Holidays & Festivals

Italy:

Carnevale: January 17 to Ash Wednesday
Carnevale always begins on January 17 and continues until Ash Wednesday. The ceremonies of the last three days of the carnival are the gayest, especially those of Martedi Grasso, or Shrove Tuesday. Throughout Italy the occasion is celebrated with colorful pageants, masquerades, dancing, music and all kinds of merrymaking.

La Vigilia Dell’Epifania (Epiphany Eve): January 5
Children receive gifts at Epiphany, in memory of the presents the Wise Men offered the Christ Child; but, unlike the tradition in Spain and some other countries, it is not the Magi who bring the gifts, but la Befana, the little old fairy witch woman. The name befana is probably a popular corruption of Epifania, or Epiphany, the feast that commemorates the visit of the Three Kings to the manger.

Capo D’Anno (New Year’s Day): January 1
New Year’s Day is celebrated with services in the churches, parties, visits and all kinds of festivities. Children receive strenna, or monetary gifts, from their parents, while friends and relatives send each other flowers and bunches of mistletoe. Since early times, Italians have attributed to mistletoe such miraculous properties as healing sickness, curing sterility in women and animals, and quenching fire. Today, a piece of mistletoe is hung over the door to “bring luck” to the entire household.

Naples:

Feast of San Gennaro

Sorrento:

Sorrento Summer of Music: July to September
The “Sorrento Summer of Music” Festival takes place every year in the cloisters of the monastery of Saint Francis in Sorrento, and its honorary President is the famous cellist Uto Ughi. Against the attractive backdrop of the Saint Francis cloisters, great names from the international music scene perform alongside emerging talent throughout the summer. There is plenty of classical music and chamber music, but there is also jazz and other genres.
Incontri Internazionali del Cinema di Sorrento: December
Sorrento’s International Film Festival first began in 1963, and every year awards are presented to the best of Italian and foreign features and shorts.

Amalfi:

Festa di Sant’Andrea: One of, if not the most important, religious events celebrated in Amalfi is the Festa di Sant’Andrea, translated as the Feast of St. Andrew. Sant’Andrea, considered as the Patron Saint of Amalfi, is honored through two separate celebrations. The first takes place on his birthday on November 30; a statue of the saint is carried around the city in a solemn procession. The second is on June 27, when the city remembers how Sant’Andrea saved it from the clutches of the evil pirate Barbarossa. Unlike his more somber birthday celebration, this festival commemorates Sant’Andrea’s miraculous acts by bringing a statue to the sea where fireworks and music await him and his staunch devotees.