The story of Festival del Sole, as its name suggests, starts in Italy in the 1990’s, where, IMG Artists Chairman Barrett Wissman and wife, cellist Nina Kotova, had often discussed organizing an event somewhere in the world where friends could make music together in a warm welcoming atmosphere with their neighbor, Frances Mayes, author of Under the Tuscan Sun. Mayes suggested that Cortona might be the very location for such a gathering.
