Falcone and Borsellino“ waterfront”
Lamezia Terme (CZ) Calabria - Southern Italy
The independent music festival in Calabria
Colour Fest was founded in 2013 a Lamezia Terme, Calabria, from a simple and ambitious idea: to bring the best of the independent music in Southern Italy, in a place where the beauty of the landscape and the strength of the community could become part of the spectacle. Every August since then, the festival transforms the Falcone and Borsellino promenade - on the Riviera of Sunsets - in one of Italy's most evocative settings, amidst the pine forest, the sea and the sunsets that gave this stretch of the Calabrian coast its name.
The project was initiated by the association “What Are Clouds” APS, founded with the aim of creating cultural opportunities in an area with very high demand and too few opportunities to satisfy it. Before the Color Fest, in 2012, the association gave birth to Sensum - House of Art, a multidisciplinary cultural space in Lamezia Terme that achieved extraordinary results in terms of participation. The leap towards a larger-scale festival came the following year, when Color Fest began to build what over the years became a a true reference point for non-mainstream live music in Calabria and the South.
Over the course of the editions, the festival grew, changed locations, even went through the pandemic season without ever stopping, and evolved from a local event to nationally recognised cultural brand.
In over ten years of activity, the Color Fest stage has featured more than a hundred artists of the national and international scene. Among them:
Lucio Corsi - Isaac Delusion - The Murder Capital - Shame - Franz Ferdinand - Editors - Fulminacci - Calcutta - Afterhours - Joan Thiele - Giorgio Poi - OKGiorgio - Chalk - Mind Enterprises - Ekkstacy - Offlaga Disco Pax - Anna And Vulkan - Gazelles - Aries - Brunori Sas - Psychologists - Seun Kuti & Egypt80 - BNKR44 - Canova - Cosmo - The Zen Circus - Colapesce and Dimartino - Frah Quintale - Iosonouncane - Marco Castello - Nu Genea - Whitemary - Populous - Giovanni Truppi - Dumbo Gets Mad - Clap! Clap! - The Notwist - Verdena - Coma_Things - Carnesi - Delicatoni - Phenoaltea - Donatella Rector - Willie Peyote - The Ice Cream Wizard - Franco126 - Emma Nolde - Toy Tonics Jam - Nello Taver - Venerus - Lovegang126 - Stuart Braithwaite (from Mogwai) - Parbleu - Fuera - Emmanuelle - Praino - Secret Naples - Bassolino - Sibode DJ - Meg - Eugenio in Via di Gioia - Ex-Otago - Fast Animals and Slow Kids - Federico Cimini - Bruno Belissimo - The Soft Moon - Galeffi - Geneva - Giorgio Canali - Elephant Brain - Leatherette - Three Merry Dead Boys - Valerio Lundini - Giuse The Lizia - Rubber - I Hate My Village - The List Representative - Ada Oda - Levante - The Social State - Manuel Agnelli - Marta sui Tubi - Angelica - Massimo Volume - Mecna + Coco - Motta - Murubutu - Myss Keta - N.A.I.P. - Nada - Naska - Nobraino - Pop X - Perturbation - Savana Funk - Scarda - Sick Drum - Trust The Mask - Gaia Rollo - Synthear - Unkle Kook and many others.
A lineup that edition after edition has built a’precise artistic identityopen to contamination, attentive to new generations, capable of bringing together international names and emerging talents on the same stage.
Color Fest is not just three days of concerts. It is a cultural project working all year round on the Calabrian territory. The association organises workshops, training courses, collaborations with schools and universities - including curricular traineeships recognised by the Sapienza of Rome and the’Alma Mater of Bologna. In 2023 Color Fest Kids, a free electronic music workshop for middle schools organised in collaboration with the Istituto Comprensivo di Maida. Every year more than twenty volunteers between 18 and 30 years old actively participate in the organisation, carrying out training in the areas of communication, logistics and event production.
The contest Supernova selects new emerging music projects from all over Italy every year - with about 400 entries per edition and live finals also taking place in Rome and Bologna - offering the winners the chance to perform on the festival stage.
Lamezia Terme is the geographical heart of Calabria: international airport, central railway station, motorway junction. This strategic location makes the Color Fest easily accessible from all over Italy and abroad, and has over time made it a tourist attraction capable of bringing visitors to Calabria from outside the region - in recent editions over the public's 60% arrived from other regions or from abroad.
The festival collaborates permanently with Coldiretti to offer zero-kilometre food, with Legambiente for the environmental protection of the location, and with local associations and businesses to create an experience that goes beyond music: a market of local craftsmen, Calabrian food and wine, camping area between the trees and the sea, guided tours of the historical centre.
Colour Fest exists to demonstrate that Staying in the South is not a second choice. That you can build culture, attract talent and generate economy even from the periphery, indeed especially from the periphery. The festival is a place of possibilities: a space where different cultural, economic and social perspectives find a way to meet and build something new.
A summer on a lonely beach, where music becomes the language to narrate the contemporary and rediscover the land.
Every year in August, the Colour Fest door three days of live concerts, DJ sets and independent music on the Tyrrhenian coast of Calabria. The location is the Lungomare Falcone e Borsellino in Lamezia Terme, a stretch of beach and pine forest overlooking the sea in the heart of the Riviera of Sunsets. Since 2013, the festival has grown to become one of the most important musical events in Southern Italy, with over 10,000 attendances in the last edition and an audience from all over Europe.
The Color Fest is meant to be experienced as a'full experience, not just a concert. L'camping area is located in the trees of the pine forest a few steps from the sea: one wakes up with the sound of the waves and closes the night with DJ sets under the stars. Within the festival are food stands with zero-kilometre food thanks to the collaboration with Coldiretti, a craftsmen's market Calabrian and national, and spaces dedicated to art, exhibitions and stand-up comedy. For emerging bands, the contest Supernova offers the chance to play on the festival's main stage every year.
Lamezia Terme is the most convenient access point to Calabria. L'Lamezia International Airport is connected to major Italian and European cities; the Lamezia Terme Centrale railway station is served by Trenitalia and Italo; the A2 motorway junction is only a few minutes away from the venue. The festival can be reached by 10 minutes from the airport and station thanks to a dedicated shuttle service. A festival in Calabria easy to reach, in the centre of the Mediterranean.
The Colour Fest is a independent music festival which takes place every August in Lamezia Terme, Calabria, on the Falcone and Borsellino promenade. Launched in 2013, in fourteen editions it has hosted over one hundred national and international artists and is now one of the most important music festivals in Southern Italy.
The festival takes place on the Falcone and Borsellino promenade, in the area of the Riviera of Sunsets a Lamezia Terme (CZ), Calabria. The location is an area between the beach and the pine forest, overlooking the Tyrrhenian Sea, just a few minutes from the airport and the railway station.
The Color Fest can be reached via the'Lamezia Terme International Airport, the Lamezia Terme Centrale railway station or the'A2 Mediterranean motorway. From the airport and station, the festival is about 10 minutes away, with a shuttle service available on event days.
Yes, the Colour Fest has a'camping area nestled in the pine forest just a few steps from the sea and the concert area. Tent sites can be booked online on the official website. The campsite offers a complete experience: you wake up by the sea and experience the festival without moving.
The Color Fest is organised by the association "What Are Clouds" APS, active since 2012 in cultural production in Calabria. The association works throughout the year with training activities, workshops and the Supernova music contest for emerging bands.
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