Zoè was born in the spring of 1993 out of a group of musicians from Salento (a region in the deep south-east of Italy) with a common need to rediscover the traditional popular music of their own land. The music of Salento is the result of centuries of varied foreign domination, but more importantly, of exchanges with other Mediterranean cultures.

Zoè’s repertoire includes working songs, love songs in local dialect and in Salentian Greek, protest songs, and especially the ‘Pizzica’ (sting): from the heart and the dances of tarantism. This last rhythm is exciting, tormenting, inebriating, exhilarating, and deeply moving all at once. It is the sum of the rhythms of the heart and breath, the beat of the earth. It is impossible to remain indifferent, because the persistent crescendo of the tambourine “beats” goes straight to the heart. if the young black people from the urban ghettos narrate, with the help of rap, the poverty and the rage, the Salentinians, from time immemorial, express their feelings and passions by beating the tambourine and by dancing the "pizzica", until they fall into a trance. It's purpose is not only expressive, but also communicative. It's a courting dance.

For this reason, beyond any interpretation, it is enough to listen to the music, to abandon oneself to its movement, to come up against this force, this uncommon musical energy. The rhythm of the Pizzica is of central and fundamental importance to the history of Zoè. “Beating” the pizzica tambourine (“to beat” on the pizzica,or “sting”) represents a decisive, profound, and sometimes painful experience for the group.