Dante Agostini
THE 100 YEARS
On the occasion of Dante Agostini's centenary, his native town, Mercatello sul Metauro (Italy), wanted to celebrate this event in a worthy manner.
While researching the history of Dante, with the aim of creating a documentary film, Nikos Papavranousis, Director of the Dante Agostini School in Athens, Greece, met with the organisers of the Musica&Musica festival in Mercatello sul Metauro. Together with Giovanna Guerra and Guerino Pari, a magnificent tribute was organised this summer.
The DADA (Dante Agostini Drum Award) competition was also an opportunity to discover or rediscover the beautiful instrument that is the drum set.
Here are some pictures and videos of this event.
First day
Cécile's thanks
It is a great joy and pride to live this moment in tribute to our dad.
Anne and I would like to thank our Dad first of all for making us live such intense moments.
This land where Dante Agostini was born has always been revered by our family. Every time my aunt Denise, Dante's sister, talks about Mercatello it is always with great nostalgia and enthusiasm. It is fortunate that her daughter, Martine Aubert, came to share this family event.
Our gratitude also goes to the municipality of Mercatello sul Metauro, to its mayor Fernanda Sacchi and to the cultural councillor Luca Bernardini for their welcome and the positive energy they put into the occasion.
When Nikos Papavranousis, Rachel Kalanzopoulou, Giovanna Guerra and Guerrino Parri told us about the realization of this tribute, it provoked a very strong emotion in all those who knew Dante Agostini.
We are therefore extremely grateful to the Musica&Musica Festival for having dedicated this edition to the figure of Dante Agostini.
We also think of Jacques-François Juskowiak, director of the Agostini schools, who expressed his great regret at not being able to come and share this moment. With these few words we would like to record his presence among us. Thanks to the untiring work of Jacques-François Juskowiak and our mother, Claude-Annick Agostini, they have made it possible for Dante Agostini's work to be so well known and today this moment takes on its full meaning.
Our thanks also go to NiKos Papavranousis, director of the Agostini School in Athens, and to the director, Rachel Kalanzopoulou, for their desire to make Dante Agostini known through a documentary that you are about to see. During their investigations here in Mercatello, they met Giovanna and Guerrino. This unexpected moment gave rise to this festival. We will also have the chance to hear Nikos and his trio "Bonne espérance" play at the closing concert.
Let's not forget to mention the Fano Jazz Festival for its association in the realization of the concert of Gégé Telesforo quartet.
The Armonie Icensi Association had the wonderful idea of creating the DADA Dante Agostini Drums Award, we are very honoured. We salute the work done by the entire jury. It is pleasant to imagine that thanks to this competition new drummers will be trained in the Dante Agostini Schools.
We would like to thank the Dante Agostini Schools all over Europe for the distribution of the competition and all the young drummers who participated in the DADA.
Our sympathy also goes to Fred Briaud for the translations he made, without which our exchanges would be very complicated.
We also think of the sculptor Pasquale Martini for the realization of the work that we will soon discover.
We would like to express our gratitude to all the organisers and in particular to Giovanna and Guerrini Guerra for all the work they have done over the months.
Finally, a big thank you to all the guests and the public who tonight with us honour the memory of our father.
Second day
Third day
The Poem of Francesco Belfiori
There is always an echo of life.
Soft. Perhaps from a stone that rings, resonates, tells. From a life remain the stories: we have the chance, the causality, the privilege to listen to them.
The stories must be followed.
From a square, sunny, as only it knows how to be sunny, a square, in summer, lost among the pebbles of the Apennines, the story leads us to Paris, a city drawn on a pentagram, with the coloured pencil of the rain.
The rain tells stories, because it has the sound of a gentle heartbeat.
The child is named after a man who travelled through hell, until he saw the stars again. Now he is grown up, he no longer breathes the Apennines, nor the Parisian rain: now his breath goes to the rhythm of the Continent and the Continent goes to the rhythm of his breath.
The man opens his hands in front of the waiting fish, but the bait does not come out on the hook, but a seed.
The stories of men sitting on the edge of an instrument, dropping seeds, everywhere.
Then it's a matter of wind and rhythm: now it rises, and the seeds fly away over the sea. Now it slows down, and the seeds fall on leaves, forming writings, signs, gestures, verses, sounds: you need method, throwing seeds to the wind.
Method means going back, searching.
We followed a sound, a stone perhaps, or steps.
Dante walks uncertainly in the square. Dante runs, for Paris.
The coat tight and pulled over his shoulders. In his pockets he has seeds, scattered on the pages. When he reaches the edge of the instrument he sits down and waits for the drums and cymbals to come up the stream.
From the pocket of the coat come the leaves, the seeds, the wind, the countryside, the square, the Seine, the Metauro: above the leaves it is written "Drumming Method - Dante Agostini".
The child from Mercatello and the man from France smile.
From life there always remains an echo.
From Dante's life, there remains a paradise of seeds, in the form of notes.
If you are against the wind, it is nice to be able to listen to them.
Nikos Papavranousis - Trio Bonne Espérance<br />Le chat qui peche<br />Reprise d'un morceau joué par Dante Agostini et Michel Hausser
Nikos Papavranousis - Good Hope Trio
The fishing cat
Reprise of a piece played by Dante Agostini and Michel Hausser
Nikos Papavranousis - Trio Bonne Espérance<br />Salt Peanut avec le public
Nikos Papavranousis - Good Hope Trio
Salt Peanuts with the audience
100 Drummers for 100 Candles
Under the impulse of Laurent Déchenaud, the Agostini school in Tours invited the other schools to get together on 19 September for the shooting of the "Happy Birthday Mister Agostini" video clip.
100 drummers for 100 candles, in partnership with the network of Dante Agostini schools, to celebrate this centenary.
A very pleasant moment under the Napoleon bridge in Tours for this birthday of the great drummer of genius Dante Agostini!
The Clip