(extract)
This time round, the event dedicated to folk music which will take place for the fourth year running at the Herodio on Wednesday 3rd June, will be special. And how could it not be, since it will be honoured by a great person, the great lady of our traditional singing, Domna Samiou. As host of the evening, she will guide us through the musical treasures of our land and simultaneously she will be welcoming the leading Greek virtuosos and two of the most important brass bands from Macedonia.
The program which Domna Samiou has prepared for the evening is exceptional, in that it will present certain highly decorated slow tunes from the Aegean and Asia Minor for the first time. Next will come the ouds, the lute and the tambouras. The leading virtuoso of the oud Nikos Saragoudas will meet the younger players Christos Tsiamoulis, Kyriakos Kalaintzidis, Socrates Sinopoulos and Perikles Papapetropoulos in an enchanting interplay along the paths of the traditional makams of the Orient. Greek sounds will dominate next, with davuls, tambourines, zil bells and spoons played by four of the leading instrumentalists, Yiorgos Gevgelis, Vangelis Karipis, Petros Kourtis and Andreas Pappas. The climax of the evening come with the composite Macedonian dances, and the rhythms of Thrace and Pontos, with yet another meeting of two top instrumentalists, Yiorgos Kotsinis on the clarinet and Michalis Kaliontzidis on the Pontic lyre. The concert will close with two famous brass bands, that of Dimitris Kotsikas from Kozani and that of Yannis Zlatanis from Edessa.
The event is being supported by the Museum of Traditional Greek Musical Instruments 'Phoebos Anogianakis'. The research and supervision is being conducted by the ethnomusicologist Lambros Liavas.
Translated by Alexander Seferiades
