Monday 7 July 2025 was a truly memorable night in many ways. The collaboration between RIDT and Festivals Malta brought together the APS Bank Valletta Campus Nights and the opening of the Malta Jazz Festival 2025. The evening was packed with talent and emotions.
The evening, hosted by Sarah Lee Zammit, opened with a speech by Festivals Malta CEO, Mr Frans Agius who spoke about the collaboration between Festivals Malta and RIDT and augured that the collaboration will continue in the future.
Pro Rector for Research and Knowledge Transfer, Prof Simon Fabri highlighted the need for such collaborations, particularly in the field of research in the performing arts. He then presented the first RIDT Charles @City@ Gatt awards in Research in Jazz and Improvisation to Joseph (Guże) Camilleri and Louise Ellul Bonici for their research on Jazz in Strait Street with a focus on Tony Carr and Lee Spiteri respectively.
Sandro Zerafa, artistic director of the Malta Jazz Festival spoke about how the soul of the festival has remained what it was 35 years ago, even though the festival has evolved with time.
The highlight of the evening was the extraordinary performance by Guże Camilleri (drums), Dominic Galea (piano), Oliver Degabriele (Double Bass) and Carlo Muscat (saxaphone), intertwined with the researched anecdotes of the Jazz scene in Malta. These anecdotes are short clips from the longer documentary on Charles “City” Gatt which will be launched late in September 2025.
photos by Elisa Von Brockdorff
