Archivi sonori per le musiche di tradizione orale: luoghi della memoria condivisa e centri di ricerca

Abstract

Ethnomusicology, a discipline that deals with music in an intercultural perspective, always kept a strong connection with sound archives, the place where its primary sources, consisting of sounds and music produced in the context of oral transmission, are preserved. The article presents the peculiar history of sound archives of music of oral tradition in Italy and the new trends of ethnomusicology, a discipline that is becoming increasingly historical and that, in its transformation, relies on archives. As places of shared memory, archives are now central to the international debate of this discipline, which is facing new challenges posed by the development of new digital technologies, and by a changed relationship with the communities in which sound documents were recorded, triggering processes of repatriation and return, addressing issues related to copyright and the development of heritagization processes, while claiming the recognition of “cultural heritage” for sound archives.