ABSTRACT
Sardinia, a 24,000-square-kilometer island off the west coast of the Italian peninsula, is culturally distinct from Italy some call it almost a continent. Sardinian music suffuses daily life, whether men sing in bars or families making music at spuntini, weekend picnics for large groups of people. Sardinian cities, especially Sassari in the north and Cagliari in the south, are cut off from rural traditions, and urban dwellers consume Italian and international pop music. Musical styles in Sardinia correspond approximately to three administrative provinces: Sassari, Nuoro, and Cagliari; a fourth province, Oristano, attained the status of a province after administrative reform in the late 1970s. Sardinian genres and local styles resist a simple musical analysis. A developed tradition of sung dances, performed polyphonically or with guitar accompaniment, exists in the center and south of the island. The two main types of dancing, ballu and danza, include two basic choreographic steps: a slide and a jump.
