The musical past revives in the present: An investigation into the cultural heritage of a community

Abstract

This article explores how two specific musical performances, drawing respectively on the rich repertoire of Italian sacred music and a specific sound environment of a region, can promote cultural participation and ingenuity in the Italian countryside amidst uncertainty and demographic change due to depopulation and the loosening of traditional communal ties. The first study focuses on a specific case in the town of Ortona dei Marsi in the Italian province of L’Aquila. A seemingly everyday experience – participation in community singing – is considered and appreciated from a musicological perspective, while its importance for the revitalisation of a community is recognised. The rediscovering of a forgotten musical heritage contributes to an evolving, prosaic sense of rural cultural resources. The particular case of the community of the small rural town of Ortona dei Marsi, overcoming isolation, distance and new circumstances through the revitalisation of a musicologically significant object, sheds light on how a community serendipitously uses the opportunity to make and maintain music together to demonstrate social and cultural resilience. The second study looks at the experiences of middle school students in the Italian city of Biella of a specific sound memory that guides and paves the way to a diverse learning environment.