Summer 2023 gives me something really special: in Lavarone, in the heart of Alpe Cimbra, in Trentino, after 6 years of work behind the scenes, we present to the public ANIMA, the project for the creation of a string quartet with tables harmonics and core in silver fir from the Avez del Prinzep, the historic and monumental tree of the Cimbrian plateaus, in the municipality of Lavarone, which crashed in 2017 at around 250 years old and until then considered the tallest silver fir in Europe.
A beautiful story, which I will tell on the occasion of the delivery of the first violin made by the master luthier Gianmaria Stelzer, commissioned by the Avez del Prinzep Valorisation Committee, scheduled for Friday 28 July at 9pm, at the Lavarone Congress Centre.
It will be an official moment, in the presence of the mayor of the Municipality of Lavarone Isacco Corradi who, since the crash, has shared and supported the desire to regenerate the Avez del Prinzep, but also a conversation with the public to reveal curiosities and background on a project from cultural and scientific implications: between unpublished photographs and video stories, I will converse with Damiano Zanocco, forest keeper of the Altipiani Cimbri and profound expert on the Avez del Prinzep, and Gianmaria Stelzer, master luthier from Trentino who today works mainly in his workshop in Zurich.
And the music could not be missing: the first sounds on this truly unique violin will be made by the violinist Elisa Cecchini, a promising young international concert artist from Trentino.
Elisa Cecchini will also be the protagonist of the second presentation of ANIMA, this time together with the Dolomiti Horn Ensemble, a quartet of Alpine horns, a fascinating instrument with an evocative sound: Saturday 19 August at 5pm, in Malga Laghetto in Lavarone, right where the Avez del Prinzep once stood and where today its open-air shaft remains, we will hold an interactive show of artistic presentation of the first violin made.
Among distant echoes, ancestral sounds and sound effects also created by the public, the voice of his SOUL will rise from the stem of Avez. And if the violinist Cecchini will be mainly engaged in a traditional violin recital with virtuosic and symbolic music by Bach, Paganini and Ysaye, the Dolomiti Horn Ensemble and the agreed public will be treated to a special sound concert-action, under my musical direction.
I thank Maestro Giovanni Bonato, an esteemed composer, for his advice and the Stella Alpina Choir for their collaboration in the interaction with the public. For the public it will be a truly immersive experience.
It is recommended to bring a blanket or mat with you, as well as the desire to make music. A musical toast will follow to celebrate the event.
The ANIMA string quartet will be completed by the beginning of 2024, when maestro Stelzer will have finished the construction of another violin, a viola and a cello.
ANIMA is a project that expresses a significant scientific implication since, as a rule, stringed instruments are made with the so-called resonance spruce soundboard.
Precisely to enhance the cultural and scientific value of the project, in the spring of 2024 ANIMA will also be told through an exhibition that I am curating together with the wonderful professionals of the Muse – Science Museum of Trento.
Thanks to a memorandum of understanding between the Municipality of Lavarone and Muse, the general public who frequents the Trentino museum will be able to learn about the history of ANIMA and all the stories it carries within itself and the relationships it has triggered, from the botanical to the acoustic field , from nature to art.
ANIMA will also be much more.