In September of 1997 a magical event took place at Storybook Farm during ProgDay 3. A little known band from Italy called FINISTERRE had been invited to play the festival that year. Few anticipated that the band?s performance would go down in ProgDay history, yet it became known as one of the most lauded and legendary of the festival’s early years. The performance was captured on video and subsequently released with all copies selling out in a rather short period of time. A live album of the performance was also released.

A few years later Finisterre bassist FABIO ZUFFANTI decided to form a new band to capture the essence of the classic Italian prog scene. The band included two members of Finisterre; keyboardist Agostino Macor and drummer MARCO CAVANI. That band was LA MASCHERA DI CERA. LA MASCHERA released their first self-titled album in 2002 on Mellow Records and toured around Italy and in Europe. The next several years saw the band release two subsequent albums, “Il Grande Labirinto” in 2004 and “LuxAde” in 2006. The group again toured Europe and even made the trip across the pond to appear at NEARfest in the United States.

Today LA MASCHERA is considered to be one of the top current Italian progressive rock bands, with a rich 70?s style, soaring vocals, and a modern touch. We’re sure they will be a fantastic way to close out Saturday at Storybook.

ProgDay is the world’s longest running progressive rock event. The 15th edition will take place on September 5th & 6th, 2009, at beautiful Storybook Farm near Chapel Hill, North Carolina. LA MASCHERA DI CERA (Italy) join OZRIC TENTACLES (UK), MÖRGLBL (France), QUI (Japan), FRENCH TV (USA), 3RDEGREE (USA) and DELUGE GRANDER (USA) for another great weekend of the best in progressive music! For more information and to hear music from all of this year’s ProgDay bands, please visit us at www.progday. net.

IMPORTANT NOTE: ProgDay has changed it’s domain name. We are now “Progday.net” instead of “.com.” If you are one of ProgDay’s many supporters, please be sure to make the change to “.net” in all of your links and bookmarks.