About dal Mississippi al Po and Seba Pezzani

Seba Pezzani is a man with many strings to his bow. Not only does he organise and run the festival, he is a gifted musician, translator, writer, and journalist. Seba has translated many academic books including books by ark Twain, Aldous Huxley, Jeffery Deaver, Clive Cussler, Joe Lansdale and Will Kaufman's book on Woody Guthrie. He's also a published author and has written three books; novel 'Tuttifruitti' with his friend Luca Crovi and two non-fiction books, 'Americrazy' and 'Istruzioni per l'USA'. As a journalist, he's written several articles for two national newspapers, Il Giornale" and "l'Unita', usually focused on American pop culture, arts, music, and books.

Despite being exceptionally busy he always found every available moment to come to ensure that we were happy, well fed and enjoying our experience. 

Our wonderful friend and tour guide Camillo at one of the venues in town

He told us a little about dal Mississippi al Po:

"The festival started 12 years ago from an original idea of Davide Rossi, who thought of conceiving a little local blues festival, with very limited finances, a couple of Italian semi-unknown bands and the extra plan of making it a real festival and not just a showcase for the involved bands. So he immediately thought of blending music and literature, asking me to talk about a book that had been recently released by a national publisher who I would sometimes work for. The funny thing is Davide and I only live 20 miles away from each other but we had never met. So that is how I first got in touch with him: as a guest of the first edition of the festival. We became fast friends. And we immediately thought of repeating the festival and trying to make it a little bigger. That is what we did in the net two years, adding a series of literary events to the music avenue.

After three years, we decided to become a "serious" festival and started inviting pretty well-known writers and musicians from several countries, bu mostly from the US or anyway creative persons who were either musicians, music lovers or musicians with an interest for books. And we have tried to keep this link the focus of our festival. I direct the literary part and Davide directs the musical part. And then there are all of the other persons you have met. We do it for fun and invest our time in what you have seen. But it is fun to try to bring marvelous creative people together."

Ellie, Judy and Fakra with Seba

Check out the books that Seba has been involved in writing and translating HERE
and for more info on 'dal Mississippi al Po', visit the website HERE - (note: the site is in Italian but can be translated to English)

Photographic Memories of Piacenza: Touring the Town and Eating with New Friends!

Exploring Piacenza

Piacenza is a very welcoming city, home to picturesque landscapes, deep culture and history, and wonderful food.

In our free time, our wonderful hosts showed us the beauty of Travo and Bobbio, both situated in Piacenza. There we were able to soak in the majesty of the spectacular scenery, witness the grandeur of centuries-old churches, observe the architecture of some ancient castles, and experience the exciting hustle bustle of the afternoon markets.

Our first stop was Castillo di Rivalta!

The oldest parts of the castle were built in the early 10th century - the oldest tower featured below. The castle and surrounding hamlet are now owned by Count Zenardi Landi who lives on the site. The count's flag flies when they are in, just like the Queen in Buckingham Palace!

We then visited the Centre of Piacenza where we saw the Palazzo Farnese, Basilica di Sant Antonino the Piazza Cavalli and the Cathedral. 

 Piazza Cavalli is in the Centre of the city and is the political and historical centre of the city. Built in the 1300's during the construction of the Gothic Palace and is as old as the San Francesco Church opposite. 

Find out more HERE

The Cathedral was built in the 12th Century and features frescos by Morrazone and Guerchino - the cathedral also features some pieces of frescos rescued from other churches in the province. 

These have been carefully preserved in partial form due to their age and the fragile nature of buildings. 

The palace is built on a former 13th Century fortress and was commissioned in 1556 by the wife of Duke Ottavio Farnese, Duke of Castro and Parma. The palace is partially built, having never been finished. The building was designed by Francesco Pachiotti and architect Giacomo Barozzi and was completed in 1602. 

The building fell into disrepair after the death of the last Farnese Duke in 1731 and was restored in the 20th Century. I can now be visited as a museum.

Camilo and Giulia are descended from the family of Duke Farnese and Giulia has a ring that belonged to the Dutchess, passed down in her family

To find out more about Palazzo Farnese and view museum opening times, visit the website HERE

Eating in Eataly 

Lunch at Pasquale's was a real treat. The food there was impeccable. There are no words to describe the starters, numerous mains and refreshing desserts. These pictures say it all. And what can get better than eating lunch at Pasquale's? Eating twice in two days, of course!

Eating in Italy is an event in itself. You will eat your main in the early afternoon, around 1.30pm and continue on until 3.00pm. We first visited Pasquale's on Day 2 of our visit to Piacenza and met some wonderful new friends - James Runcie and his wonderful wife Marilyn, Mikaela Bley and her partner Dag as well as Camilo, Giulia, Valeria and Seba. We began with bruschetta and pizza, which was swept up with great enthusiasm by our party. We followed with a seafood lunch of clams, muscles with spaghetti and finished our meal with some gelato. We were treated to delicious local wine from the region, which came out cool, fresh and lightly sparkling.

On our second day, we began again with pizza and bruschetta and followed with potato pasta shells, salad, and a lemon sorbet. Both were amazing and gave us a real taste of the Italian experience. Pasquale himself came to the table to greet, kiss and laugh with the party! 

"We just sit and eat and the world comes to us" - Marilyn Imrie

Day 1 - How to Keep Sane in a Queue

I began the early day with bags packed, clothes laid out and a sense of anticipation, a feeling I was glad of throughout what was to become a very long and eventful day.

They say the best-laid plans are always somewhat ambitious, and ours was no exception. I had organised myself ahead of time, printed our e-tickets and checked in the night before. I caught the train on time, I arrived at Manchester Airport on time and met my lovely travel buddy on time. That's where our good luck seemed to flounder. As we made our way through security we were stopped for all manner of issue - an electric iron, medication, random checks. As we sighed with relief, our chaperone, Will, stopped and threw his hands in the air. We immediately knew something was wrong. We looked up at the flight information board and saw the word all air travellers dread - CANCELLED! Our well-timed flight had been cancelled thanks to good old staff sickness.

We began to panic, albeit calmly, and made our way back through border control and to the place where we met at the check in.

And so our wait began...

There are many things you can do in a slow crawling queue, and today we were going to discover just how many there were:-

• Practice balancing on one leg
• Talk about the politics of the day
• Play a game of 'eye spy'
• Concoct stories about all the people around you - who they are, what they do, why they're travelling
• Tell stories about yourself

Our queuing was kept endlessly entertaining as Judy told us stories of her life. As an actor, singer, teacher and voice coach, Judy Blazer has lived a wonderful and interesting life. She told us of her parents - her mother, an Italian voice coach at the Naples Conservatory and her father, a Polish-Jewish American who met during the Second World War. They settled in Montclair, New Jersey, raising Judy and her brother. As she grew up her love of singing grew and she moved to the Manhatten School of Music after dropping out of junior year at high school. 

Of the many wonderful stories that Judy told during our long wait, this was my most memorable. Her parents owned an apartment in New York and had many tenants over the years. One such tenant appeared in the 60's, a lovely British girl with lilac hair. The lilac-haired lady spent some time in the apartment and was liked so well by Judy's parents that they invited her over to dinner on occasion. When she left the apartment her parents showed Judy a gift that she had left. A vinyl 45 single of the song "Son of a Preacher Man". The lilac-haired girl was Dusty Springfield. 

As the hours went by in our seemingly endless queue, we found another flight and were given a complimentary lunch for our trouble. We flew to Heathrow and boarded our British Airways flight to Milan, finally arriving at 9.20pm. I noticed the rise in temperature immediately, but instead of feeling suppressed by it I felt a burst of renewed energy in my tired body. We were here!

Our Plane

The view as we flew over the Alps into Italy

Our wonderful host Seba arranged a pick up for us and we met Camilo; a marvellous member of the crew and Piacenzian who we would get to know over the next three days. Camillo drove us the 1 hour 30 minute trip to Piacenza and we finally arrived at the City Hotel where I washed the day off me, rested my weary head on my pillow and felt that anticipation once again.

The coziest hotel room