The world's biggest music mine

Along the ancient Via Appia, on the outskirts of the city of the Sassi stone districts, there is a place that best represents the region and its history: the Cava del Sole. It takes its name from an ancient seventeenth-century bas-relief depicting an anthropomorphic sun: the relationship between humans and nature is the key to understanding how the city of Matera has been built by 'subtraction' and was first declared a UNESCO heritage site and then the third oldest settlement in the world. A place forgotten for years; it has been reinvented as a receptacle for events: this is where the adventure of Matera European Capital of Culture 2019 began.

In this limestone shell, halfway between a lunar landscape and a land of giants, there has been a gathering of artists from all over the world. A curious audience welcomed them, livening up the Cava every evening, which proved to be the ideal launch pad, suspended between the past and future. To celebrate the arrival of man on the moon, the British group Icebreaker performed 'Apollo soundtrack', composed by Brian Eno, Roger Eno and Daniel Lanois with arrangement by WooJun Lee. 50 years later, the spectator becomes a child before a stage that opens and lights up with video installations projected onto the tuff walls with images taken from the NASA and e-Geos archives. The unusual guest of honour in this case is the Moon, rising high above the Cava.

In an increasingly cosmopolitan and frenetic society the concept of 'tradition' has anchored itself to that of 'culture' with an increasingly stronger need to rediscover its roots; and so, in a strange play on words, what came first, from the Latin 'tradĕre', now becomes a source of attraction, calling to itself an ever wider audience. The Night of Taranta, now in its XXII edition, was one of the first examples of this phenomenon that encompasses the Matera 2019 project as a whole. This year Materadio, the Rai Radio 3 party, was dedicated to 'I Sud' and to the way southerners attract and send a message to the rest of the world.

No framework, no limits to creativity and collaboration: during the first edition of the Open Sound Festival, producers from all over the world have enthusiastically taken up the challenge of reclaiming elements labelled as rural and obsolete and reinterpreting them with a modern twist. Instruments such as the cupa-cupa, the bagpipes and the frame drum have become the undisputed protagonists of one of the most revolutionary festivals in recent years.

The creative process has its own circularity: what was considered classic until yesterday, tomorrow can be new. And at this musical crossroads all these stories reminded us of who we were and who we can become.

Here, where it all began, the wonderful journey of Matera 2019 came to an end. December 20 was the day dedicated to 'Open Future, Together!', a series of events that greeted Matera and its citizens, absolute stars of the Italian and European cultural scene, throughout 2019. The culmination of the day was reached in Cava del Sole, where a touching institutional ceremony gave way to an engaging and fast-paced concert.