"The musical tradition of ma'lūf is believed to have reached North Africa with Muslim and Jewish refugees escaping the Christian reconquista of Spain between the tenth and seventeenth centuries. Although this Arab Andalusian music has been studied in other parts of the region, until now the Libyan version has not received Western scholarly attention. This book explores the place of this orally transmitted tradition in Libyan life and culture. It investigates the people that make ma'lūf and the institutions that nuture it as much as the traditional itself. Patronage, music making, discourse about life and music, history, and ideology all unite in a musical tradition which is richly intriguing and intricate beneath its seemingly simple surface"--P. [4] of cover.