Creative Stories: The Rockin' 1000

In 2014, Fabio Zaffagnini had a dream.

He was listening to a Foo Fighters song on the radio and thought it’d be ‘very cool to see them’ play a concert in his hometown, Cesena.

But how do you convince a huge band to have a concert in a small city in Italy?

You get creative.

Fabio found inspiration from an unlikely source – the 2003 Jack Black comedy film ‘School of Rock.’

“On the DVD, there’s a bonus feature where he says if you really want something, you have to ask – and it works better if there are a thousand people screaming behind you,” Fabio said.

With that thought in his mind, Fabio decided to make a plea to the Foo Fighters with ‘the biggest tribute ever to a rock band.’

His idea was to bring 1000 musicians together – a combination of singers, drummers, guitar and bass players – to play one Foo Fighters song, and invite the band to come to Cesena.

And though Fabio’s dream sounded impossible, his passion was contagious.

He pulled together a team to help with logistics, and they started raising money for expenses and equipment. They built a website and began auditioning musicians.

The project – called the Rockin’ 1000 – faced resistance along the way.

“We think these kind of things can happen in other countries, but not Italy. Every time we’d tell sponsors or musicians about the idea, they’d say it was cool but it’d never happen,” Fabio said.

But he and his team stayed true to their vision – and persisted.

They managed to turn a local park in Cesena into a performance space, and brought in the toilets, structures, microphones, cables and electricity needed for the event.

And on July 26, 2015, the Rockin’ 1000 came together in Cesena, and played a rendition of the Foo Fighters’ upbeat anthem, ‘Learn to Fly.'

A crew of 100 volunteers helped with production, and a video unit filmed the performance using 30 cameras.

After their performance, Fabio made his plea to the band:

“Italy is a country where dreams cannot easily come true,” he said. “But it’s a land of passion and creativity. What we did here is a huge miracle.”

"We ask you, the Foo Fighters, to come and play for us in Cesena.”

The video of Fabio and the Rockin’ 1000 was shared online and quickly went viral, viewed by millions around the world – including the Foo Fighters.

The band responded with a tweet and saying: "Ci vediamo a presto, Cesena," which means "See you soon, Cesena."

And three months later, the Foo Fighters travelled to Cesena and gave Fabio and the crowd a concert to remember.