k, it's late in the afternoon and the Athenean heat a world of pain for all, however the air breeze that climbs up to my 5th floor and the quite urban view of my window made me listen again to a song that was certainly written on a winter night.
You 'll never get to understand its song beuty unless you sing it. I know its hard but give it a try. Picture yourself on a Greek island, on some mountainous village (those with the white houses all over) having a drink sitting outside at a warm night and few tables far from you, a couple of guys with their instruments start playing.
Oh, man. I need holidays.
Your tired footsteps [Το κουρασμένο βήμα σου]
lyrics: Kostas Virvos
music: M. Bakalis (1952)
Here is a scene of an 80's TV series named "The minor of dawn" which was dedicated to rembetiko music. The lyrics in English are given as subtitiles. This specific song was written few years after rembetiko supposingly seased to be. Its form is such, however the presence of a 4-string bouzouki along with other characteristics of its structure places it a bit towards the form of music that followed rembetiko: Laiko (=people's music). We will have the chance to talk about that genre several times since it spreads in almost 4 decades (1950s-60s-70s-80s) and it can't be overlooked.
...What was I saying? Ah, yeap, that I need holidays. That has to wait a bit...
t last some action. We had been presenting and translating all these songs without a word about the instruments or the conditions under which they were originally performed. This is mainly because most videos we can find are either of low quality (like the recordings) or aestheticly bad (you know, these youtube videos with silly photostreams) and our description skills in stuff you have never seen are not good enough.
The video below is dragged from the movie "Rembetiko"(1983) written and directed by Costas Ferris. The movie was awarded in 1984 with the "Berlin Silver Bear" but the soundtrack was proven to be much more popular than the movie itself. Its composers were the poet Nikos Gatsos (Νίκος Γκάτσος) and the conductor Stavros Xarchakos (Σταύρος Ξαρχάκος).
Skip the Greek of the first dialogues, there's nothing important with that, and focus on how this woman (Sotiria Leonardou/ Σωτηρία Λεονάρδου) gains people's attention as she sings with her soul. The theme of the song is the vainess of human nature. And this is a proof that you can better discribe such stuff with that sort of music. Rembetiko is like the imaginary part of complex numbers. A shortcut to simple truths.
I'm on fire, I'm on fire
lyrics: Nikos Gatsos
Music: Stavros Xarchakos
vocals: Sotiria Leonardou
When the man is born
a pain is born too
and when the war flares
you are incapable of counting the blood
I'm on fire I'm on fire
add more oil into the flames
I am drowning I am drowning
throw me in a deep sea
I swore to your eyes
which was like a Gospel's truth to me
the stab you gave me
to turn it into laughter
I am on fire I am on fire
add more oil into the flames
I am drowning I am drowning
throw me in a deep sea
But you deep inside Hell
brake the chains
and if you drag me next to you
bless you to be
I am on fire I am on fire
add more oil into the flames
I am drownig I am drowning
throw me in a deep sea
(translation dragged from stixoi.info - English version credited to dimitris2, available also in Italian)
Anestis Delias (the light jacket man sitting on the left) and a bunch of musicians
"
ne afternoon, I was with Anestis Delias and Mpatis, here - around Keratsini - up to the hill. Anestis and Batis had their instruments with them, as well as something to get ourselves high on later. On the way, we found Karydakias that was playing bouzouki. Nice guy, he was killed later on -during the war. Anestis had written the music, but he had no lyrics. It was... a zeibekiko. We stood there, on the hill, Anestis were teaching the others the music and all three of them started playing. I was listening. Batis said: [Hey magka, your knife, to handle it right...] and there he stopped. We all got what the song was about, so we started helping out with the lyrics.[...] Karydakias continues: [...You need to have the guts, you poser, (you need to have) the heart to pull it out...]. The first part was ready. The second and the third was Batis’ and the last one is Karydakias’ and mine. That’s how we wrote that one.”, Nikos Mathesis (nicknamed : Nikos the nuts) remembers.
Anestis Delias
It is not only the evolution of music forms and trends. It is a whole mindset mirrored in these songs. A deeply familiar way of life, no matter how many years have passed.
The song is titled Poser and it is attributed to the Smyrne -born (Izmir) Anestis Delias. The picture given above is a croped part of the one given in previous post (the man standing on the right). He died 31 years old because of heroine. A woman destroyed him, trying to possess and control him, they say. An amateur home grown translation is given below.
The Poser [Το κουτσαβάκι / Ο Φιγουρατζής]
Anestis Delias [Ανέστης Δελιάς]
1936
Hey magka*, your knife to handle it right You need to have the guts you poser, a heart (you need to have), to pull it out You need to have the guts you poser, a heart, to pull it out
Don’t you try these on me You‘d better hide your “sword” Cause I’ll get high one day, you poser and I‘ll come along your crib
Cause I’ll get high one day, you poser and I‘ll come along your crib
(Long live Artemi with your nice plectrumings**!)
You‘d better go to someone else, you poser To show off that way Cause I have smoked as well, you poser And I got dangerously high
Cause I have smoked as well, you poser And I got dangerously high
I told you once, behave wisely Or else I’ll bash you straight away I’ll bring my “gat”, you poser And there I’ll humble you I’ll bring my “gat”, you poser And there I’ll humble you
(Long live Babi with your Baglama.... bravooo!)
*magkas {μάγκας} = tough guy / buster / hep.
**plectrumings = the ups and downs of the bouzouki plectrum
e continue the rembetiko journey back to 1936 with the song "Karavotsakismata" ("shipwrecks") by Markos Vamvakaris (standing on the left) and Stratos Pagioumtzis (sitting on the left). The song is attributed to Markos Vamvakaris. Markos and his famous Piraeus Quartet is probably the standard reference when it comes to classical rembetiko music. The following bio is from the Markos Vamvakaris Archive.
When Markos was fifteen years old he stowed away on a ship to Piraeus and got a job loading coals on the docks. This was tough, low-down work, but the nights were all about hashish and women. He was kept in fine clothes by an older whore and hung out at the tekes every night. In 1925, Markos heard Old Nikos play bouzouki and was immediately hooked. Six months later he was playing at a teke when Old Nikos stopped by, he couldn't believe it was the same kid who'd never even played a few months earlier. Nikos said they'd show Markos something in the morning and he'd come back and play it better than them in the evening.
Because the bouzouki was considered a low-class instrument, it had not been recorded until 1932 when Yiannis Halikias (aka Jack Gregory), a greek-american, recorded his "Minore Tou Teke". The record was very popular, so Spyros Peristeris, who was working as a record producer, composer and instrumentalist for Odeon records in Greece, convinced Odeon to record Vamvakaris. In 1933, Peristeris supervised, and played guitar on Markos' first recording session (although he had recorded two songs in 1932 for Columbia, they were not released until later). Markos recorded one zebekiko, O Dervises, and one Hassapiko, O Harmanes. Markos hadn't considered himself a singer but ended up doing the vocals on these records. They were very successful and Markos' rough and powerful singing became fashionable.
Markos eventually teamed up with singer Stratos Pagioumitzis, baglamatzis Jiorgos Batis, and bouzouki player Anestis Delias to form his famous Piraeus Quartet. His popularity was sustained throughout the 1930's, despite growing political turmoil. Eventually the style of rebetika that Markos had pioneered became more mainstream, and by the 1940's Tsitsanis had started changing the subject matter to be about love and less about hashish, prison and other rebetika topics. Likewise, Hiotis started changing the sound of the music, adding strings to the bouzouki in 1956 and moving towards a more flashy, electric and westernized sound. Markos continued to record in his older style through this period. He passed away in 1972.
Shipwrecks [Τα καραβοτσακίσματα]
Markos Vamvakaris [Μάρκος Βαμβακάρης]
Torments, bitterness, poison, shipwrecks, oh
As the rock that gets beaten
by the sea waves
As the rock that gets beaten
by the sea waves, oh
Torments, bitterness, poison, shipwrecks
What have I done and you harass me
Oh, what do you think you're doing, adoring someone else
You don't love me, just say it
I am left alone and forsaken
I'll die, I won't live anymore
I stop loving, I'll forget
I'm a shipwreck, stop laughing at me
(Stratos: Long live Marko!)
At home everybody is coming down on me about you
Their harsh words poison me
Their harsh words poison me
At home everybody is coming down on me about you
What have I done and you harass me
Oh, what do you think you're doing, adoring someone else
arming up with easy west-influenced listenings couldn't last long. So we go straight back to 1948, to listen to a recording of a love song that had been strictly censored because of it can also be read politicaly, "Be a little Patient". Times of civil war, since 1946. A war that was the first act of cold war in Greece which ended in October of 1949 leaving behind a totally demolished country, socially and politically. Vasilis Tsitsanis -the composer- sung this song with Sotiria Mpellou, an incredible and unique woman voice. A little bit of background about that man can be found on Rebetiko Row website link for him.
Rebetiko (which may also be found as rempetiko, rembetiko) is a music kind oriented from the East. As such, or more specifically as "of Turkish influence and origin" rebetiko is officially prohibited in 1936. Do not look for glory, decency or elegance on the lyrics or the music. It was played for many years by lower social classes, drop-outs, also by some considered "criminals" at their time. But still, look for emotions, for pain, for love, for humor, for a fight against the Establishment and the social injustice. Some sort of blues, you could say. The wiki article is surprisingly nice:
Rebetiko, plural rebetika, (Greek ρεμπέτικο and ρεμπέτικα respectively), occasionally transliterated as Rembetiko, is the name for a type of Greek urban folk music. A roots music form of sorts, the sound of the genre reflects the combined influences of European and Middle Eastern music. Rebetiko music has sometimes been called the Greek blues, since like the blues, it grew out of a specific urban subculture and reflected the harsh realities of an oppressed subculture's lifestyle: poverty, alienation, crime, drink, drugs prostitution, and violence. But rebetiko's subject matter also extends to other subjects: romance and passion, social matters, people such as the mother, death, the difficulties of living in a foreign country, army life, war, trivial matters of everyday life, exotic places, poverty, labor, illnesses, and the minor sorrows of people. A major theme of Rebetiko is the pleasure of using drugs, especially hashish. Rebetiko songs of this kind are called Χασικλίδικα (hasiklidika). Also like the blues, rebetiko progressed from being a music associated with the lower classes to becoming during the 1960s and later a revived musical form of wide popularity, especially among younger people. Rebetiko music was closely associated with the mangas Greek urban subculture. Finally, rebetiko songs usually display the same chord progressions found in songs from classic Mississippi delta bluesmen like Robert Johnson and others.
All the rebetiko songs are based on traditional Greek or Anatolian dance rhythms, zeibekikos, aptalikos, chasapikos and servikos being very common but they also include tsifteteli, karsilamas, syrtos and other dance styles.
[...]
Petropoulos divides the history of the style into three periods:
1922–1932 — the era when rebetiko emerged from its roots with the mixture of elements from the music of Asia Minor
1932–1942 — the classical period
1942–1952 — the era of discovery, spread, and acceptance.
So, there we are. Third period, lets say. However the song doesn't know about periods. It talks about things without age. It's one of those that you can dance. Zeibekikos is the rhythm called. A beautiful male dance that originates from the Zeybek warriors of Anatolia. Since we are definitely going to come back to that later (while this post is already getting to big), you can read the wiki article for some introductory information.
Sotiria Mpellou
This specific unique record is dated at the 11th of November of 1948. The key word for its censorship (that continued even after the civil war) was the word "dawn". Tsitsanis as well as many other composers wrote songs about love with undercover meanings of that form to cheat the censorship. In 1950 the song entered the Athens Police Department's list of "forbiddens" under the title "The Patient". At that time there were policemen destroying hundreds of gramophone records with that song... Tsitsanis himself at his autobiography is stating:
"It was very hard to write what you really wanted to. You wouldn't get the licence even to record it. [...] At that time, around 1948, I wrote one with symbolism in lyrics hoping that it would pass the censorship, while its meaning is clear.. "Don't fall in despair for he won'’t be late at the crack of dawn he'll come by you to beg from you a new love's beginning be just a bit patient..". The first part talks about the soldiers' needed patience since he might be on the mountains, in exile or in prison. The second "pushes the clouds away" from their hearts and the last part symbolises the hope for peace.."
The translation given below the song was dragged from www.stixoi.info and it is also available in Italian, German, Hebrew, Turkish and French. You can check there.
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