Mondo Musica, Part One

As I mentioned Tuesday, I spent last weekend in Cremona, where we visited the city and Mondo Musica 2011. What's Mondo Musica you ask? It's where some of the best instrument makers in Europe (the world?) come to show their newest creations and best work. People come from all over to browse the pianos and string instruments on display.

The piano room featured the strangest booth of the day: a player-piano featuring a balding old man with a cape. Tommaso tried to ask him a question before we realized what was going on. In the end though we did learn one thing - there is no true Italian word for creepy; which it too bad because it would have come in handy at that moment.

Day Trip to Cremona, Italy

Last weekend our friends Georgette and Tommaso invited us on a day trip to Cremona for Mondomusica 2011 and a side trip to the city of Cremona itself. Kate couldn't make it, but I was more than up for the 2.5 hr ride to Cremona.

Mondomusica was great - more on that another day; I'm taking over the blog this week - but Cremona was the surprise of the trip. Like a good tourist, I knew exactly nothing about Cremona before the trip, so everything was a surprise and everything made we want to return.

The city itself was beautiful and had a totally different aesthetic from Florence. As it turns out, Cremona has been home to some of Italy's greatest string instrument makers (the Stradivari among them) since who knows when. Europeans from all over would visit Cremona to find instruments, and the northern European influence especially can be seen all over. In fact, the city was part of Austria as early as 1707. Cremona retains that well-ordered, neat and clean Austrian feel to this day. When Neapolitans visit Florence, I'm told they remark about how clean the city is; Cremona made me feel like I've been living in Naples.

Anyway, some of the main sites of the city are in the photos above. It's a great town, especially if you're a music fan, so thanks to Georgette and Tommaso for taking me there.