From August to October, from the palaces on the Canal Grande to the villas along the Riveria del Brenta, the Festival Monteverdi Vivaldi becomes metropolitan. A journey through music, art and architecture, to discover the eighteenth-century Venice. Some of the most beautiful palaces in Venice, the Teatro La Fenice and the nearby Ateneo Veneto will host events of the festival. And then there is the Brenta Canal with its villas as an ideal extension of the Canal Grande. The festival goes ashore to the mainland, among the beautiful frescoes of Villa Widmann Rezzonico Foscari in Mira and Villa Foscarini Rossi in Stra. The protagonist will be the music of an unexpected Antonio Vivaldi, without the wig. 'To take the wig off' Antonio Vivaldi in Venice means revealing the man beneath the wig, presenting rarely performed pieces and arias and drawing parallels with other great composers of his era. Vivaldi without the wig is the true Vivaldi, who remains contamporary through the ages and who has been repeatedly reinterpreted and retranslated. In addition to the concerts there will be 'the festival salon', a series of meetings with big names of the Baroque music scene as the mezzo-soprano Vivica Genaux and the contralto Sara Mingardo.