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“An Approach to
Playing Violin in Rebetiko”
by Hank Bradley
This essay started as an attempt to compile some sort of bibliography on
the subject of the violins heard on recordings of rebetika. Not fluent in
Greek, I am limited to English language sources and the help of some very
generous friends, but it’s painfully apparent that not much printed information
got rounded up. The prize of the search was Lisbet Torp’s magnificent book on
the violinist Salonikios.[1] Sleeve notes on LPs and CDs were also helpful,
particularly those of Dr. Martin Schwartz [2] and David Soffa. More unpublished
information came from the Detroit record collector Dino Pappas, in his
carefully handwritten (and sometimes wonderfully rowdy) notes accompanying
cassettes of 78-rpm classic-era rebetika and demotika music, and in personal
communications until his death. Some of his famous collection is resident now
in Athens, possibly accessible to persons interested in the Greek, Turkish and
Armenian music of Greece and Asia Minor. [See bibliography.]
But barge we now ahead to fill up a page or two, with the intent of
helping fellow Anglophone violinists or fiddlers to ingest some of this
magnificent music. Apologies to scholars – this is written by a practical
musician who chases good tunes, tries to play them as their inventors did, and
whose hands speak Greek better than his face.
For a good introduction to the general concept of rebetika, see the
bibliography. There are gems of understanding there, not the least from the pen
of our wily Ed Emery. Many of these gems have bibliographies of their own,
adding up to a long inspiring winter of reading by the fire. Preferably with
some of Dino’s breathtaking records for further inspiration.
Well, assuming one can pull tunes out of a violin to some extent, how
does one go about playing rebetika? Enter here my old friend Jack Kalionzes:
“Forget reading and writing about playing music. What good will that do? Either
you’re going to play it or listen to it, otherwise forget it – writing isn’t
going to help. You have to realize, with all those scales and arpeggios and
crescendos… Greek violin has things in it that aren’t even NOTES. Get next to
some of those singers with the rubber band voices. Pay attention to them, and
just figure out how to do that on the violin.”
WHAT IS REBETIKA VIOLIN?
Some folks define rebetika as the music of the bouzouki-wielding Piraeus
musicians of the 1930s. Others include music from Asia Minor, notably Smyrna.
Some of the Smyrna musicians were musically educated (Ogdontakis, Peristeris,
Tundas), and they tended to have larger bands, different instruments (violins,
outia, kanonakia et al), more elaborate orchestrations and more melismatic
singers. The pioneer studies of these styles call them the Piraeus and Smyrna
schools. Good enough.
But you rarely hear violins and bouzoukia together – those Piraeus and
Smyrna schools didn’t overlap very much. Occasionally great results did arise
from overlaps, for instance on Yannis Papaioannou’s recording of Pende
Ellines Ston Adi, where the bouzouki seconds the violin as an outi normally
would.
And ‘rebetika violin’? I wouldn’t waste much time searching
ethnomusicological literature for perfect definitions of a distinct style. The
violinists who recorded on rebetika songs did what they knew how to do, and
that ran the gamut of what Greeks did with violins in folk (demotiki) and
popular (laiki) music. The most distinctive rebetika instrumental style was
invented by the bouzouki and baglama players of the Piraeus school, right there
on the spot. Most of the violin players ventured much further afield and had
occasions to play a wider musical spectrum.
I submit that to play rebetika violin, one need just listen to and
absorb a significant number of rebetika songs (like bluegrass, it ain’t
rebetika without the singing), and then apply violin parts that follow the
idiom and do no harm to the musical style.
THE WAY THEY PLAY IN GREECE AND ASIA MINOR.
Even in the ‘classical era’, there was crossover by musicians between
dimotika (village) and laika (city, including rebetika) idioms. The same
suspects show up playing violins on all sorts of recordings. Remember that
record companies were out to sell product to multiple audiences, and that as
part of the ‘factory’, musicians would be called on to speak all the musical
languages they possibly could. As an example, Andreas Tsekouras summoned a
band, including the superb violinist Kyriakos Gouventas, for a concert at the
2002 Hydra gathering. It followed his all-encompassing talk on the Epicurean
ideal and development of Greek popular music from the 19th century
to the present. The cast of exceptional musicians and singers he assembled was
able to provide an illuminating example of the many strains and styles
coexisting within and without rebetika.
Quoting Martin Schwartz again, “In the early part of this (20th)
century, Greek musicians of Turkey performed Turkish and Greek music and
hybrids thereof. The Greek musicians of Asia Minor were also well acquainted
with music of Romania, Italy, and European music in general”. [3] We should not
imagine that the violinists on the old recordings were the products of cultural
isolation – they were eager to assimilate whatever music they came across, as a
way to expand their audience.
The recordings of Semsis and Ogdontakis show them both to have been
exceptional players, particularly in their elaborate solo dance pieces, syrta,
tsifte tellia, karsilamades. But in accompanying singers, their lines were less
elaborate, perhaps sometimes due to hastily written arrangements, played a few
times for the recording session and never repeated? Many of those recordings
include a little flourish by the violin for dessert, where the player unlimbers
elegant decorations and agility. By comparison, the recordings of Marika
Papaghika were made by a band that performed regularly together, with various
violinists. [4] She even owned her own nightclub on Long Island, and recorded
songs of many styles including rebetika from 1918 to 1929. Her violinists (Zoumbas, Naftis, Gretsis,
Makedonas) were also excellent players, naturally of varying styles, but the
ensemble playing was very well integrated.
It is interesting to compare modern Greek violin, as represented by
players such as Kyriakos Gouventas or Stathis Koukoularis, with the best of the
classical era recordings, leaving amplification effects out of the equation.
The elaborate gracings of the older generation seem tighter and more subtle,
while current practice in Greece and Asia Minor includes wider gracings and
tonal shadings, gulps and slides, in general more florid or exaggerated. Not to
mention the cello effect of the fifth string sported by Mr. Gouventas.
HOW DID THEY LEARN?
Current American practice for learning idiomatic music of various
cultures (Virginia and Tennessee included) is centered on the existence of
week-long ‘camps’ where students receive detailed examples, instruction and
sometimes music transcriptions from cultural insiders. But the classical era
violinists had no such luxuries – at best, an apprenticeship with a working
musician. [5] The prime requirements were a good ear and good memory, in
addition to the ability to play the instrument. Dr. Schwartz describes Tountas (who also ‘discovered’ Roza
Eskenazi): ‘As a youth he traveled widely and studied folk music of many
peoples’. The travels included Africa and Europe. He also describes Spiros Peristeris (another Athens recording
director and excellent mandolin-guitar-bouzouki player) attending an Italian
night school in Constantinople, and becoming ‘chief mandolinist in a
prestigious Smyrna string ensemble’.
Lisbet Torp tell us that Salonikios had a father and a grandfather who
were makers and players of violins. By the age of ten he himself was a
promising musician; in his early teens he was playing for the Sultan of the
Ottoman Empire; until he was 36 he was on the road playing through Asia Minor,
Persia, Palestine, Egypt and Ethiopia, with long intervals in Constantinople.
‘Semsis had a very good ear for music and he had picked up various musical
styles and large repertoire in the various places which he visited during his
travels’.[6]
From Texas-Mexican culture comes another anecdote, as I recall, from the
accordionist Narciso Martinez. Yes, yes, this isn’t rebetika, but here’s one
example of how ear musicians learn. In a nearby town there were brass band concerts
on weekends, and Martinez liked the music and hoped to learn to play it. He had
a compadre with a good memory who would sit on a hillside with him and listen
to the concerts. Afterwards at home, said compadre would whistle each tune
repeatedly (after one hearing!) until Martinez had worked it out on the
accordion. Greek musicians call such untutored learning ‘stealing’.
ANGLO FIDDLE vs GREEK.
Anglo folk music is full of examples of unschooled
fiddlers with abilities ranging from crude to very good. In early American
commercial recordings, fiddlers’ abilities ranged from the sublime to the
ridiculous – the recordings sold mainly to their peers and local audiences.
There appears
to be a difference between that down-home music and the offerings of the
recording companies operating in Greece at the same time. Some recorded
rebetika music was technically simple (although musically very powerful), and
was composed and played by unschooled musicians. But most of that was in
Piraeus style (singers with bouzoukis and an attitude) and rarely included
violins.
The Smyrnaica where violins or liras were present was
arranged and performed by more polished performers, and the recording companies
apparently made a policy of obtaining the best possible violinists. So much so
that Dimitris Semsis and Ioannis Dragatsis (Ogdontakis) acted as recording
directors for Columbia, and Semsis for HMV as well. Each of them appears on
literally hundreds of recordings, of a wide variety of music and songs. A
question arises: were there other violinists of their caliber or near it, who
were not recorded in this era for failure to pass these gatekeepers?
An Anglo or American fiddler venturing from safe old traditions into
Greek playing is in for some big, but certainly not superhuman, changes. Follow
the examples of Semsis and Tountas above, and of Walter Starkie (do read Raggle
Taggle sometime), of Arthur Smith playing the blues, and of Stephane
Grapelli entering the jazz world: unfurl those ears, and address the following
transitions.
From a few comfortable major, minor or modal scales, to the Greek and
Asia Minor canon of dhromi (roads) with names, whose notes aren’t all available
on a piano, and whose intervals include wide gaps and and might appear
eccentric to a newcomer. Sometimes you drive those roads differently uphill
than down.
From tunes comprised largely of strings of sixteenth notes, to more
complicated phrasing with individual decorations on practically every note, and
meters looking like the old socket wrench sizes 7/8 or 9/16.
From a fixed left-hand position, to a very mobile acquaintance with all
the higher positions. Remember before the advent of amplification, singers and
violinists frequently used high ranges to penetrate crowd noise and reach
larger audiences.
And even the players who are proficient at Irish airs or the blues,
which include some improvisation, are faced with the lifelong challenge of
improvising respectable taximia. Essentially, our musical pilgrim makes the
transition from fiddler to violinist, and then learns one or more new musical
languages, and preferably, somewhere in the process, Greek itself. Do pay close
attention to those singers! And singing some melismatic songs in that language
might well be a salutary learning process.
WHO WERE THE VIOLINISTS OF REBETIKA?
A rummage through my 30-year collection of recordings turns up just 14 names. Certainly there were more, but a great number of records were made crediting the singer or bandleader, and leaving the violinist (and the rest of the band) anonymous. Most named here are found on small American labels, while most of the hundreds of recordings produced in Greece feature one or the other of the two Greek giants, Dimitris Semsis (‘Salonikios’) and Yiannis Dragatsis (‘Ogdontakis’). As noted elsewhere, they (like George Grachis in Chicago) were the recording directors, and organized the bands and chose the musicians who made the recordings. Below is a listing, with names of some of the singers they accompanied, and the names of their labels.
It would be a joke to represent this list as more than a small sampling
of the whole body of recordings with violins or liras, made in the years before
1940. And I leave it to others to determine what’s rebetika and what’s not.
Remember these violinists played all sorts of music.
|
His Master’s Voice, Odeon, Columbia |
||
|
Athanasios Makedonas |
Marika Papaghika |
Victor |
|
Alexis Zoumbas
(Epirot) |
Marika Papaghika |
Victor |
|
Vangelis Naftis |
Marika Papaghika |
|
|
Dimitrios Semsis (Macedonia) ‘Salonikios’ |
Roza Eskenazi, Rita Abatzi |
RCA Victor, Orthophonic, His Master’s Voice |
|
Ioannis Dragatsis (Smyrna) ‘Ogdontakis’ |
Nouros, Dalgas, |
Decca, Odeon, Columbia, Standard, Victor,
Orthophonic |
|
Nishan Sedefchian |
|
Kaliphon, Columbia |
|
Kemani Memdouli Bey |
|
Columbia |
|
Nick Doneff
(Bulgaria) |
(Marko) Melkon Alemsharian |
Kaliphon, Metropolitan |
|
Alexis Zervas |
(Marko) Melkon Alemsharian |
Panhellenic, Balkan |
|
St. Lazarou |
Yiota Lydia, Stellakis |
Columbia |
|
Anti Loris |
Angela Palagoudi |
Kalos Diskos |
|
Andreas Poggis |
|
Kalos Diskos |
|
George Grachis |
Marika Papaghika, Angelo K. Stamos, Katsani
(Mourmouris) |
Greek Record Co. of Chicago |
NOTES
1. Lisbet Torp, Salonikios – The Best Violin in the Balkans,
Museum Tusculanum Press, University of Copenhagen, 1993.
2. CD Greek-Oriental Rebetika Songs and Dances in the Asia Minor
Style, 1911-1937, Arhoolie Productions, Inc., El Cerrito, California, 1991.
3. Dr. Martin Schwartz, CD, Greek-Oriental Rebetika Songs and Dances
in the Asia Minor Style, 1911-1937, ibid.
4. David Soffa, CD, Marika Papaghika, Greek Popular and Rebetic Music
in New York 1918-1929
5. Fivos Anoyanakis, Greek Popular Musical Instruments,’Teacher and
Pupil’
Petropoulos, Elias, Songs of the Greek Underworld – the Rebetika
Tradition. Translated from the Greek by Ed Emery. Saqi Books, 26
Westbourne Grove, London W2 5RH (2000)
Emery, Ed, Rebetika: History and Origins, Emery’s Occasional
Papers: Issue No. 13 (8 November 1999) http://www.geocities.com/HydraGathering/archive.html
Torp, Lisbet, Salonikios – “The Best Violin in the Balkans”, Museum
Tusculanum Press, University of Copenhagen (1993).
Bradley, Hank, Counterfeiting, Stealing and Cultural Plundering – a
Handbook for Applied Ethnomusicologists, The Mill Gulch Press, Seattle
(1989).
Anoyanakis, Fivos, Greek Popular Musical Instruments, National
Bank of Greece (1979).
Holst, Gail, Road to Rembetika, Denise Harvey & Company,
Lambrou Fotiadi 6, Mets, Athens 407 (1975).
Petropoulos, Elias; Petrides, Ted; Schneider, Sara; Papadimitriou,
Sakis; Dragoumis, Markos; Butterworth, Katherine, Rebetika – Songs from the
Old Greek Underworld, Athens, Komboloi (1975)
The e-mail list of EEFC (the East European Folklore Center) includes
some discussion of rebetika, with valuable pointers to further sources. On the
Web at http://www.mindspring.com/~ginbirch/eefc/,
registration required.
DISCOGRAPHY
AMALIA! (Amalia Bakas) Old Greek Songs in the New Land, 1923-1950, Arhoolie
CD7049, Arhoolie Productions, El Cerrito, CA (2002).
RITA ABATZI, 1933-1938 – Rembetissa, Heritage HT CD 36, Interstate
Productions, East Sussex, England (1996).
MARIKA PAPAGIKA, Greek Popular and Rebetic Music in New York
1918-1929, Alma Criolla Records, Berkeley, CA (1994).
GREEK-ORIENTAL REBETIKA: Songs and
Dances in the Asia Minor Style, Folklyric CD 7005, The Golden Years: 1911-1937,
Arhoolie Productions, El Cerrito, CA (1991).
THE DINO PAPPAS COLLECTION: in the basement of the Association for
the Protection of Intellectual Property (AEPI), a royalties organisation, at
Frangloklisia / Samou 51, a 10-minute cab ride from Maroussi metro station.
Phone number 210 685 7494. Sotiris Lykouropoulos is in charge [ sotlyk@aepi.gr ]. As far as Ed Emery knows (and thanks to him
for this entry), the archive is open to the public.
YOUR FRIENDLY LOCAL RECORD STORE: Treasures untold await, in the form of
reissues of old recordings, and some lovely new ones. Rumors extol the virtues
of one ‘Mikrasiatika’.
Hank Bradley,
Seattle, Washington,
October 2003
E-mail: hankbradley@uswest.net
HOME PAGE – PROGRAMME FOR
THE 2003 CONFERENCE – HOW TO REGISTER – ACCOMMODATION –
REPORT
ON THE 2002 CONFERENCE – REPORT ON THE 2001 CONFERENCE – ARCHIVE – WEBSITES – PHOTOS –
