The curtain falls on the eighth edition of the Stone Theater Lyric Festival, conceived and promoted by the Sicilian Lyric Choir, and the final balance traces the profile of an unprecedented artistic, cultural and civil undertaking.
With the exceeding of the record quota of over ninety thousand total attendances and an unprecedented turnout of the public, recorded between the evocative thousand-year-old cavee of Sicily and the prestigious extra-moenia stages of Gubbio, Spoleto and Valletta in Malta, the event is unequivocally established as the center of musical and stage production with the greatest impact in the entire South.
Guided by the powerful and visionary claim “Caring Eternity”, the 2026 season was characterized by a profound commitment and civic duty, combined with constant attention to social inclusion and the rediscovery of unjustly forgotten historical and monumental sites, transforming archaeological parks, ancient theatres, forgotten monuments and stone cathedrals into extraordinary agoras of beauty and territorial redemption.
The journey of this imposing collective rite began last July 12th in the solemn setting of Monte Jato with a moving homage to the memory of little Giuseppe Di Matteo, and then unfolded along an extraordinary itinerary of over forty events, almost all of which were sold out, up to the triumphant final evenings.
«We experienced an overwhelming summer, in which the ancient stone returned to become flesh, voice and pulsating memory», underlines Francesco Costa, artistic director of the Opera Festival of the Teatri di Pietra. «Seeing over ninety thousand people fill the auditoriums, being moved by Nabucco in LIS, vibrating with the notes of Morricone in Malta and rediscovering once forgotten monumental treasures demonstrates that great music is not a luxury for the few, but a primary asset of civil and spiritual redemption. This extraordinary triumph is the victory of beauty that does not give up, of real inclusion and of a community that still knows how to caress eternity».
Such an overwhelming success arises from the quality and extraordinary variety of the genres offered, capable of embracing great opera, symphonic music, film soundtracks, auteur pop, mysticism and dance. This edition also stood out for the great celebrations of cultural memory, such as the homage to the fiftieth anniversary of the death of Luchino Visconti with an evocative production of Cavalleria Rusticana at the Teatro Greco Romano in Catania, in which the realist drama merged in an unprecedented way with the projections of neorealist cinema. The season also saw the solemn debut of Giuseppe Verdi’s Nabucco at the Greek Theater of Syracuse, in Tindari and at the Teatro Antico of Taormina, a production that marked a historic turning point for accessibility and social inclusion thanks to the integration of Italian Sign Language (LIS) for deaf audiences, created in collaboration with the University of Parma and the ENS. Added to this were the great anthology symphonic evenings in Taormina dedicated to Hans Zimmer, Ennio Morricone and Ludovico Einaudi, the profound spirituality of Mozart’s Requiem – L’Opera del Fuoco, and the poetic homages to Franco Battiato performed among the stones of Argimusco, Morgantina and in the evocative scenery of Etna at the foot of the Teseo Screpolato sculpture.
The imposing geographical map of the Festival touched on an extraordinary number of cities and historic centres, involving Monte Jato, Palermo, Syracuse, Gela, Catania, Morgantina, Santo Stefano Quisquina, Avola, Palazzolo Acreide, Tindari, Ventimiglia di Sicilia, Adrano, Taormina, Maletto, Canicattini Bagni, the Argimusco Plateau, Leonforte, Priolo Gargallo, Selinunte, Nicolosi, Agrigento, Tortorici, Mazara del Vallo, Ragalna, Centuripe, Palagonia, Ragusa, Carlentini, Gubbio, Spoleto and Valletta. The ancient stone and the forgotten places of each territory have thus returned to vibrate with art, once again becoming a living and shared heritage.
The breath of the event was able to forcefully cross the borders of the island, bringing the immortal melodies of maestro Ennio Morricone onto international stages with the extraordinary response of Love Morricone in Valletta and in the Roman Theaters of Gubbio and Spoleto. To crown this unrepeatable season, the Festival provided an overwhelming epilogue with the traveling flamenco tour that set the squares and theaters of Catania, Syracuse, Caltanissetta and Tindari on fire.
Recording over ninety thousand cheering souls who passionately shared the sacred rite of live music demonstrates how widespread culture can become a living and pulsating reality. With the unanimous acclaim of critics and the warm response of the public, the Lyric Festival of the Stone Theaters and the Sicilian Lyric Choir archive an unforgettable edition, confirming themselves as ambassadors of excellence and Mediterranean identity in the world