Two hundred and fifty thousand voices, or over three hours of music, alternating between early hits and songs from his latest album, "Il giorno che attesa." More than just a live performance, it was a gathering of a community that for years has identified with a message of redemption. At a certain point in the evening, even Ultimo stopped. Before him was no longer an audience, but a city. A sea of lights, phones on, and people from all over Italy who had come to transform Tor Vergata into the largest paid concert ever organized in Italy. "We're making history," he wrote on social media. And it's hard to disagree.
July 4, 2026, will remain a symbolic date in the Roman singer-songwriter's career. A fairytale that drew 250,000 spectators, surpassing the record previously held by Vasco Rossi at Modena Park in 2017 (225,173 tickets) . A record built in just ten years of career, a very short time compared to that of the great names in Italian music.
The event was conceived as something much larger than a concert. The stage, 140 meters wide and 60 meters high, was dominated by the artist's gigantic luminous signature and a thirty-meter-long infinity-shaped catwalk. Making it visible even to the most distant spectators were 2,500 square meters of LED screens, eighteen giant screens distributed throughout the area, thousands of lighting fixtures, and dozens of sound towers. A true city of music built for one night.
Ultimo's entrance was spectacular, arriving from above in a helicopter, a self-declared homage to Vasco Rossi's entrance at Modena Park. Opening the evening was Fabrizio Moro, the first artist to believe in him when Niccolò Moriconi was still a young man struggling to make his mark in the capital's clubs. Then came the first notes of "Pianeti," his eyes shining, and he bowed before a huge audience. The finale came with "Sogni appesi," concluding a journey through the songs that built his connection with the audience.
The numbers also speak to the scale of the event. Ticket revenue is estimated at around €16 million, while the resulting revenue for Rome is close to €90 million, including hotels, restaurants, transportation, and services. In the days leading up to the event, thousands of fans had already transformed the Tor Vergata area into a gigantic tent city, hoping to secure a spot under the stage for the inauguration of an artist who transformed the feeling of being "last" into a collective identity.
(Unioneonline/D)
