The American University of Florence held an entertaining and melodic concert for students to attend on April 14, 2026. This unique experience was in celebration of the hard work of student progress into the semester thus far. Unlike an average community center event, Student Academic Advisor Sofia Galli organizes one concert per semester to connect the long-term students with the community. “I felt like it was a very nice representation of cultural integration, which is one of the core pillars of our institution.” Galli said, “And here it's applied because these people themselves are, some of them, are musicians from the Ivory Coast.”

While Jazz from the Ivory Coast is not the most common of music that young people listen to, Galli shared how she came about organizing concerts for the university. “This comes because I studied at the Conservatory of Florence, so I think it's a language without barriers,” Galli said. “It's music, so it speaks universally to everybody.”

Samuele Strufaldi, fascinated with Jazz music since childhood, took a trip to the Ivory Coast in 2019 where he began the Davorio project with a new friend he had met, Boris Pierro. Pierro was the one who introduced him to the culture and land, which eventually evolved into more than just a study abroad program for Strufaldi. The project, started by composer Strufaldi and Pierro, aims to raise funds for a social space in the village of Govosagna in southern Ivory Coast. The sonic archive is outside the village and was made to create new music and art all while producing projects for a community.

Creating the project came with its challenges but Strufaldi and his team came back to what was most important to them. “In the end, we decided the most important part was to have a local partner, who was Boris' family who already had a project there, so we married the project and we supported it with the money from the album without bringing anything from outside” Strufaldi said.

The event, welcoming to all AUF students, aimed to culturally integrate and introduce the music of the Ivory Coast into a familiar space inside Florence. The event gained quick numbers as soon as Boris Pierrou and Flavio Buccino started playing their drums loudly inside the community center located on Via Ricasoli. Alain Franck Nahi, an African dance instructor located in South Florence joined in, wearing traditional clothing from the Ivory coast area to accompany the music. He also accompanied the drums with a shekere (a shaker), adding to the dynamic atmosphere.

Students and staff alike could both be seen enjoying and celebrating this special occasion and dancing together. Nahi taught the steps and moves that corresponded with the music, all without words, and just actions. The music connected everyone in the room with the same energy; people who speak different languages and come from different corners of the world.

Strufaldi’s next project is tackling a similar goal as the Davorio project. “When I released Davorio I started going to Lebanon in the Palestinian refugee camp to teach music to the community with an association called Music and Resilience that is operating in Ukraine and in all the complicated territories,” Strufaldi said. “We are making community music and much more and I started doing the same as I did for Davorio building a music archive and building the tracks but with more participants from many countries.”

Strufaldi’s compositions can be listened to on Spotify and all proceeds for both the Lebanon Project, to be released by the end of the year, and the Davorio project are given back to the causes they are serving, allowing opportunities for them to make more music and share their stories on an international scale.