A request from Reggio Emilia’s Jewish community helped trigger the decision to cancel two July concerts by Kanye West. It is the latest in a string of European bans on the rapper now known as Ye.
Italian authorities have moved to block two major concerts in Reggio Emilia, barring performances by Kanye West and Travis Scott on public order and security grounds. The decision adds Italy to a growing list of European countries that have refused to host the controversial American rapper.
Prefect Salvatore Angieri announced on Friday that the two events, scheduled for 17 and 18 July at Reggio Emilia’s RFC Arena, would not go ahead. The decision followed a formal request from the local Jewish community, whose leader Nicoletta Uzzielli had urged officials to cancel West’s concert and replace it with a performance that would bring “music back to the forefront as a universally unifying force.”
In its statement, the regional prefecture cited several factors: the cancellation of previous concerts by West in other countries; the real risk of counter-demonstrations; and the logistical concerns posed by two large-capacity events on consecutive nights at the same venue.
West — who now performs under the name Ye — was due to appear alongside Scott and a lineup that included The Chainsmokers, Rita Ora and Swedish House Mafia.
A catalogue of controversy
The decision comes after a prolonged period of antisemitic, racist and pro-Nazi statements by West that have provoked widespread condemnation and a cascade of professional and legal consequences. In 2022, he posted on social media that he would go “death con 3 On Jewish people.” Last year he released a song titled Heil Hitler and sold merchandise bearing swastikas. He has since sought a public rehabilitation, publishing a lengthy statement in the Wall Street Journal in January in which he wrote: “I am not a Nazi or an antisemite. I love Jewish people.”
The statement has done little to reverse the tide of bans. West was refused entry to the United Kingdom earlier this year, a decision that triggered the cancellation of his headline slot at London’s Wireless Festival. In France, Interior Minister Laurent Nuñez was reported to have sought to ban his 11 June concert in Marseille, which West subsequently announced was postponed “until further notice.” A concert at the Silesian Stadium in Chorzów, Poland, scheduled for 19 June, was cancelled in April “due to formal and legal reasons.”
Scott’s inclusion in the banned events also attracted attention. The Houston rapper faced intense scrutiny following the Astroworld festival disaster in November 2021, in which ten people aged between nine and 27 died and thousands were injured when panic broke out in an over-capacity crowd pressing towards the stage during his headline set.
