There is a place between Piedmont, Lombardy, Liguria, and Emilia-Romagna meet, where valleys circle around Monte Chiappo and share a musical language unlike anywhere else in Italy. Locals call it simply “our dance,” while outsiders know it as the dance of the Quattro Province.
The tradition belongs to feast days, weddings, and winter gatherings; to kitchens and farmyards as much as village halls; its steps are fast, its tunes are brisk, and the sound is carried by a piercing double-reed pipe called the piffero, once played alongside a small bagpipe known as the musetta.
