Music of Epirus (Greece)

Music of Greece
General topics
Ancient • Byzantine • Néo kýma • Polyphonic song
Genres
Entehno • Dimotika • Hip hop • Laïko • Punk • Rock
Specific forms
Classical • Nisiotika • Rebetiko • Skiladiko
Media and performance
Music awards	Arion Awards • MAD Video Music Awards • Pop Corn Music Awards
Music charts	Greek Albums Chart • Foreign Albums Chart • Singles Chart
Music festivals	Thessaloniki Song Festival
Music media	Difono • MAD TV (MAD World, Blue) • MTV Greece
National anthem	"Hymn to Liberty"
Regional music
Related areas	Cyprus
Regional styles	Aegean Islands • Arcadia • Argos • Crete • Cyclades • Dodecanese Islands • Epirus • Ionian Islands • Lesbos • Macedonia • Peloponnese • Thessaly • Thrace

The music of Epirus in the northwest of Greece (present to varying degree in the rest of Greece and the islands^[1] ) contains folk songs that are mostly pentatonic and polyphonic, sung by both male and female singers. Distinctive songs^[2] include lament songs (mirolóyia), shepherd's songs (skáros) and drinking songs (tis távlas). The clarinet is the most prominent folk instrument in Epirus, used to accompany dances, mostly slow and heavy, like the menousis, fisouni, podhia, sta dio, sta tria, zagorisios, kentimeni, koftos, yiatros and tsamikos. The polyphonic song of Epirus constitutes one of the most interesting musical forms, not only for the east Mediterranean and the Balkans ^[3], but also for the worldwide repertoire of the folk polyphony like the yodeling ^[4] of Switzerland. Except from its scale, what pleads for the very old origin of the kind is its vocal, collective, rhetorical and modal character.

References

1. ^ World Music: The Rough Guide by Simon Broughton, Mark Ellingham - 1999 - ISBN 1858286352,page 127,"The repertoire tends to fall into three categories which are also found further south mirologya or laments (the instrumental counterpart is called skaros); drinking songs or tis tavlas ;and various dancable melodies as noted above common to the entire mainland and the islands also"
2. ^ World Music: The Rough Guide by Simon Broughton, Mark Ellingham - 1999 - ISBN 1858286352,page 127,"The repertoire tends to fall into three categories which are also found further south mirologya or laments (the instrumental counterpart is called skaros); drinking songs or tis tavlas ;and various dancable melodies as noted above common to the entire mainland and the islands also"
3. ^ Engendering Song: Singing and Subjectivity at Prespa by Jane C. Sugarman,1997,ISBN 0226779726,page 356,"Neither of the polyphonic textures characteristic of south Albanian singing is unique to Albanians.The style is shared with Greeks in the Northwestern district of Epirus (see Fakiou and Romanos 1984) while the Tosk style is common among Aromanian communities from the Kolonje region of Albania the so called Faserotii (see Lortat-Jacob and Bouet 1983) and among Slavs of the Kastoria region of Northern Greece (see N.Kaufamann 1959 ).Macedonians in the lower villages of the Prespa district also formerly sang this style "
4. ^ Engendering Song: Singing and Subjectivity at Prespa by Jane C. Sugarman,1997,ISBN 0226779726,page 356,A striking counterpart from outside the Balkans is the polyphonic Yodeling of juuzli from the Muotatal region of Switzerland

Further reading

• World Music: The Rough Guide by Simon Broughton, Mark Ellingham - 1999 - ISBN 1858286352
• Greek Folk Dances by Rickey Holden, Mary Vouras – 1965
• Engendering Song: Singing and Subjectivity at Prespa by Jane C. Sugarman,1997,ISBN 0226779726

External links

• Greek traditional music from Epirus
• Songs from Politsani
• Epirus Music
• "Deropolitissa", Greek traditional song from Epirus
• Skaros, Greek traditional shepherd's song from Epirus
• Moiroloi, Greek traditional lament song from Epirus