It will be the first official tribute that Calabria will dedicate to the late Otello Profazio, the great artist who passed away two years ago and who, with his

It will be the first official tribute that Calabria will dedicate to the late Otello Profazio, the great artist who passed away two years ago and who, with his songs, helped to tell and export Calabrian folk culture all over the world. The Cuore Cantastorie festival will be a special gathering for storytellers who will meet on June 13 and 14 at the San Giovanni Monumental Complex in Catanzaro to celebrate, through music and various dialects, the historical identity and beauty of local traditions.

The free event, promoted with the participation of the Municipality of Catanzaro and supported by the Calabria Region, will culminate on the evening of Saturday, June 14, with a concert that for the first time will see Calabrian storytellers Francesca Prestia, Rocco Jenco, Nino Racco, Biagio Accardi, Nando Brusco, and Fulvio Cama take turns on stage, gathered to remember Otello Profazio through a personal reinterpretation of his most famous songs. The event program will instead open on the first day, Friday, June 13 at 5:30 pm, with the inauguration of the photographic and documentary exhibition "Thank you, dearest Otello!" curated by Gian Paolo Borghi, a scholar of folk traditions and ethnologist. The southern "minstrel"—who had embraced the Cuore Cantastorie project by participating in the first edition—was deeply committed to the research and revival of folk singing and, at the same time, to the dissemination, even internationally, of the various expressive realities and the history of our origins. His work, through the skillful use of radio and television, enabled a broader communication of traditional culture projected into ever-wider dimensions.

The exhibition aims, therefore, to highlight the different facets of Otello Profazio's work as an almost unique experience in the Italian artistic scene. After the opening of the exhibition, it will be discussed at a conference attended by Tiziana Oppizzi and Claudio Piccoli of the cultural association "Il cantastorie on line," Giuseppe Tripodi, writer and friend of the artist Profazio, Massimo De Pascale, author of the book "Otello Profazio. A viva voce," and Paolo Bolano, Rai journalist. In conclusion, there will be a musical performance by the well-known Sicilian storyteller Mauro Geraci, who will talk about his memories related to Profazio through ballads inspired by the myth of Orlando at the center of the album “I paladini di Francia.”