Monday 29 June 2015

For a change...

...some Polka from Crete


Plus a couple more traditional approaches to Cretan music that are less than conventional nowadays:

Stratis Kalogeridis' take on Kastrines kontylies:


Charchalis' Chaniotiko syrto:


Wednesday 24 June 2015

Χορός του δρεπανιού

or at least a variation of the theme, to be found here starting at 13:08:


Forthcoming, October 2015: Jim Samson, Nicoletta Demetriou (Eds), Music in Cyprus, Ashgate

http://www.ashgate.com/isbn/9781409465737

Wednesday 10 June 2015

Limits and complexities

"It's not my fault if I play Azerbaijani melodies. Okay, I don't talk to them but I play their music. As a musician I play their music. And they do the same. Whether they play our music I don't know. But I play theirs. It's not about the music. Maybe it's not their music. Maybe it's them playing our music. It could be that way round. And then, you know, their music and ours comes from the same place: we play it, and they do. [...] And how we are [sic] supposed to know who wrote it? We sing it in Armenian and they sing it in Azeri. And whose music is it? It belongs to us all.What's the war got to do with it?"