San Rocco is Pisticci's most important religious festival. The town’s population swells in the week leading up to the the 17th, as visitors and expatriates come to enjoy the celebration. The spiritual aspect is the foundation, but it is intermixed with the celebration of summer with itinerant merchants, amusement rides, sporting events, and nightly music. The beaches teem with people seeking the relaxation of the sun. For people watchers, the passegiata (stroll) of the Corso is transferred to the edge of the Gulf of toranto for the morning.

On the 17th, starting early in the morning the statue of the Saint is carried through the town from the main church to the main square. Hundreds of people come from all over to join the procession and to pray. People offer donations; money is pinned to the statue's garments, and donors have their names put in a register. This ritual lasts for 7 hours.

Finally at night, after the music dies, the socializing on the square abating, and with the passegiata complete, the town explodes with an astonishing pyrotechnic display the last and most spectacular of three straight nights. The fireworks, heard and seen from surrounding towns, are enough to keep firemen busy on the mountainside ensuring that the arid fields do not erupt in flames. Finally, a series of three ritual booming explosions announced the end of the show.

Since 1999, as a prelude to the Festival of San Rocco, the LFF has grown enormously, earning an important place in the artistic and social spectrum of international short film festivals. A festival of people and places, the LFF is able to create a family atmosphere for the public and the professionals that come from around the world to experience outdoor open theater amongst the white-washed “lammie” and “casedde” (the typical residential style for which Pisticci is known), or in spectacular settings such as the wheat fields, ancient ruins, or the Sassi of Matera.

The LFF is now distinguished in its ability to draw a large number of attendees to view the excellent quality of local and international films that are presented in this very unique setting. The crowd of attendees find that the delicious local flavours of food, wine and people are in abundance during the festival.

Suggestive and spectacular are the places that form the backdrop to many projections, no aseptic cinemas but true natural stages, as land, wheat fields, ancient ruins, the famous Sassi of Matera, or small white houses and picturesque farming community.

The festival celebrating the Patron Saint reaches its climax on this day, starting at sunrise with the procession of the shepherds, which wakes the ancient quarters, to greet the Image of the Virgin. As she winds her way around the City escorted by her “Knights”, her passage is announced with fireworks.

In the afternoon is taken from the Piccianello church and is carried in procession on a large decorated papier-mache float, the “Carro Trionfale,” along the main streets of Matera, which are flooded with people. In the evening the procession reaches the Cathedral Square.

The accompanying Knights, whose horses are draped with paper and velvet flowers, surround the float. The charioteer urges the mule team through the Corso towards the close-by piazza, to return the symbol of the Feast to the throngs gathered there. Following the same ancient ritual, the police struggle to keep the masses of people away from the Carro until they get to the Square, where in their wild excitement the crowd assaults and obliterates the chariot, and people vie to get a piece of the papier-mache as their yearly relic.

The festivity ends in the late evening with the din of the mind-boggling fireworks contest, which creates a unique experience above the ancient quarters of the Sassi.

The historical reenactment celebrates the stay in Montescaglioso of King Charles of Bourbon in 1735. The event has had great public success. It includes a parade of participants in costumes of commoners and nobles of the country, the Benedictine monks of the abbey of St. Michele, and teams of dragoon soldiers on foot, teams of dragoons on horseback, the Court and the King on period coaches. The festive atmosphere picks up with music of the period, dancers, stilt walkers and fire-eaters.

After the parade, in typical Basilicatan bombast, spectacular fireworks are launched in honor of King Charles. In conclusion, a flamenco concert is given to recognize of the close relationship between Naples and Madrid, where Charles was called to reign, leaving the throne to the Neapolitan Ferdinand.

The big day is August 20, a statue of San Rocco is carried by procession led by the banner of Montescaglioso, through its main streets. Along the way, the stops are preceded by firecrackers, after which the faithful offer banknotes or gold, which are placed on the base of the statue.

In the afternoon as the seven draft horses lead the “Carro” into the churchyard of the convent of the Capuchins, music is blaring in Piazza Roma, and again in typical fashion on the outskirts of the town an amusement park entertains the young; this goes on deep into the night.

Around one o'clock at night, a powerful bang announces the start of the long-awaited fireworks that will illuminate the night until he can be seen and heard by Pomarico and Miglionico.