Grandezze & Meraviglie Festival Musicale Estense

Grandezze & Meraviglie qualifies as the longest running early music Festival in the Emilia Romagna region and is acknowledged in Italy as one of the most innovative festivals. At an international level, it is known as one of the major events expressly addressed to the early repertoire (from the Middle Ages to the early nineteenth century) offered with instruments and performance practice of that time. The Festival was founded on the occasion of the celebrations of “Modena capitale”, anniversary of the transfer of the Estense court from Ferrara to Modena (1598-1998).

The Festival was awarded the 28^th Abbiati della Critica Musicale as “best initiative of 2008” with the following motivation: “to the Festival Musicale Estense Grandezze e Meraviglie for the ability to combine the dissemination of early and baroque European repertoires with the valorization of the Estense musical heritage (notably ducal collections) in a now decade-long programme entrusted to ensembles known for their refined authoritativeness, framed in an interdisciplinary context and widespread within the territory.

In its 20 years of life, the Festival has organized more than 400 concerts, dozens of concert-lessons and conferences. To date, 30 CDs and DVDs bear the stamp of Grandezze & Meraviglie thanks to the Festival’s participation in various ways to musical productions.

The municipality of Modena (Comune di Modena), having realised that there were continuities between this early music festival and the previous editions, allowed Associazione Musicale Estense  to use the same title as Grandezze & Meraviglie Music Festival. Its main supporters over the years have been the Fondazione Cassa di Risparmio di Modena, Fondazione Cassa di Risparmio di Vignola, Fondazione Cassa di Risparmio di Mirandola, the  Municipality of Modena, the Municipality of Sassuolo, the Municipality of Vignola, the Municipality of Mirandola and the Municipality of Carpi.

. For the past 20 years, Grandezze & Meraviglie has been a solid reality, which includes concerts, cultural, educational and interdisciplinary activities, masterclasses, meetings organized with schools, informative concert-lesson and the series of university conferences I linguaggi delle Arti.