Gioacchino Scrugli

Gioacchino Scrugli died in Nuoro on the morning of 8 October 2026. He was about 89 years old. L'Unione Sarda, which reported his death the same day, described him as a historic figure of the city's choral singing and a protagonist of its musical and folk life for decades, whose passing left a deep void in Sardinian choral music. No cause of death was made public, and funeral arrangements had not been reported.

Gioacchino Scrugli was born in 1937. His musical life was rooted in Nuoro, in the Barbagia region of central Sardinia. His exact date of birth has not been published.

He took up music very young. With the soprano Antonietta Chironi, who was almost the same age, he studied under the pianist Maria Rosaria Denti Sodo, at the time the main teacher of music in Nuoro. At the end of the 1950s he began singing in the mixed polyphonic choir directed by Antonio Pintus, and in 1958 he joined the Città di Nuoro civic band, also led by Pintus, first on flugelhorn and later on baritone saxophone.

In 1961 Scrugli was one of the founders and soloists of the Corale polifonica Santa Maria della Neve, a mixed choir directed by Don Pietro Cottu that brought together the best Nuoro voices of the day in sacred music, opera and traditional song. At the same time he sang with Don Sergio Piras's choir for solemn services at Nuoro Cathedral.

He also worked on stage and screen. In 1963 he acted with Pino Amatiello's company La Bottega, and in 1965 he played a part alongside Ugo Tognazzi in Luigi Zampa's film Una questione d'onore. As a singer he began as a tenor, recorded in 1963 singing Recondita armonia from Puccini's Tosca, and later settled into a baritone voice.

In 1966 he was among the fourteen founders of the Coro Barbagia of Nuoro, directed by Banneddu Ruiu, and sang on its RCA Italiana record Sardegna canta e prega. In 1974 he became the choir's director and arranger, a post he held until 2011. He enlarged both the repertoire and the membership, arranged many traditional Sardinian songs, and led the recordings of volumes two, three and four of Sardegna canta e prega in 1990, 1998 and 2000. In 1988 the choir won first prize at the first regional review of traditional Sardinian choirs, Città di Ozieri.

As a soloist he was closely identified with Adios Nugoro amada, Deus ti salvet Maria and Badde lontana. In 1994 he received the title Maestro del folklore at the Regional Festival of Sardinian Folklore, for helping to preserve and enrich the island's musical heritage in Italy and abroad.

Scrugli lived in Nuoro for most of his life and was known there as a painter as well as a musician. Little has been published about his family life.

Scrugli led the Coro Barbagia for longer than anyone else in its history, and his arrangements and recordings helped carry the songs of Nuoro well beyond Sardinia. Cronache Nuoresi called him the many-sided soul of Nuoro singing, between opera and tradition. His interpretations of Adios Nugoro amada, Deus ti salvet Maria and Badde lontana remain part of the island's musical memory.