Semantic Homogenization in Italian Popular Music: A Diachronic Analysis
2026-07-06 • Computation and Language
Computation and Language
AI summaryⓘ
The authors studied the lyrics of songs from the Sanremo Music Festival in Italy to see if the variety of meanings in the words has decreased over time, similar to findings in popular English songs. They created a new method using advanced language analysis tools to measure how similar the song lyrics are across many years. Their results show that Sanremo song lyrics have gradually become more similar in meaning, reflecting a global trend. This study highlights how language technology can help understand changes in music and culture over time.
semantic similaritylyrics analysisSanremo Music Festivalnatural language processingembedding techniqueslarge language modelssemantic varietycultural expressiontopic modelingstreaming platforms
Authors
Lorenzo Canale, Stefano Scotta, Alberto Messina
Abstract
In recent years, studies have revealed a decline in semantic variety across popular music lyrics, particularly in English-language songs on streaming platforms like Spotify. This research examines whether a similar trend can be observed in a different linguistic and cultural context: the lyrics of all finalist songs from the 75 editions of the Sanremo Music Festival, Italy's most renowned music competition. What sets this work apart is the development of a flexible and efficient methodology for tracking changes in semantic similarity over time, which can be applied to different datasets to study similar phenomena. Drawing on a combination of full-text, segment-based, topic-based, and word-level analyses, the approach leverages both embedding techniques and large language models. When applied to the Sanremo corpus, this framework reveals a gradual move toward increasing semantic uniformity, echoing the global patterns identified in previous studies. These findings underscore the value of natural language processing tools in uncovering long-term shifts in musical language and cultural expression.