Jacopo Tomatis is a musicologist, music journalist, and musician. He is a Research Fellow at the University of Torino, Italy, where he teaches Popular Music and Ethnomusicology. His first book Storia culturale della canzone italiana (2019) won the IASPM book prize in 2021.

List of abbreviations of the archive funds
Acknowledgements
Prologue (in the form of a picture)
INTRODUCTION
1. A song, a show, a record
2. Popular music and politics in the "boom" years
3. Communism, ethnomusicology and folk revival
PART 1. The myth of Bella Ciao
4. Meet the Nuovo Canzoniere Italiano
5. One week in Spoleto
6. Constructing the myth: the countess, the colonel, the rice picker
7. Bella Ciao in the theater: protest and distinction
8. After Spoleto
9. Bella Ciao on disc: antagonism and the market
PART 2. The performance of "real" folk
10. Organizing folk: the structure
11. Curating folk: the repertoire
12. "Bella Ciao" of the partisans
13. "Bella Ciao" of the rice pickers
14. Performing philology: Giovanna Marini's "fakes"
15. Staging folk: direction, sets and costumes
16. Strumming folk: the arrangements
17. Singing and learning to sing folk: the voices
18. Sounding folk: the studio recording
CODA: Us and them
Notes
Index