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		We are particularly pleased to have created, through this exhibition of African musical instruments, an opportunity to come into contact with an important aspect of African culture, namely traditional music.
		THE LAND OF SOUNDS This "virtual" exhibition is the natural consequence and result of a "real" exhibition (of about 130 original instruments) that the Cosv produced and presented in Milan in 1991 and which has since been repeated all over Italy, always arousing great curiosity, interest and admiration. . CONSTRUCTION TECHNIQUES The CONSTRUCTION TECHNIQUES applied when making the various instruments are very interesting to observe. We are in the presence of what are commonly defined primitive instruments. But what does this concretely mean? THE AREA OF DIFFUSION The area of diffusion of the individual instruments or groups of instruments varies greatly and can be very large or relatively limited. THE MATERIALS It is worthwhile observing (and reading) one thing about the MATERIALS the instruments are made from. THE FORMS Often a series of instruments easily traced back to the same form and function derives from an initial prototype. CLASSIFICATION OF THE INSTRUMENTS Without wanting to go into technical details, we think there should be a general classification of the many instruments collected here which follows the criteria commonly adopted by almost all those who study musical instruments. This classification usually divides musical instruments into four main categories: IDIOPHONES, MEMBRANOPHONES, CHORDOPHONES AND AEROPHONES.
		HOW TO VISIT THE VIRTUAL EXHIBITION "Africa : the land of sounds" This exhibition presents about 60 African instruments coming both from the sub-Saharan regions (Black Africa) and from the Maghreb (Morocco, Tunisia, Algeria, Libya, Egypt) and can be visited using various accesses:
		THE VIRTUAL EXHIBITION For conditions to ask for real exhibition: COSV at phone number 0039 02 2822852. HISTORICAL IMAGES and DRAWINGS The historical images are of National Archives Of Zimbabwe. The drawings are pull up from "Musical Instruments - A resource book of traditional musical instruments of Kenya" volume by Jhon Kamenyi Wahome - Jemisik Cultural Book (Nairobi 1986) This section is edited by Beba Stoppani
Project, design and development by COSV - Via Soperga, 36 20127 Milano - Italy On the iniziative of COSV-ICEI-INTERSOS-SOLIDEA with contribution of Ministero Affari Esteri - D.G.C.S (http://www.esteri.it)