How on earth do they do it in Italy? Get together a cracking professional choir with four supreme soloists, hire two grands and a harmonium, have a truly on-the-ball conductor, find an idyllic setting in a Franciscan monastery, and play Gioachino Rossini’s eloquent, eclectic masterpiece, his ‘Petite Messe Solennelle’, on the occasion of the Pesaro composer’s 150^th death anniversary.  Then, after a superlative musical banquet, provide another foody one in the Arcadian grounds of the monastery gardens with pasta, a multitude of finger dishes and a mouth-melting selection of sweets. And all for a voluntary donation to the local Misericordia or emergency and ambulance service…

This wouldn’t happen in London except if one pays for three-digit priced tickets (and then the drinks would be extra, unlike the free-flowing prosecco of Sunday evening).

The simple fact is that in Italy it’s often too much of a bureaucratic bother to set up ticket sales, what with all the government taxes and so forth. Furthermore, Italians are generous towards such organisations as the Misericordia and, of course, the Banks of Lucca are not mean-minded machines like they are in Europe’s former (after March 29th next year, that is) financial capital, but are true Maecenases of the arts.

Rossini packed everything into this greatest of his ‘sins of my old age’ as he termed his post-theatre productions. Gioachino had given up opera over thirty years previously, realising full well that his style was going out of favour (he’d anyway earned his dosh out of writing such masterpieces as the ‘Barber of Seville’ and ‘William Tell’).

It’s a ‘Petite’, (lasting well over an hour…), ‘Messe’ (perhaps that’s right as it’s a hotchpotch with everything from the strictest double fugue counterpoint in the ‘Quoniam’ and the ‘Vitam Venturi’ to heroic arias worthy of the finest operatic stage) ‘Solennelle’ (strictly speaking a Mass is solemn but there are plenty of witticisms in Rossini’s version which can bring a smile to the most dour-faced listener.

The gorgeous evening was also the concluding event in the greatest music festival this side of Lucca. Maestro Roni’s inspiration for the ‘Serchio delle Muse’ (translation unnecessary) was to bring music to the smallest village, to the highest mountain side to the most distant valley. This year was as varied as ever with a concert on the heights of the majestic Pania della Croce mountain, with three wonderful operettas (yes Italy has a great operettic tradition equal to anything that G n S, Offenbach and Lehar can conjure up) and lots more.

If you know nothing of the Serchio delle Muse festival then inscribe it in your brain ASAP. It’s the best thing going around here and more than makes up for the sad demise (temporary, I hope) of Barga Opera.

I should add that the evening was also a nice social event and I met up with truly valuable friends, some of whom had come from Pisa just on my Facebook announcements.

Don’t miss out for next year and the great maestro Roni’s festival if you’re in our lovely part of the world.