It cannot be denied that no historical period has had as atypical a relationship with music of its present as our century has. Indeed, only the twentieth century has seen the various avant-garde proposals as a source of conflict, starting from the last decades of the last century, when the exhaustion of the tonal system exposed musical language to very diversified choices. Balancing between dodecaphony, inspirations from Eastern cultures, electronic experimentations and phenomena of concretisation, the musical world has witnessed the crises of a civilisation which can no longer recognise itself in an idea of a music based on a claim of natural rule structures.
This situation has been drawn out and is still not resolved today, meaning that now at the dawn of a new millennium we have difficulty recognising and appreciating works which by now belong to tradition. A negative consequence of this situation has been the breaking of the relationship and of any form of dialog between the composer and the public crowding into halls and theatres.
In no other historical period has musical life taken on the archaeological behaviour of our time, in which current concert seasons always refer to the classical-romantic periods, pushing themselves at most to Stravinskij, Mahler and musicians of the national schools. If it is true that the polemic position of the avant-garde in part contributed to this situation, it is also true that public laziness and its search for the reassuring value of the well known is still at the base of this current rejection of repertoires which should already be incorporated as a part of our music al consciousness.
This event wishes to offer an exchange of the experiences of some of the important figures of the schools of composition of the North East. In this much it would like to be a living testimony of the research which animates our musical life.

Roberto Calabretto