Electronics Prevails

'Orphée' at the Roma-Europa Festival,
reviewed by GIUSEPPE PENNISI

The RomaEuropa Festival is twenty-five years old. When it first started, few believed that it would survive that long because the Italian audience had the reputation of being rather conservative and, thus, hardly open to a festival which tried to marry modern and classical music with ballet and electronics. More surprisingly, the festival was headed by a not so young former politician -- now ninety-two years old -- who after several ministerial posts had became the head of a major insurance company but has always had the flair for modern paintings and contemporary music...