Mendoza’s Wine Festival: Vendimia Acto Central
Months of wine tastings, wine tours, parades, and Vendimia partying all culminate in a final show: El Acto Central. A Las Vegas-style theatrical performance and live music concert hidden in the mountains and heard around the world.
This year marked the 50th Vendimia festival held in the Frank Romero Day Amphitheater and the golden anniversary was marked with unique splendor.
A twenty minute drive west of Mendoza city, nestled within the hills of the Andes Mountains, the amphitheater sets the scene for Mendoza’s biggest party. Though Vendimia festivities go on for months across Mendoza province, the Acto Central is the focal point and attracts tourists from around the world.
Though the estimates are less than precise, event organizers estimated that somewhere between 20,000 and 30,000 people filled the venue, and several thousand more onlookers clung to the surrounding hillsides – the cheap seats, but also the seats with the most spectacular view.
It’s not unusual for Vendimia tickets to sell out within hours. The crowd spills over onto the hillsides, but it makes for a nice picnic spot and a great view.
Acto Central isn’t a quiet affair. It’s loud, it runs late into the night and it’s a party to celebrate the end of a successful grape harvest and the beginning of new wines. Just as the musical notes echoed off the the hillsides, so too did the energy audience. And, comfy as those cement slabs may seem, hours of waiting perched atop nothing but solid rock can get a little rough, even for the most hard-core enthusiast.
But the massive crew of artists, dancers and actors – over a thousand strong in all – captivated the audience and made the wait well worth the while.
Much like the opening ceremonies of the Olympic Games, the Acto Central is more than flashy jazz hands, it also tells a story. The scenes followed the journey of an old man returning to his memories of life in Mendoza and living among the vineyards. Dancers illustrated his memories through the change of the seasons and the growth of the vines – from grape seedling to autumn harvest.
The multicolored baby birds are meant to represent the young people working the harvest. Spending long hours in the vineyards, cutting grapes from the vines.
The dance of the leaves celebrate the coming of fall and the end of the harvest season. Representative of a time of rest, the completion of a difficult job and a time to enjoy the fruits of many months of labor.
The dance of the brides and grooms represented the man’s memories of his brothers and sisters getting married. It also represented the joining together of the white and red grapes during the time of harvest.
- Dances from the 1960s and 70s were meant to evoke the happy memories of family parties and times spent with loved ones throughout the man’s life.
As the narrative said: “The bird made the tree, the tree made the vines, the vines made the grapes, the grapes made the wine, and the wine made the man.” This celebration of the connectivity between the earth, the vine, the wine and the human hands was a central focus of the celebration.
The show was bookended by local rock bands and Argentine legendary musicians, including Carlos (Charlie) Garcia himself.
And the night ended with a spectacular show of fireworks coordinated with the orchestra’s music, which made the spectacle all the more magnificent.
For a quiet city, Mendoza knows how to put on a show. The Acto Central runs for four nights, just to satisfy the high demand of those clamoring to buy tickets. But for those of us lucky enough to be in Mendoza for Vendimia, making the hike to the mountain theater is something that cannot be missed.
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