![]() To begin with a few called ‘table tunes’ will be played to warm up the mood and speed up the flow of ouzo. The musicians bring out their instruments: a clarinet, one or two violins, the long-necked lute and the défi (tambourine). I rom time to time they come together on the occasion of some celebration families and friends are reunited and the village experiences a partial and temporary re-constitution around a table and several bottles of ouzo. Singers and instrumentalists all live and work in Athens. Moreover, Ktísmata, the village close to the Greek-Albanian border where our musicians come from, is today being ravaged by the emigration of its inhabitants, as is the entire region of Epirus. When one adds the difficult vocal training needed for a mastery of the ‘yodelling’ technique used by the singer called the ‘embroiderer’, one realizes why the initiation into polyphonic singing must begin in childhood. Their performance demands not only a thorough knowledge of this extremely rich and varied repertory (the performers of the music recorded here claim that each song often has more than ten variants of both the text and the music), but also a perfect familiarity with polyphonic invention and a solid gift for improvisation. On listening to this recording one will readily understand how arduous an apprenticeship is necessary to master these songs. With the exception of a study by the musicologist, Spyros Peristeris, published in Athens in 1958, there has, to the best of our knowledge, been no other systematic work devoted to the extremely ancient musical tradition of Epirus, and particularly to its polyphonic songs.īut musical traditions are in greater need of musicians to perpetuate them than of researchers, and looked at from this point of view, the future of Epirote polyphonic music is more than precarious. Introduction to the Polyphonic Songs of Epirus
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |