A Million Euro Flight. Costly closure for the Valley of the Temples.

One million euros of public money and Agrigento’s Valley of the Temples closed for two days (a Saturday and a Sunday in high season, to boot: Aug. 31 and Sept. 1) for a concert by “Il Volo.” This, in a nutshell, is the news. It will be curious to see, should there be (as is hoped), the reaction of the usually somnolent world of cultural heritage, which during the week of Ferragosto was willing to let the rotisserie already ready on the grill cool for a moment to lash out against Madonna’s birthday in Pompeii. Controversy then, in recent days, because a private individual, Madonna, dared to tread the ground of the ancient Vesuvian city, moreover during the hours when it was closed to the public, spending 250,000 euros out of his own pocket. Less fuss, however, over the million euros that the Sicilian Region and the Valley of the Temples Archaeological Park will spend on the two-day concert event, which will result in the park being closed to the public for two full days.

Just as preparations were underway in Pompeii for the Feast of Our Lady (which involved no cost to the Archaeological Park: we may blame it for the less-than-stellar management of communication before the event, but certainly not for burdening visitors and taxpayers, because the Park did not spend a penny), theAgrigento Archaeological and Landscape Park Authority of the Valley of the Temples of Agrigento published a determination, 612 of Aug. 8, with the economic commitment for the realization of the event “Il Volo live at the Temple of Concordia,” a project in the total amount of 1.249,976.62 euros, as stated in the determination, of which 800,000 is for the concert alone (and 200,000 in cachet for the “three tenorini,” as the three singers were called the first times they were illuminated by the limelight, since they were little more than children), to which other expense items must be added, including travel, overnight stays, and various technical costs. The determination explains that the concert “expects” to be broadcast “on Rai 1 or Mediaset” and “on U.S. public television,” starting in December 2024 with continuation into 2025 and “with widespread coverage equal to 97 percent of the vast American territory” (which, of course, does not mean that all Americans will watch the concert: it just means that the PBS signal reaches almost everywhere).

So there is talk of “forecasts,” but for now all we know is that the event will be broadcast on Christmas Eve, so much so that today a communiqué from the Sicilian Region asked the August 31 audience (600 people) to “wear appropriate clothing for the period when the show will be aired”: solidarity to those who will have to go up to the Temple of Concordia in their coats in the middle of the Sicilian summer, which has no reputation for being particularly cool. However, we do not know the impact estimates, we do not know what channels the show will be broadcast on, we do not know how long it will last, and we do not know whether news about the Archaeological Park will also be broadcast during the airing or whether the Temple of Concordia will be reduced to a mere setting, despite the note from the Sicilian Regionwanted to make it clear that the Temple “will not just be a backdrop, but will be transformed into a central scenic element, enhanced by a refined play of light” and that “on stage, in addition to the three singers, a choir and orchestra will also perform, creating an immersive experience that will give new life and visibility to one of Sicily’s most iconic places” (whatever that means: it now borders on unconstitutional to have a statement that does not contain the phrase “immersive experience”).We then know that it will all be borne by Sicilian taxpayers and visitors to the Archaeological Park, since, for the concert alone, 500,000 euros will be covered by the Sicilian Region with an expenditure under the title of “contribution for the promotion and organization of initiatives related to the event Agrigento capitale della cultura italiana 2025,” and 300,000 euros will instead be committed to the Park’s budget.

Now, the case deserves some considerations. The first issue is that of the event itself: there is to consider that the budget item for the promotion and organization of initiatives related to the Italian Capital of Culture 2025 consists of four million euros. It is worth considering that we are not talking about the budget for communication: we are talking about the total resources that the City of Agrigento has received from the Region to organize and promote the initiatives of the capital of culture (another million will come in 2025). In practice, it is the total budget that the Region has provided for Agrigento Capital of Culture, and one-tenth of this sum (500 thousand euros: the rest will be covered, as mentioned, partly by the Park and partly by other budget chapters) will be committed to the concert. Let us keep in mind that the Brescia-Bergamo capitals of culture 2023 dossier (for now, at least in the opinion of the writer, the best edition of the Italian capital since the title has existed) had a budget, for marketing and communication activities alone, that amounted to two million euros. So we are talking about a concert that will cost half of what Bergamo and Brescia budgeted last year for communication (ending up attracting over 11 million visitors in the end). However, this is not the first time that concerts have been organized at the Valley of the Temples: there is a facility in the Valley of the Temples, the Piano San Gregorio, which is suitable for concerts of four thousand spectators (instead of the one thousand six hundred planned in front of the Temple of Concordia, where the Il Volo concert will be held: visitors will pay a ticket, the cost of which will most likely be 80 euros, and the proceeds will be donated to charity, but it has not yet been specified to whom). One wonders, therefore, whether it would have been more virtuous to gear up to prepare a concert together with a private organizer and, at most, to collaborate by paying only the rights for television reproduction.

All this, moreover, in the face of closing the Park for two consecutive days on a summer weekend: in addition to the costs should therefore be calculated also the shortfall of the takings of the two days, and the poor figure towards international tourists who may have booked months in advance their vacation in Sicily and find themselves forced to give up visiting the Valley of the Temples in the face of a communication arrived a week in advance (the notice on the social of the Valley of the Temples was published yesterday, while on the website, in the page “Schedules”, at 16:00 on August 22 still does not appear).

Then there is another issue: that of the image Agrigento wants to give of itself. Let us also admit that this is a brilliant territorial marketing operation, that it is worth the money it cost, and that it generates a superior return, which is entirely possible and, indeed, desirable (we wish the event success). Even allowing for all this, the fact remains that the Italian capital of culture should be an expression of a very high standard: one then has to wonder whether a national-popular group, a TV variety group, which has been successful abroad because of the stereotypical image it provides of Italy (look at the setlist the three former tenorini show off in a random concert in America: Funiculì funiculà, O sole mio, Granada, Torna a Surriento, Libiamo nei lieti calici, La donna è mobile, and so on) is best suited to represent the image of Agrigento (and of Italy, as next year Agrigento will be the Italian capital of culture) in the world. If we think of Italy and music, Verona comes to mind with its opera and theater season at the Arena, symphony concerts at the Fenice in Venice, opera and dance at La Scala in Milan, and let’s also throw in the Puccini festival in Torre del Lago, Umbria Jazz, the blues season in Pistoia, and the I-Days of rock that attract audiences from all over Europe. Does the city of Agrigento really want to introduce itself to Italy and the United States with a Volo concert? What target audience does Agrigento intend to address? Perhaps the same audience that then leads us to write alarmed articles about overtourism? Is it, in short, capital culture?

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