streets, palaces and churches, private and public spaces, the wonderful halls of the Palazzi dei Rolli, intended for a few, and the monumental naves of the churches, open to everyone.
Alongside these visits and the many related events, tours to De Andrè's places are born, inspired by the music and lyrics of the passionate singer from Genoa, confirming once again how Rolli Days is a transversal event that not only celebrates the past , but brings history into the present, combining the figurative art of frescoes and paintings with the performative art of music and theater.
January is a particular and evocative edition that opens a year full of art and culture for Genoa.
And so, walking through the historic center, you enter Palazzo Centurione, looming like the keel of a ship stranded in the maze of medieval streets.
The building is located at the beginning of one of the main streets of Genoa and a stone's throw away is via del Campo, the title of one of the best-known songs by Fabrizio De André, who imagines the street and one of its buildings as a stage for a love story between a client and a very young prostitute, an entirely profane story lived on the threshold of those very noble palaces, which became brothels in their decadence.
"Via del Campo, there is a little girl, with dewy lips, eyes as gray as the street".
A little further south you reach the church of San Luca, where the frescoes and decoration of the church have as their protagonist, together with the saint, the figure of Mary, celebrated in the marble group by Filippo Parodi and in the 'Nativity' canvas by Grechetto.
Maria is also the protagonist of an entire album by Fabrizio De André, dedicated to the evangelical 'The Good News': "And you leave, Maria, among the other people who gather around your passing, a hedge of glances that do no harm in the season of being a mother."
A 5-minute walk away you can visit another church, that of Santa Maria Maddalena, in the shadow of the large buildings of Strada Nuova, behind the richest seats of city power, in the neighborhood that more than all represents the ambiguity between the profanity of free love and the almost religious sacredness of frescoes and works of art.
Like the one that De Andrè with 'La canzone di Marinella' dedicates to a modern, extremely earthly Maddalena, who in the song takes on the aura of a celestial woman.
Behind the church there is another building to visit: Palazzo Lercari Parodi, where in the main floor hall there is a large fresco dedicated to Megollo Lercari, an illustrious ancestor of the owner family and well known in the Genoese chronicles due to his terrible vengeful wrath.
The resentment of the man who cut off his nose and ears for revenge reminds us of that of the 'Judge' protagonist of one of the texts of the Spoon River Anthology, adapted and set to music by Fabrizio De André.
We return towards the port and enter Palazzo Cattaneo Della Volta, located between the San Giorgio market and the Ripa: since the Middle Ages, these streets witnessed the passage of goods, illustrious guests, processions and common people, who lived and lived these crowded spaces.
This is 'The old city' that De André sings: here the streets are so narrow and the buildings so close together that the sunlight almost doesn't filter in. "In the neighborhoods where the good Lord's sun doesn't give its rays."
For information and reservations: visitgenoa.it/rollidays-online
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