Last year Pisa Airport was full of signs asking ‘Could Lucca be the most beautiful little town in Italy?’ The medieval mosaic of Lucca certainly merits its own glory, and here’s hoping that it avoids becoming prohibitively expensive and over-run with tourists. The city is already well-known for its city walls topped with different trees – every season offers you a new sensation. This is a favourite location for early morning exercise, offering a free peak behind mansions along the way, like the garden of Palazzo Pfanner, a popular venue for weddings near Porta Santa Maria.
In summer Lucca becomes an open-air art gallery. It’s also a green city, famous for bicycle travel, and of course for Puccini and his operas. Less well known, but also from Lucca, Francesco Geminiani was an 18thcentury violinist and composer who, in his time, was celebrated as the equal of Handel and Corelli. And the Istituto Musicale Luigi Boccherini is world-famous and teaches everything from jazz to classical music. While I was there I saw Filippo Gorini, the latest young Italian prodigy, and another resident of Lucca, at the Boccherini Auditorium. Filippo played Brahms and Schubert without sheet music. But this was not an exclusive affair. The audience ranged from older women in fur coats to casual young boys with earrings and long hair. In Lucca, music is for everyone.
INDEPENDENT CITY
Lucca was an independent dukedom from the 12th to the 19th century, and was one of the last to join the new nation of Italy.
