Of the more than 20 million Americans with Italian roots, approximately 87 percent are of Southern Italian origin.  This massive dispora from Italy’s south has made southern Italian cuisine, culture and traditions into familiar aspects of Italian American life; yet the wealth of classical music originating in the Italian south has remained a mystery, even to the millions whose ancestors left her shores.

This week’s guest, Alexis Zingale, hopes to change that with The Southern Italian Piano Project. The Southern Italian Piano Project seeks to change the narrative and ensure that the lesser-known composers from the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies, from both before and after the Risorgimento, attract the attention and respect given other composers in the canon of classical music.