Italy Prepares To Fight The Coronavirus With a Flash Mob
#Music
MILAN — Beleaguered Italians may have found a temporary antidote to their shattered spirits that won’t infringe on the country’s strict anti-coronavirus measures: a nationwide “Sound Flashmob.”
One day after the country’s death toll from the COVID-19 virus passed 1,000 — second only to China in severity — organizers urged Italians to “open the windows, step out onto the balcony and play together, even from a distance. Let’s cheer up the cities!”
At 6 p.m. local time on Friday (March 13), they are inviting citizens to take whatever instruments they can find, even pots and pans, and make music. “This way our country will, for just a few minutes, become one gigantic free concert,” they say on a Facebook post.
The Flashmob Sonoro (“Sound Flashmob”) initiative is being promoted by Fanfaroma, a Rome-based brass collective whose name is a combination of fanfarone (“braggart”) and Roma (“Rome”).
Rome is the city where the event is likely to have the most success , although the organizers are hoping it will catch on elsewhere. Milan’s prestigious music school, the Conservatorio, has, for example, lent its support. Word of mouth and social media are the main driving forces.
Last week, the Italian government banned all concerts, live events and public gatherings until April 3. Then this week it imposed a national lockdown. “No more nightlife,” Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte declared on Monday in a TV address.
Health officials have discouraged Italians from leaving their homes; they face fines if their reasons for doing so aren’t sufficiently valid. The only establishments that remain open are pharmacies and shops selling food. Everything else — bars, restaurants, schools, universities and even churches — are closed, while most Italians are working from home.
But the fact that the nation’s city dwellers tend to live in apartment buildings means that there is nothing to stop them from standing on their balconies, instruments in hand, and playing music.
And that’s precisely what should happen this evening.
The Sound Flashmob is not the only musical event that is planned for Friday. The Ministry of Culture is staging an 18-hour live-streamed “marathon” titled L’Italia chiamò (“Italy called”) from 6 a.m. until midnight local time. It will feature musicians, artists, actors and scientists who will endeavor to explain “How to react to an emergency that is without precedent.” It has the support of FIMI, the representative of Italy’s major record labels. Its name is a quote from the country’s national anthem, L’inno di Mameli (“Mameli’s Hymn”).
And Italy’s anti-coronavirus party will continue at 7 p.m. local time the following day (Saturday, March 14) with Mestolata Collettiva (literally, “Collective Ladle”). This time citizens are invited to stand on their balconies and bang their pots and pans for five minutes.
via https://www.DMT.NEWS/
Mark Worden, Khareem Sudlow, DMTDaily
