V: Thanks for finding time for this M. You play the piano in the group. Have you come across or played Rebetiko music before?
M: I have heard about it but not really played it. I have never gone deep in this music.
V: In the original versions you never find piano for a series of reasons. Despite that you play the music in a very natural way. How do you feel about the music?
M: It feels like home, with the melodies and the rhythms. Especially with the rhythms, I feel like I don’t really need to think a lot. It feels natural because I have been raised with this kind of rhythms.
V: What about the role of the piano in these rhythms in terms of this group?
M: It depends, for example even if I was playing some Finish traditional music, I have played some rhythms that come from our cultures. I have been Fusing some things already, but this is the first project that I try to play like this with other people.
V: What about the spin that we give to the music with the musical traditions from other parts of the world?
M: I feel that it is really nice how they blend. Rhythms that come from Aruba or Brazil, can be very similar to the Balkan Rhythms. In this case I don’t feel like I am trying to play things that do not go together. I feel that the first gigs band was very organic, everything was like a glove. In the second gig we did not have equal time for making the rhythms work together. I felt sometimes that I did not get it. It needs more time for the new songs. The older songs though were cool. Every musician was aware of the music. We were all on the same boat and this passed to the audience. We were not trying to mix things. It was naturally happening.
But even Atakti which is from the new set is working already. I really liked the clave idea. For the rest it is a matter of playing together.
V: How do you feel about what the audience receives? Do you feel it is too much or is there a purpose in the music that passes to the audience?
M: I think it makes the people feel something. To feel happy, sad... Lots of emotions there.
I like to present to people how Balkan Music is but also to show how rich it is, where it can go.
It does not only need to be how it has been played before. It is so rich that you can do lots of things with its elements. This is for every musical tradition.
V: What about the musicians? How is it to play with people with different backgrounds?
M: I think it is really cool. There are not so many challenges because everybody tries to do their best, and you can see that. For me this is the most important thing. And everyone is enjoying. It is not like hi came here just to play my part. We really enjoy the music and try to contribute to it in our own ways. I feel we are listening very good at each other.
V: Do you think the cultural background of the musicians affects the music?
M: Of course. For example, we have an Aruban drummer. He gives a lot of spices there which is very beautiful. A Balkan drummer would play totally different. Not better or worse. Just different.
For me it is good to make new things in traditional music, we have to do music that gives something to the people. On the other hand, I am as well happy that there are people who want to play music as it was written. That is how you preserve it. But for me, I want to be the person who brings new things because we also need this kind of people. If you want some tradition to go further and be part of 2020 it has to have something new and fresh to offer as a suggestion. To make people excited. To open the way for new things. This is how things progress. If we all did the same, we would have only one type of music. It is important to play with people from other places like in Andalucía, like Flamenco like Fado. You know what I mean? It is the natural way to make new things.
V: Where would you like to go with this project, in terms of merging the cultures.
M: It is very nice to be here. Also bringing as Balkan people this music to this country to this people.
The music can go to a totally different direction, and I feel that with this band, we should continue working and make people know this culture and feel the music, cause there are people who feel this music and love it. We could also have a tour in the places where the original music was born. Would be interesting to observe.
V: Thanks a lot M, and good luck to you.
Having discussed with Ilias, Merve and other musicians in the project, I kept bringing into my head the points made by them – points about how they see and approach music, what music means to them, what our music means to them and what is it that we are doing through this project.
Some of the things stated in the interviews were in my head already, some other things I followed myself consciously, a few other things that I was not fully aware of were happening to me as well, and finally some of the things were completely new to me, regarding why and how I see our project.
To begin with, talking with Ilias and listening to his views on how we approach the music in our project, it got clearer in my head that what we have been doing has only a tenuous connection with the original genre of Rebetiko and Greek urban folk. The directness and raw power of the melodic lines of the original compositions were standing proud within the music, but not anymore categorising or characterising it. The spirit and the purpose of our renditions of the music share some elements with original Rebetiko, but at the same time are completely different from the originals. The energy and, at moments, the feelings that were channelled from the players to the audience connect us through time. On the other hand, we are completely different in terms of the meaning of the music and what the music itself represents.
In the case of the Rebetiko, the music expressed the life and struggles of the folk and the formation of communities around this music. In the case of our project, the music also represents the formation of a community, but under completely different terms. The formation of community derives from the collaboration of the musicians, carrying with them their different cultural and musical backgrounds and at the same time finding a common language of communication through music. Finally, based on these facts, I abolished the idea of connecting this project to Rebetiko music and started investing heavily in our own product as Rebetiko-based fusion.
Another notable point in all of our conversations was the different types of people on board this project. Ilias represents a particular music culture, and has great roots in playing this music. Chrysa holds the tradition dear and, with deep respect and personal versatility and skills, acts as a bridge between the original and the new. Christopher and Joao, with great love in their own traditions, have the thirst of learning and respectfully internalising the new traditions we approached. People like Merve and Joni listened and searched what to offer the music to bring it to the next level. Beltran brought musicality and continuously searched for the best way to approach the material. Finally, people like Viivi and Tero understood the music and upon this base, offered their personal style to the sound of the fusion.
Everyone offered immensely to the music of this project for all the above reasons, but the greatest contribution of all was the collective one of facing the music and the ideas of this collaboration in an open and accepting way. It stands out in both of the above interviews that the essential ingredient in any collaboration, including ours, are the people who are part of it. In our case the criteria for choosing the musicians were based on several aspects. They were not only based on personal aesthetics and musical skills, but more on what the music was asking and, most importantly, on the character, openness, the mutual respect of the people involved and the collaborative spirit. We would not have been able to reach the transcultural moments if any of these characteristics would be missing.
One more great point has been the direction the music has been taking. Exploring the possibility of creating something new in terms of musical collaboration, we have had the opportunity to introduce elements of different musical and rhythmical traditions to an audience that had not been previously exposed to this music, while being respectful of, but unconstrained by those traditions. We were, in fact, opening rather a new musical direction through the fusion of rhythms, harmonies and melodies. Through our collaborative work we had the opportunity to be part of a musical laboratory and consequently we were able to present the findings of this laboratory to a wider audience.
A final point underlined in all the interviews and conversations is the important role of playing in an transcultural environment. It was not by chance that the musicians derive from 8 different countries. Each musician, while looking in the same direction, interpreted the music in their own personal way, giving it a twist that would not be there otherwise. I am positively sure that if more or different people, with diverse backgrounds, would have been involved in this project, the result would keep altering, according to the contribution of the players.
I am truly thankful to the participants in the project for their great contributions, but also for taking the time to reflect on the project and talk with me about it.
Throughout the years it has been a constant and conscious choice of mine to sit and talk with people, in order to learn about what I consider important topics from them. Whether it is local traditions, way of life, social conditions, music, everyday life experiences or the influences of all the above it has always helped me to talk. From elderly people in a café in a small village, to musicians of previous generations and all the way to my own family members of the past and present generations, I have found that this is the way to have a more complete understanding.
I chose to approach this project in the same way, as I was after receiving opinions and input that I would come to widen my own existing understanding of the Rebetiko 2.1.
To approach the music from another angle, I decided that the best way was simply to talk to the musicians and creators of this fusion.
I talked with Ilias Papailias and Peggy Tzeretzian on a Monday morning this past winter.
Ilias is the Bouzouki player of the band and one of my great teachers of this music, not only in terms of music but also in terms of introducing me to my own country’s culture regarding Rebetiko and Greek Urban folk music in two ways. This was achieved in both an objective way, with facts and the songs of this musical and social movement, and in a subjective way: how he understood it, practised it and lived his life close to it. Peggy is Ilias's life companion and a dear friend of mine that takes great interest in Rebetiko and Greek urban folk music. Our conversation for this common project started after having coffee, smokes, some meze – and, of course, only after catching up with our everyday life matters.
Here are some parts of our discussion on Rebetiko music and our Common project:
V: What characterises Rebetiko music? What are the elements that lead us to recognise Rebetiko.
P: Rebetiko is more a way of life. It is freedom outside the social norms. If I was born that time I would for sure be a Rebetisa. It is the simple fact of enjoying and embracing the passions of life, expressing yourself through it. To socialise and exist through the music. You could express your basic instincts and feelings through the music mostly without words. In a libertarian way, away from the norms. This is something that does not happen so much today. Imagine that for them that way of life did not have a label. They rarely use the term Rebetis/Rebetisa.
V: how is Rebetiko translated in 2020?
P: It does not exist. The Social standards are different.
V: What about what we do? That we meet and socialise through music in a smaller social circle?
P: We do not do this. We just reproduce the music of a different era and express through it. We do not alter it mostly. We miss the originality of it.
V: Is what we do in Rebetiko 2.1 continuation of that music of that time?
P: Why does it need to have a continuation? It can maybe evolve in different things.
Take rap for example. I am not a rap fan but if you see the lyrics and the way of life, I consider this closer to the style and way of life of the rebetiko. It is more political and social.
V: So, guys finally does what we do, have some characteristics of Rebetiko? In terms of root breaking and creating a wider freedom in music?
P: You are not Rebetes. There are no drugs, heavy drinking, living in the night among social outcasts as they define them today, parallel and outside of the system.
I: I don’t believe that we could have rebetiko music written today. The society is different.
P: There is no connection with Rebetiko in terms of the social aspect of it. To explain this to someone who has does not know Rebetiko you need the lyrics, the stories. In this way there is a barrier with the language. They will come to understand and appreciate the rhythm and the melody. But they will not get the full picture. It would be a more international version of it. The image and the story is absolutely needed.
I: There is the other side as well. Musically speaking in the 20s you are in a place that you have instruments like santur, oud, violin, all the instruments and suddenly you create a new instrument!
Deriving from saz, tambura and other more eastern instruments you make instrument fretted, like a mandolin, the Bouzouki. But you do not use it like a mandolin. It is like having a guitar and suddenly you put it in electricity with distortion. You must discover play rock. Same when you invent bouzouki you have to do something different. You play melodies that are not for violin or clarinet. So, we got rebetiko. It was not based on guitar or bass. It was based on bouzouki. It derived from our traditional songs, from the songs that came from Izmir and minor Asia. The rhythms and the scales that they used. But played in a different instrument. First in Istanbul and Izmir where the cultures were all together and then in Thessaloniki, Volos and Piraeus. People who fled from turkey and came to Greece. Some of them where even educated musicians, leading choirs, orchestras and musical groups. They came to Greece and were poor among poverty. It is there that they find Bouzouki, an instrument with eastern feeling and sound but fretted and able to behave in a western way. Simply like this, they started to create a new kind of music that would mix the two worlds.
V: So to make the connection, what is the role and the character of Bouzouki in ´Home´ project?
I: Bouzouki is the instrument that will play and highlight a melody. Now in this project the melodic lines could be played by any melodic instrument.
V: In our case we did not chose to have the melodies from another instrument alone.
I: Look. Rebetiko is a music that came to exist because there was the Bouzouki. Say that Bouzouki was never invented. If you would have a guitar for example, we would have the style of Katsaros.
It would be more western, more European. We would have maybe other tunings. We would have another type of music. Maybe the scales and the rhythms would pass in the exact same way, but the sound and the feeling would not be the same. So, what bouzouki brings to Rebetiko is the melodic lines but more importantly the colour and the sound. The colour and the sound was depicting the atmosphere of the era. They were playing rebetiko even with an oud and a violin. What we mean with rebetiko is simply two people sitting inside a tavern, a café, in the 30´s and just played their music. Now the character of it as we know it was due to the Bouzouki. The sound and the feeling of Bouzouki. It would not be the same with a mandolin.
V: When there is bouzouki in what we do, when we mix Greek urban folk and Caribbean and south American rhythmic cultures how do you see your role there.
I: First of all, it is not Rebetiko. You just use the melodic line of this music, the scales and the lyrics.
I would not call it Rebetiko. Maybe in 2060 for someone who has not been exposed to this music previously, our recording can be identified as Rebetiko. For me still it will not be. I would not wish this to happen. But this is of minor importance. Labels are only for the people who make them.
V: Leaving the social aspect of Rebetiko aside for 5 minutes, I feel that when you play Bouzouki and Chrysa is singing on this project you keep and present a piece of Eastern Mediterranean and Greek urban folk and you combine it with a rhythmical tradition of Brazil, Cuba, Aruba and so on. What do you feel that your role is. To adjust your playing to the rhythm? To keep your line and music as it is and the rhythm has to adjust to your playing? How can these two musical traditions coexist?
I: You must try everything. You must be open for this marriage. Bottom line it has nothing to do with the instruments and the traditions. It has to do with the players. If you bring an Indian table player with a blues guitarist, he will play other things and they will create other things. They do not need to have any cultural connection between them. The bottom line is that they have to coexist and to be descent human beings. They can play and they will have fun.
V: So it is based on Ilias that plays bouzouki, Christopher that plays the drums, Joao that plays the vibes and so on.
I: It is only up to the people! Only up to the people. We are all ambassadors of our culture. On the other hand, it does not mean that if you go on stage with an a******e, all the Greeks or Brazilians are like him! The ideal would be to only play with nice people. As for the traditions I see no reason that they could not coexist. Different people have been coexisting normally for ages! Why couldn’t it be the same with music? We only need to find a common language between us. That’s all.
V: Do you ever feel that we over twist something? Have you ever felt that it is too much?
I: Yes. But not immediately. You have to first expose the music. The musician cannot be the only judge of the result. It is only then that you can realise what goes and what doesn’t. In the example of Prousa, I find our take of the song this overcrowded, overplayed. It is a matter of personal aesthetics though. Even if you do not keep it you have to experiment with it. As I ask the drummer to play his tradition in 9/8 I need to be open for the other way around. It is not a matter of how I would like to play one song or the other. If the arranger brings you an idea you must be open. You will play it enough times to understand what fits and what does not.
V: I feel that some things work, and others don’t. What about you?
I: Isn’t it always like this? Could it be always ok and right? That’s not normal. It is one thing!
After every gig everyone from the audience must remember something from the concert and cry.
V: Why does he or she need to cry?
I: From the joy that they were there and listened. This one moment. Music has to move you inside.
We are not passive receivers as an audience. We need this connection with the music and the musicians.
V: So in this way we go back to the social character of music. Why do I choose to listen to your music.
I: You know what? Remember Rebetinkatu in Tenho. Our last song was not practiced, not played as well as we could, it had one chord and one melody. People did cry. All of us. 50-70 people we became one. Do you know what is a musician? His is an ´ηθοποιός´ (….). As the actor remembers the lines, we happen to remember the melodies the rhythms and the harmonies. If the musician is not an ithopios, he is an interpreter. We must produce ethos. You must be concentrated in what you do.
I see nowadays, many musicians check their telephones on stage, two are playing and two are chatting. This is not the way t go. People did not come to see you for that. I understand that there are cases that people get tired overtime. But it cannot be a constant.
V: Was it like this at the era of Rebetiko? Did musicians produce ethos?
I&P: No. It started as a need to express what you had in your soul. It was not from the beginning inclusive. But it very soon became.
V: with our music we are not rediscovering the moon. People have rearranged a lot this music in different ways. Do you feel that we do something special here? Or is it another day at work?
I: Every day is special. As long as I can express myself through the music, produce something, meet people. Yesterday we got a passer-by to listen to our gig just because he saw the advertisement. This is a win. It makes it worth it. A person that would never get to know you got to know you!
you took this person out of his schedule!
For me it about feeling good with what you do. I have my ritual before every rehearsal.
I ´ll have my shower, I will put my perfume, I choose my nice clothes, I eat light, I go ready!
You have to make it count.
V: tell me about samba!
(Story of ilias)
I: I really like it. Wherever I play I am on. I enjoy the twist. It builds some special feeling this constant kicking.
V: What about the fact that in Hasapiko you intonate the 1 and in Samba you intonate the 2? Does it kick you? Does it bother you?
I: How is that my fault? (we both laughed hysterically)
It does not bother me at all. It is fresh. In Zeibekikos and the odd meters is different. I need to concentrate to have the 1. They have changed a lot and I need help to get in one. They it goes to rails! For me it is amazing that you studies people always start the songs counting 4. You have to learn how to count at least to 9 to start these songs, 7-8-9… (laughs come again)
V: Is it of your interest to play on Tumba or Samba or any other rhythmical tradition?
I: Yes, but I am more interested to play with the people that play these rhythms. But if in don’t understand I cannot digest. It is a matter of harmony and coexisting with people and traditions.
I will accept one last question (third time laughing hard)
V: One last. What do you want to get out of this project.
I: Me? Nothing. I will try to play what the maestro tells me. Simple as that. At the same time, I try to contribute with my character, with my way of playing. Every time that I go back home from the rehearsals, I feel excited. I am happy that I play these songs. Not only it does not bother me that we twist them, but it pleases me in a way. It is the fact that I played music with you guys!
V: Thank you for your time Liako.
I: What do we cook? (final laughs)