The Festival dei Due Mondi (Festival of the Two Worlds) is an annual summer music and opera festival held each June to early July in Spoleto, Italy, since its founding by composer Gian Carlo Menotti in 1958. It features a vast array of concerts, opera, dance, drama, visual arts and roundtable discussions on science.

Because Spoleto was a small town, where real estate and other goods and services were at the time relatively inexpensive, and also because there are two indoor theatres, a Roman theatre and many other spaces, it was chosen by Menotti as the venue for an arts festival. It is also fairly close to Rome, with good rail connections.

The festival has developed into one of the most important cultural manifestations in Italy, with a three-week schedule of music, theater and dance performances. For some time it became a reference point for modern sculpture exhibits, and works of art left to the city by Alexander Calder and others are a testimony to this. For a variey of reasons, including loss of funds and the birth of many similar festivals throughout Italy, the Spoleto Festival has now lost some of its international prominence; however, it remains a very important cultural event.

Spoleto (Latin Spoletium) is an ancient city in the Italian province of Perugia in east central Umbria on a foothill of the Apennines. It is 20 km (12 mi) S. of Trevi, 29 km (18 mi) N. of Terni, 63 km (39 mi) SE of Perugia; 212 km (132 mi) SE of Florence; and 126 km (78 mi) N of Rome.

Spoleto was situated on the eastern branch of the Via Flaminia, which forked into two roads at Narni and rejoined at Forum Flaminii, near Foligno. An ancient road also ran hence to Nursia. The Ponte Sanguinario of the 1st century BCE still exists. The Forum lies under today's marketplace.

Located at the head of a large, broad valley, surrounded by mountains, Spoleto has long occupied a strategic geographical position. It appears to have been an important town to the original Umbri tribes, who built walls around their settlement in the 5th century BC, some of which are visible today.

The first historical mention of Spoletium is the notice of the foundation of a colony there in 241 BC; and it was still, according to Cicerocolonia latina in primis firma et illustris: a Latin colony in 95 BC. After the Battle of Lake Trasimene (217 BC) Spoletium was attacked by Hannibal, who was repulsed by the inhabitants During the Second Punic War the city was a useful ally to Rome. It suffered greatly during the civil wars of Gaius Marius and Sulla. The latter, after his victory over Crassus, confiscated the territory of Spoletium (82 BC). From this time forth it was a municipium.

Gregory Porter is a jazz vocalist, songwriter, and actor. His debut album, Water, released in 2010 via Motéma Music, was nominated for Best Jazz Vocal album at the 53rd Annual Grammy Awards. He was also a member of the original Broadway cast of It Ain't Nothin' But the Blues. His sophomore album, Be Good, which contains many of Porter's compositions, was released on February 14th, 2012, and garnered critical acclaim for both his distinctive singing and his compositions, such as "Be Good (Lion's Song), "Real Good Hands", and "On My Way To Harlem".

Porter was born in Los Angeles, California, and raised in Bakersfield, California, where his mother was a minister. He attended San Diego State University on a football scholarship until a shoulder injury sidelined him permanently. Performing in local jazz clubs, Porter met saxophonist, pianist, and composer Kamau Kenyatta, whose mentoring played an integral role in Porter's career trajectory and professional development. Kenyatta introduced Gregory to flautist Hubert Laws who, upon hearing Porter singing along to Charlie Chaplin's "Smile", chose to include a bonus track featuring Porter's vocals on his Hubert Laws' Remembers the Unforgettable Nat King Cole (1998). Eloise Laws, Hubert's sister, happened to be visiting the studio, and helped get Porter cast in one of the leading roles in a new musical, It Ain't Nothin' But the Blues, which premiered at the Denver Center for the Performing Arts before moving to Off-Broadway and ultimately Broadway, in spite of previously having appeared in only one other theatrical work, Avenue X.