Music of Greece

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The music of Greece is varied and regionally very different. Folk music has a high priority in Greece and modern music is also strongly influenced by folklore . In many areas, Greek folk music shows influences from church music, or there are even older elements, e.g. B. the pentatonic scale in Epirus , included from antiquity. The regional styles differ greatly in terms of melody and use of instruments, but at the same time have clear similarities in terms of rhythm and text content. These differences are mainly due to the geographical conditions that separate the respective regions from each other by water or mountain ranges. Greek music also has two musical pillars. On the one hand that of the mainland-motherland music and on the other hand the music of Asia Minor, which accordingly contains some oriental elements. The music of the Aegean, in turn, has its own style, which, depending on its proximity to the mother country or Asia Minor, may have been influenced by the respective elements.

Ancient Greek Music

The music of Byzantium

The church music of the Eastern Roman Byzantine Empire in particular represents a crucial link between the music of antiquity and medieval music history (example: Gregorian chant in its original form in Byzantium). It had a decisive influence on church music in the Eastern European countries and lives on today in a different form in Greek church music.

Folk music (Dimotiki Mousiki)

Dimotiki Mousiki (from Dimos the people) or more appropriately Ellinika dimotika tragoudia is traditional Greek folk music mainly from rural areas. It is accompanied by clarinets, guitars, frame drums with bells ( defi ) and violins and includes dance music forms such as the Chaniotic Syrto , the round dance Kalamatiano , the Tsamiko or Arvanitikos (dance of bravery) and the Chasaposerviko . Vocal music such as the Kleften songs, which were sung by the rebels during the partisan war against Ottoman rule from 1715, are usually songs of struggle, death, loyalty and betrayal, so mostly of a tragic nature, which is still the mainstay today in addition to love Element of Greek music is.

Old folk songs , the Paradosiaka , from Thessaly and Central Greece are mainly played with clarinet and violin . The songs are often about the Ottoman yoke , war and displacement.

The island's folk songs, the nisiotics , are often spirited or melancholy. The predominant instruments are the lute , the violin, the dulcimer santouri with 100 to 140 strings and the pear-shaped Cretan lyra .

Bagpipes are still often played in northern Greece, namely the gajda , which is also common in Bulgaria , and the zurna , a conical double-reed instrument that is widespread in the Arab world, Turkey and Armenia . The latter usually plays together with the big drum Daouli . Another type of bagpipe, the tsambouna , is played on the Greek islands, which , unlike the gajda, has no drone whistle , but instead has two parallel pipes . On Karpathos it is traditionally played in a trio with lyre and lute.

Up until the National Socialist pogroms in World War II, there was a strong Sephardic music tradition in Thessaloniki , which is passed on today by the singer Savina Yannatou .

Many of the earliest recordings were made by the Arvanites (Albanian Greeks) Giorgia Mittaki and Giorgios Papasideris. Among the instrumentalists of the older generation were clarinet virtuosos like Kostas Karakostas, Tassos Chalkias, Baggelis and Vassilis Soukas , still active are Petro Loukas Chalkias, Giannis Basilopoulos, Giorgos Mangas, Giorgos Yevyelis and Vassilis Saleas, who along with Theodorakis on the album Litany is heard, the oud player Nikos Sara Gouda, who also belly dance music plays, and the fiddlers Giorgos Koros, Stathis Koukoularis, Nikos Chatsopoulos, Nikos Oikonomidis and Giannis Zeygolis. The Santouri player Aristidis Moschos, who died in 2001, should also be mentioned.

Greek folklore is often played on instruments that were played by the Greeks and Persians in ancient times. Later these instruments were adopted by the Arabs and Moors who transmitted them to the West.

Some Greek folk songs have become popular with us in the last few decades, but in German translations. Examples are The Donkey Driver and Kawuras, the Cancer .

Popular music (Laïki Mousiki)

Rembetiko

The Laiki Mousiki has its roots in Rembetiko , which was created in the 1920s and 1930s, especially in urban subcultures. Greeks from Asia Minor, who formed a sub-proletariat in the cities as a result of the population exchange as a result of the Asia Minor catastrophe , developed this style of music based on their musical traditions. Typical instruments are bouzouki , guitar , baglamas , accordion and violin . Markos Vamvakaris , Manolis Chiotis and Vassilis Tsitsanis were among the most famous composers and interpreters of Rembetiko . The songs are often about the stranger, love, prison, everyday life and misery. Because of its melancholy mood and its origin in the slums, the rembetiko is often referred to as the Greek blues . The film 'Rembetiko' by Kostas Ferris from 1983 gives an impression of the living conditions and lifestyle of the Rembetes.

Most of the traditional rebetiko songs were composed in the 1930s to the 1950s. They were frowned upon in the Greek bourgeoisie. The composers Manos Chatzidakis and Mikis Theodorakis took up musical and thematic elements of rebetiko in their compositions and made it socially acceptable.

Newer Laïki Mousiki

Laïkó is the popular music that replaced Rembetiko in the mid-1950s. The lyrics of the songs by Tsitsanis in particular addressed not only the sub-proletariat, but also the problems of the rest of the population, so that the rebetiko reached a wider audience as early as the early 1950s, but this also led to serious stylistic changes. The role of the interpreter in particular increased, while the composers took a back seat. Singers like Stelios Kazantzidis , Manolis Angelopoulos, Grigoris Bithikotsis , Panos Gavalas and singers like Giota Lydia , Poly Panou , Kaity Gray and Mairy Linda become famous. Manolis Chiotis adds a double string to the bouzouki and introduces Latin American rhythms such as mambo and rumba . He tries to make Buzuki music socially acceptable. Musicians like Giorgos Zambetas and Akis Panou develop their own style. In spite of everything - like rebetiko before her - popular music was not accepted by the educated circles until a few years ago. It was not played on the radio for decades. The apolitical attitude and the Turkish origins were criticized.

Popular art song (Éntechno Tragoudi)

In the entechno elements of rebetiko meet with western song and chanson forms and with some composers (e.g. Giannis Markopoulos ) traditional dimotiki mousiki . Mikis Theodorakis and Manos Chatzidakis are considered to be the founders of this style of music in the 1950s. Many Entechna Tragoudia are settings of poems by well-known Greek poets and thus help the poetry to become extraordinarily popular. The singers include, for example, Maria Farantouri and Nena Venetsanou . Traditional music singers appeared in the 1960s with Dionysis Savvopoulos ; many of these musicians played neo kyma , a mixture of entechno and French chansons . Savvopoulos mixed influences from American musicians such as Bob Dylan and Frank Zappa with Macedonian folk music and political song lyrics. Artists such as Arletta , Mariza Koch and Kostas Chatzis offer a similar style of music .

During the military dictatorship 1967–1974 and in the years thereafter, the texts often took up political issues, including in hidden allusions. Quite a few singers and composers took part in the resistance against the colonels and their music created an identity for the opposition across generations and political groups. The colonels banned Theodorakis' music, owning his records, and singing and listening to his songs.

Current developments

One of Savvopoulos' students is Nikos Xydakis , who modernized the Laïkó by using oriental instruments. His most successful album was Konta sti Doxa Mia Stigmi (1987, with Eleftheria Arvanitaki ).

In the 1980s and 1990s in particular, Vangelis was the most internationally successful Greek musician. His titles Chariots of Fire (1981) and Conquest of Paradise (1995) became world hits, including So Long Ago, So Clear should not go unmentioned.

The singer and composer Giorgos Dalaras has become known across Europe. His songs are rooted in the Greek musical tradition, on the other hand he also has a weakness for American songwriter pop, which he sometimes mixes with the Greek-orchestrated ballads.

Greek rock music also has relatively sophisticated representatives in the form of Giannis Aggelakas (member of the popular punk band Trypes) or the group Gruppeκουλαγκ (Gulag) originally coming from punk rock. In the black metal area, the band Rotting Christ in particular provided some music exports.

In the field of electronic music, Michalis Delta is worth mentioning, whose album To chroma tis meras, recorded with Tania Tsanaklidou in 2001, is a clear example of the mixing of modern music with traditional singing.

Kristi Stassinopoulou has been a regular guest in the World Music Charts Europe since the international release of her CD Echotropia , after only reaching a meager 14th place in the 1983 Eurovision Song Contest . The former musical actress with extensive musical roots and her partner Stathis Kalyviotis created an idiosyncratic, but also very catchy and poetic world music sound. She has also worked as a fantasy writer in the past .

In the techno area, the tinkerer duo Αλλου (Allou) in particular has made a name for itself, adding a Greek character to the common patterns of house , trance and breakbeat music, especially in the linguistic and vocal area. Their debut CD, released in 2000, also draws on stylistic borrowings from popular models such as Kraftwerk or Cabaret Voltaire .

Art music

Until the 19th century, Greek art music received little attention in Western Europe . Still, before 1669, Crete had an important musical culture. Frangiskos Leondaritis was a composer who had made a career in Crete, Venice and Munich.

From the beginning of the 19th century, the so-called Ionian School was formed on the Ionian Islands , whose composers mainly created vocal and instrumental works according to the Italian tradition, but since 1830 they have also used elements of folk music and popular music. The most important composers of the Ionian School are Nikolaos Mantzaros , Pavlos Carrer , Spiridon Xindas (1810-1896) and Spiro Samara . Dionissios Rodotheatos and Dimitris Lialios introduced romantic symphonic music in Greece. Towards the end of the century and after the founding of the Athens Conservatory , the composers increasingly reflected on the Greek folk music tradition: Manolis Kalomiris and Dimitri Mitropoulos established a Greek National School . Nevertheless, Mitropoulos was a composer of new music (e.g., Ostinata , Concerto Grosso , 10 Inventiones ). As a student of Schönberg, Nikos Skalkottas was the first Greek to compose in series , the best-known representatives of new music from Greece are Theodore Antoniou and Iannis Xenakis . The most famous composers of rebetiko and Greek film music, Mikis Theodorakis and Manolis Hadjidakis, have also composed works for classical ensembles. Today the contemporary Greek composers orient themselves towards the international music scene, partly however with the inclusion of traditional melodies and instruments.

Other Greek composers are

See also

literature

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Kawuras, the cancer folkstanz.in-berlin.de