Όπλες,

κούκλες, 

πανούκλες...

όπλα - ες (συνων. όπα), αναφώνηση, χαιρετισμός στη διάρκεια κεφάτης ατμόσφαιρας

πανούκλα - ες, μτφρ. 1. πολύ άσχημη γυναίκα/ 2. σκληρή γυναίκα, δύσκολη.

Οι τρεις λέξεις όπλες, κούκλες, πανούκλες ριμάρουν και χρησιμοποιήθηκαν σε μερικά μικρασιάτικα τραγούδια. Αμολιόταν σαν αστείο, σα χιουμοριστικό σχόλιο και διφορούμενος ύμνος στη γυναικεία ομορφιά. Ταυτόχρονα, η τρίτη λέξη πανούκλα, υπενθύμιζε τα προβλήματα που δημιουργούν στους άντρες.

"Σύμφωνα με τον Ησίοδο, οι αθάνατοι που ζούσαν στον Όλυμπο δημιούργησαν πρώτα το Χρυσό Γένος των ανθρώπων. Αυτοί οι άνθρωποι ζούσαν σα θεοί, χωρίς φροντίδες, βάσανα και λύπες. Είχαν μακριές ζωές και δε γερνούσαν ποτέ. Πέθαιναν σα να του έπαιρνε ο ύπνος..."

O Jean Pierre Vernant στο θέμα "Γυναικείες μορφές του Θανάτου στην Ελλάδα" γράφει, "εκείνο τον καιρό δεν υπήρχαν γυναίκες, πριν τη δημιουργία της Πανδώρας, ούτε και ο Θάνατος. Ο Θάνατος και η Γυναίκα παρουσιάστηκαν ταυτόχρονα..."

Αν φανταστούμε μιά συνηθισμένη κομπανία πεντέξη αρσενικών που παίζουν ρεμπέτικα, θα τολμούσα να βεβαιώσω πως δε τους λείπει καθόλου μιά γυναικεία παρουσία. Τα περνάν μιά χαρά αναμεταξύ τους, ανατγωνίζονται στους ψηλούς τόνους και κοιτάζονται με κατανόηση όταν τραγουδάν στίχους που μιλάν για τη προδοσία των γυναικών ή τα καμώματά τους. Μιά γυναικεία φωνή μπερδεύει τα πράγματα, ιδιαίτερα όταν υπάρχει ακροατήριο. Τα μάτια στρέφονται προς τα κείνη πράγμα που, με κάποιο τρόπο, είναι εκνευριστικό για τον παίκτη του μπουζουκιού που συνήθως αρέσκεται να παίζει το ρόλο του επίγειου θεού και να τον θαυμάζουν για το τρόπο που παίζει ενώ, κατά κανόνα, παίζει παρόμοια μ΄όλους τους άλλους...

Το Ρεμπέτικο ήταν και είναι ακόμα μιά ανδρική υπόθεση, ένας μαγικός ανδρικός οργασμός.

Αν κάποιος υποστηρίξει ότι οι γυναίκες του ρεμπέτικου ειδώθηκαν σα δευτερεύον εξάρτημα, σε κοιτάζουν παραξενεμένοι σα να είπες ότι το συνηθισμένο χρώμα των προβάτων είναι το φωσφορικό πορτοκαλί.

Οι ακόλουθοι στίχοι του Καλδάρα από το τραγούδι "Μες της χήρας την ταβέρνα" (1958), με τον Πρόδρομο Τσαουσάκη και το συνθέτη, σε στίχους Ευτυχίας Παπαγιαννοπούλου (...), "δεν αξίζει μιά γυναίκα όσο αξίζουν δυό παιδιά", όπου το ουσ. γυναίκα θεωρείται κάτι σαν αναγκαίο allien, απεικονίζει τη στερεότυπη αντίληψη στο ανδρικό συλλογικό υποσυνείδητο σ΄όλο το πλανήτη. Απλά, στην Ελλάδα είναι ιδιαίτερα έντονο.

Rebetes did not like money  - really?

Young people in Greece are still saying : "what's the meaning of money when you are broke?" Τhis abstract, in first sight, game wih words and meanings is usual in Greece. Think of it while you're reading this post...

"My name is Marianthaki and I never loved money... "
"I hate money..." (Markos)
"Money mean nothing to me when I look into your eyes..." (Chiotis)
Only three examples among many, expressing dislikness towards money in rebetiko.

Ιt is useful to have in mind that rebetiko verses are written up to 98% by young men and the content was directed to young people. During the years of youth the reaction against money and the necessary demands instead of earning them is very common. Love and enjoyment have a primary importance. There is no hurry because the young people consider themselves as immortals.

There are no people who dislike money. There are people who despise money but this is something else. It is not that they don't like the advantages one wins through money. They are against the methods of earning them, because money cost a lot. Money is a very expensive article...

Here is an example of a song which sends the same message but through a clearer and more convincing way. It is the song of P. Toundas "Τα λεφτά σου δεν τα θέλω" (Ι don't want your money" -1934 either with Roza Eskenazi or Rita Abadzi). Ιt is one of the simplest and nicest songs in rebetiko.


I don't want your money, stop loving me!
I've told you several times, you're a noble mangas...

I want to be with a fish sailer, sailing fishes in the market,
I want him to have a pair of scales and a teziaki*
When I love such a fine and brave guy
how can I refuse to be with him?

I don't want your houses, your wealth and all that.
You can't convince me with your tricks, you're a noble mangas

*τεζιάκι (teziaki) = a small closet with a drawer where they put in the small money.


As you can see, the young woman denies to get together with a rich mangas (possibly much older than her) and she prefers a young man BUT a fish-saler something meaning automatically, a good economy.


The method of picking upp songs whose content is suitable instead of setting up another theory is very usual but dangerous and dishonest. I'm giving here a different example which gives a picture of the relity we all know...


Marikaki (.......) Skarvelis, Rita Abadzi


Why do you mind, Marikaki, and you ask why I'm getting drunk
and you're complaining I'm not coming to meet you?

The reason is that I know you're having fun with a mangas in Halandri
and you want me only for using my money

You love that mangas who is a handsome dais*
and you like me 'cause I have money

That's enough, Marikaki, you're cheeting me in three years
you need to spend my money instead of saying you love me.
I don't want you anymore, Marikaki, stop asking about me.

Yoy cruel, Marikaki, you got all I had, you bitsh!


*dais = bully(wrong word to explain the very interesting and deep meaning of the word dais. In a coming post I will give a wide explanation of this missunderstood word)


I would like to remind that, up to 1940, there are just a few songs naming workers (εργάτες). Τhe usual allibi that rebetes of the first period had no contacts with the limited working class is not enough, according my to my opinion. I can remind the songs "Εργάτης τιμημένος" (The hοnoured worker" - 1931, Panos Toundas, K. Dousas) and "Φτώχεια μαζί με την τιμή" (Poverty together with honour" 1934 - Panos Toundas, Rita Abadzi). In both cases the workers appear to be proud and honoured. In the song "Είμαι τεχνίτης ξακουστός" (I'm a serious craftsman/workman") - 1940, Κ. Skarvelis, G. Κavouras, we probably have the first sign of a man who tries to convince a woman to be with him though he is a worker...

Perhaps you feel it's boring to focuse on such details. I could understand that. I'm just trying to draw the curtains and show what is hiding behind...


Concerning the latter Tsitsanis song "Οι φάμπρικες" (The fabrics) - 1950, with Marika Ninou and Prodromos Tsaousakis, I've always been reserved towards the big composer's intelligent manoeuvres. The main verse is "Γειά σου, περήφανη κι αθάνατη εργατιά" (Cheers to the proud and immortal working class). The song is very famous and well-known. My personal problem is that I don't believe that workers were proud of what they were. In certain countries and during certain revolutionary periods, yes. Not in Greece, anyway...

If you disagree concerning Tsitsanis song, think of G. Mitsakis "Τα τρία αδέλφια" (Τhe three brothers) - 1950*, Marika Ninou, Tatasopoulos, Mitsakis) and think, why so much noise about Tsitsanis song and no comments about Mitsakis? The two songs have similar ncontent but what coused a contempt against Mitsakis song was his last verses "when we finish the jobb we go all three to drink. We don't give a dumn even if the whole world would be burned, one of plays the baglama, the second plays the bouzouki, the third the guitar and, let the poverty not harm us, just cheer up". Poor Mitsakis, he just used and old expression of joy in the wrong moment when all Greece was burning itself in a Civil War. But this expression is only an effort to avoid despair. If we did not have similar atittudes in Greece, we would not have existed as a nation, or we would exist as a nation full of lunatics and we are, in some way...


Consequently, I insist that it is an idealised myth to believe that rebetes did not like money. They proclaimed it because the chanses to have money were limited and because they were young so that they had the "luxury" to joke and being indifferent.




*Tsitsanis and Mitsakis were influenced by each others ideas about new songs and there is a lot of examples where they recorded songs with similar content, during the same year.

Listen 

http://soundcloud.com/worldlittoday/rebetiko-psalm

"The ghost in the machine"

My dead Mikrasiatis father used to take a lot of nerve pills. Ignorant of even the simplest parts of his inner universe, he used to tell me, "something strange is hapenning to me. I feel as if I had a machine in my mind, playing music all the time. Do you think it´s connected to my pills?"


I´ve always had a ghost of a music machine in my mind, though I´ve never taken nerve pills...
This machine is playing, almost continuously, all kinds of music from Bach to Stockhausen, from ethnic to jazz, but mostly rebetiko songs. The other days I wrote down the following: "I´m walking in a wide street of the north hemisphere, having my forehead turned towards the sky, while I hear in my mind the clapping of Rita Abadzis´s wooden spoons she played in the song of Kostas Skarvelis, "Widow, you set fire in my heart"... ("Χήρα, μ΄έκαψες")...

http://www.fileden.com/files/2008/6/6/1947074/XIRA%2C%20M%27%20EKAPSES%201933%20RITA.mp3

"who else has a tormented heart to be my comrade,
to walk together in waste lands and not seeing people..."

Some words before I wellcome you...

from the left: G. Batis, S. Keromytis,

Stratos Payioutzis, Markos Vamvakaris

This blog follows a different path to approach the Greek "subculture" music called "rebetiko". This music is, in a way, equivalent to tango, fado, flamenco, blues. It is the most sincere music ever composed in Greece. It reached its culmination during the 30΄s and it has been faught in all ways from the "establishment".

"Rebetiko" is not only songs played by bouzouki, as most of the people believe. There is a big era, containing thousands of songs created by tremendously talented Greek composers and musicians who were forced to leave their life in Asia Minor and come to Greece as refugees, after a stupid war (1922) against Turkey. Their music is the backbone and the spinal cord of rebetiko but it was forbidden and struggled in 1937.



You, who need to see behind the tourist facade and look for the unexpected in a world tending to look the same all over, let me give you a red thread, as Ariadne did with Theseus when he got into the Labyrinth, and lead you to a fascinating and unknown world. 

Wellcome!

Rebetiko Co.

see http://www.facebook.com/home.php?sk=group_130565273677633&notif_t=group_activity

!!!

Hi,


The main part of my writings and music can be seen in 

elkibra-rebetiko.blogspot.com

but unfortunately in Greek. Try it and use the Translation Service

Dear friends,

This post is adressed to all of you who live in different countries and visit this blog. I think I am the only Greek who has started a blog in English for Rebetiko lovers. I mean a blog which tries to go deeper in this era and not only dowload songs or write once more Rebetiko's History. The problem is that I don't know how many of you are Greeks living abroad and how many do not speak Greek.

Please, be kind and comment my writings. You can thus help me to choose the right topics and you would also give me courage to go further..

It is quite difficult to express myself in proper English but I'm really interested to spread out information about this magic music.

Rebetiko has a wide and unknown era, much wider than what I can see being named here and there.

Help me to make our communication more profound. Will you? 

The words meraki and meraklis

You who listen to rebetiko you hear often the words "meraki" and "meraklis". They are two simple but at the same time two complicate and significant meanings.
Take for example the sentence:
he has a big meraki for rebetiko
ehei megalo meraki me to rebetiko
έχει μεγάλο μεράκι με το ρεμπέτικο

Α common explanation could be "he likes rebetiko very much" but it is superficial.
The word is Turkish so you can try http://seslisozluk.com/
Turkish-English lexicon. Write each one word and click on "ara" (search)


If you already did it perhaps you got into a panic as I did...

Now you get another example from my DICTIONARY OF REBETIKO which is going to be published in Greek, during the autumn 2008.

I' m sorry for a bad translation...


meraklis o, -ou, meraklidissa, subst.[+](turkish merakli= a human being who is after the knowledge, is attentive and has an alert state of mind.) 1. somebody who has roots in his tradition, is experienced and attentive and knows, both consciously and perceively the sensible balance among things, human beings and phenomena (ZAHOS) A kind of popular philosopher : "Το γιασεμί στην πόρτα σου, μερακλή (see entry) μου, ήρθα να στο κλαδέψω, σεβνταλή (see entry) μου""εγώ' μαι βρε μιά μερακλού και θέλω μάγκα γιαβουκλού"(see entry)"η μικρή μου γκομενίτσα(see entry), μερακλίδισσα η μουσίτσα(see entry), ήξερε ποιά είν' ωραία (see ωραία) και με ήθελε κουρέα"2. in connection to wishes and abilities. The one who is looking for qualities, even in lifes' simple pleasures, as in making cofee or preparing something which can give satisfaction(in connection to mood and erotic relations) good mood, love sorrow: "όποιος δεν είναι μερακλής να πάει να πεθάνει γιατί στον κόσμο όπου ζει, μόνο τον τόπο πιάνει"( = καταλαμβάνει)3. free use of the word, always in connection to the above named meanings: "και όταν μπαίνω στον τεκέ (see entry) βλέπω τρία μεράκια, τρεις κοπέλλες όμορφες να πίνουν τσιμπουκάκια (see entry)meraklidikos, i, o, adj.[+]: "μερακλίδικο παιδί""παπούτσια μερακλίδικα από τα παλιατζίδικα πήγαινε και κανόνιζε, δυό ζευγαράκια ψώνιζε"meraklono, meraklonomai v.[+]come into good mood, feel nostalgic: "όταν παίζω ταξιμάκι (see entry) μερακλώνω, την πατρίδα μου θυμάμαι κι όλο λειώνω""πάντοτε μερακλώνω γιά τα χειλάκια σου και τα ναζάκια (see entry) σου και τη ζωή μου δίνω""να μερακλωθεί κι ο Χάρος και ν' αρχίσει το χορό"meraklidika, adv.[+]


Less panic though the Greek examples from rebetiko verses?
The coming post "The meaning of consolation in rebetiko" is directly connected to the two words of this post and a deeper "diving" into the heart...

.

What women caused Markos Vamvakaris..

I´m publishing a list of troubles which Markos Vamvakaris got through in his adventures with women... All this is taken from his own song lyrics.

1. they cut him into pieces
2. they were spitfull
3. he spended in vain his youth for them
4. they made known what they did to him
5. they hurted him
6. they made him wonder like if he was crazy
7. they burned him deeply in his heart
8. they grew him weak and sicky
9. they runned away
10. they crashed him
11. they "poisoned" him with sorrows
12. they drove him mad
13. they opressed him
14. they smashed his body
15. they broke his heart
16. they tormented him

and much more...
Ask anybody the following question: "what is rebetiko´s atittude towards women?" I bet you get the following answer from anybody: "rebetiko praised women in hymns; rebetiko loved women excessively"...

Elias Petropoulos

http://www.guardian.co.uk/news/2003/nov/19/guardianobituaries

In order to get a clearer sight over the future

I climb on my ancestor's shoulders

The first step...

How should I begin?...
This blog aims to be different from any others which deal with the old Smyrna. The choosen photo gives a sign. It is an everyday life scene when nobody suspected what was going to happen...
I don´t know at this very moment which pat

First whispers...

This blog aims to be different from any of the others which deal with the old Smyrna.

Whispering softly...

http://www.fileden.com/files/2008/6/6/1947074/Smyrni%20me%20ta%20perihora%20%28Pandelidi%29%201930.mp3

http://youtu.be/huG8E3_pO-s

"Smyrna with your suburbs" (1930), S. Pandelidis, singer Georgia Mittaki

LET us go then, you and I,

When the evening is spread out against the sky

Like a patient etherised upon a table;

Let us go, through certain half-deserted streets,

The muttering retreats 

Of restless nights in one-night cheap hotels

And sawdust restaurants with oyster-shells:

Streets that follow like a tedious argument

Of insidious intent

To lead you to an overwhelming question …

Oh, do not ask, “What is it?”

Let us go and make our visit.

from "The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock "

T.S. Eliot (1888–1965). Prufrock and Other Observations. 1917.

About women (Oples, koukles, panoukles...)...

Opla -es (syn. opa) = exclamation

Koukla - es = doll - metaforically, babe, sweetheart

Panoukla -es = plaguee, pest - metaforically, 1.very ugly woman/2. hard, tough, awkaward, complicated

"Oples, koukles, panoukles", three rhyming words used as an exclamation in a couple of Mikrasiatiko songs. They were said as a joke, and for "praising a hymn" to womens beauty. At the same time the third word panoukla is reminding of the problems a woman causes to men.

According to Hesiod "The immortals who lived on Mount Olympus created first the golden race of mankind. Those people lived as gods, without care, pain and sorrows. They were long-lived and not getting old. They died like if they fell asleep..."

Jean Pierre Vernant in his "Feminine figures of Death in Greece" writes , "at that time there were not existing any women(before Pandoras creation) and not Death either. Living like gods together with gods, the men of the golden race were unchangeable during their life and they were covered by something similar to a sweet sleep, instead of death. Death and woman appeared simultaneously...

If we think of a usual company of 5-6 masculine people playing rebetiko songs, I can assure you that they are not missing at all a feminine presence. Τhey are enjoyning themselves, the are competing of reaching the highest tones, they look at each other with a mutual understanding when they sing verses having ambiguous meanings about women. A feminine voice splits up, especially when there is an audience because the eyes are turns to her and that irritates the bouzouki player who likes to play the role of the mortal god who is admired for the way he plays though he mostly do it in the same way with all others.

Rebetiko was and still is a masculine affair, a magic masculine orgasm...

If somebody claims that women were regarded as a secondary accessory they look surprised at you like if you had claimed that the sheap's usual colour is the phosphoric orange...

The following verses of Kaldaras song "A widow in the tavern" (1955 or 19579), "a woman has not the same value as two guys", where the noun woman is regarded a something alien compared tguys refers to an established attitude in the collective subconscious all over the earth. Especially in Greece is extremely emphasized.

Let us see a fragment from Markos Vamvakaris autobiography dictated for Angela Kail (Athens, 1973) : "...Moushoundis (i.e. police chief in Thessaloniki who liked rebetiko and its people) when he saw me said to the police who brought me there, "come here", he said, "did you ask him who he is? - Yes. Didn't you tell me to fetch here the human being (άνθρωπος) and the woman who was there? I fetched him. I don't remember what happenned with the woman...".

Ιn the original text we read the word άνθρωπος (= human being) which is a masculine in Greek as in, perhaps, in all languages, except Swedish where it is feminine(!). The word άνθρωπος is explained with the word man. It is obvious that we have a contradiction between άνθρωπος and woman. Woman is not an άνθρωπος... Α similar example is the contradiction (still existing in Greek) between the word φαντάρος ( = soldier) and άνθρωπος. Τhey are typical exaples of symbols carried in everyday language. We don't bother using them but they form an unconscious ideology.

(to be continued)

Do you know who Nouros is?

elkibra-Nouros.blogspot.com

AMALIA VAKA

This article is copied from http://maviboncuk.blogspot.com and written by David Soffa, Berkeley, 2002

Amalia Baka
Mavi Boncuk Amalia! Old Greek Songs in the New Land 1923-1950




Three days after her 15th birthday, traveling by herself on the The Kaiser Franz Josef I, Mazaltov (Mally) Matsa of Janina, Turkey, steamed toward the new land. Two weeks shy of a year later she married Jack Saretta, a fellow from her hometown, and set up housekeeping on Rivington Street in New York's Lower East Side, a short walk from the New York Janina Synagogue. She had work as a seamstress and he made silk flowers for lady's hats.

The Janina she left in 1912 was diverse, fractious, complicated, multinational and multicultural, in many ways similar to New York. Romaniote Jews had lived in Janina for about 1,800 years. Life for Mally had been strictly defined by that tradition. In the Romaniote community, girls were born to a servile position in a male-dominated world, their births not recorded, their early education limited to that which would best serve their future husbands, and their worth reckoned in the end by the number of male children they might bear. A Rornaniote girl was kept at home until her father chose a husband for her. When she married, she was sent to live in the home of her new husband.

Mally's marriage was certainly arranged before she left Janina. The home she made in the new land was intended to continue the old ways. The enumerator for the 1920 census found Mally and Jack with two daughters, Diamond and Esther Cleoniki, named after their grandmothers in the Romaniote tradition. The old ways had a good foothold on New York's Lower East Side, although for Mally the pressures and freedoms to be found on foreign shores had shaped changes even before she landed. She had traveled by herself on the Kaiser Franz Josef I, an immense modern ocean liner, only months from its own maiden voyage (actually the largest ship ever to fly the Austrian flag). At Ellis Island she was detained because she did not have the $50 in cash required of new immigrants; after a phone call she was sponsored by her Aunt Rachel. Life in New York demanded money, so Mally got a job sewing in a factory.

Circumstance had forced her to accept a level of responsibility and independence forbidden Romaniote girls in Janina, and with it came opportunities that were also customarily denied. In Janina, Mally lived within Jewish, Greek, and Turkish cultures, and threads of each are woven through her songs. About the only public or semi-public activity that Romaniote women could engage in was the keening of laments at the time of death. Romaniote religious ceremony is conducted in demotic, that is, everyday spoken Greek, instead of Hebrew, and Romaniote singing also borrowed traditional Greek melodies. The memory of these songs and laments was deeply instilled, and they would always be an important part of Mally's repertoire. Mally sang all her life.

Her talent for singing was "discovered" when she sang in the factory where she sewed, or when she sang while hanging up her laundry. Both stories are probably true. She sang in Greek and Turkish, and by the early 1920s had begun singing professionally as Amalia in Greek cafe-amans and Turkish clubs. Her first recordings were eight Turkish songs for the M. G. Parsekian Record Company, across the Hudson River in Hoboken, New Jersey; then in Chicago, she recorded six Greek and Turkish songs for the Greek Record Company of George Gretsis and Spiros Stamos. Amalia's independent spirit and emerging career caused trouble at home. In the old country, women who sang in clubs were considered prostitutes- fallen women at best.

Jack divorced her, and Cleoniki was sent to live in Greece ("kidnapped", Diamond says). In 1926 Mally converted to the Greek Othodox Church in order to marry Gus Bakas, and continued recording as Amalia Baka from 1927 to 1929. Gus worked in the restaurant business, and Amalia was herself involved in clubs and restaurants, both as owner and as headline entertainment. Live performances in Turkish clubs, cafe-amans and restaurants were the mainstay of Amalia's singing career. She was always working, according to her daughter, Diamond, who from the beginning was with her at recording sessions and on stage, playing doumbek, encouraging her with "Ya sou, Mitera! " ("your health, mother!") and sometimes singing duets with her. Cafe-amans were lively and numerous in Prohibition-era New York. Entertainment, atmosphere and booze were a magic combination, and dozens flourished around Eighth and Ninth Avenues at 33rd and 34th Streets, packed with people from all parts of the city. Amalia opened her own club, the Cafe-Aman Pavsilipon, with, as Diamond remembers, "- a few tables and a bottle of bootleg booze ... little by little they were coming in ... the priest came in, too."

Amalia did not record in the 1930s, but traveled quite a bit, often with singer George Katsaros, and sang at clubs, restaurants, and resorts in an informal circuit that included New York, the Catskills and Finger Lakes areas of New York, and cities with large Greek populations such as Detroit, Chicago, Gary (Indiana) and Philadelphia.

By 1940 Amalia and Diamond were living in Chicago, and Amalia was involved with a club/restaurant, the Pantheon, near Halsted Street in the heart of "the Delta," Chicago's old Greektown. Chicago Greek restaurants were also bars and nightclubs, social watering holes with live entertainment, cadres of regulars and many stories. Amalia was a spirited and memorable participant who helped lead the charge for about two decades and is still remembered with fondness and awe. "If she didn't like you, chairs would fly", recalled John Katsikas, a cymbalon and samtouri player who accompanied Amalia.

Her performance of "Bahaiotiko," a slow dirge, is remembered still, as is her prowess at poker and barbuti dice. To a patron who needed money to get married she gave a gold ring from her own finger, "and she would swear like a man". In the early 1940s Amalia was recording again, this time for Ajdin AsIlan's MeRe/ Balkan/ Gadinis/ Kalaphone/ Metropolitan family of labels in New York, in which she also had part ownership. Her recording sessions in New York were with luminaries such as clarinetists Gus Gadinis, John Pappas and John Dalas, kanounists Garbis Bakirgian and Theodore Kappas, and violinists Alexis Zervas and Nick Doneff.

During World War II Greek music in the United States saw a revival of songs and styles that had originated or were popular in the late 1910s and early 1920s, the time of the influx of ethnic Greek refugees from Turkey into Greece as part of the 1922 League of Nations relocations. Over a third of Amalia's recordings from this period were old songs from her own or from pioneer Greek vocalist Coula Antonopoulos's early recorded repertoire. Mostly laments or songs that expressed resilience in the face of troubles, they offered some solace to expatriates horrified at the fate of Greece and their families and friends there during World War II.

Amalia retired in the early 1960s. Chicago's redevelopment efforts had removed the heart of Greektown to make way for the University of Illinois Chicago campus, and Amalia's home and the restaurants and clubs she sang in were destroyed. Diamond had moved to Florida in 1960 and opened the New Hellas restaurant in Tarpon Springs, close to where the sponge boats docked. Amalia followed in 1974, moving to New Port Richie, just north of the docks. Amalia died in 1979. Her obituary did not mention that she was a singer, that one of the most fluid and evocative of Greek voices had been stilled.

Amalia lived and sang with great passion. Though her repertoire was very traditional she made her songs her own by comments and ad libs while singing, by changing words, and by using songs to show what was happening in her life. She wrote "Elenitsa Mou" when she was baptized, taking the baptismal name Eleni, and she wrote and sang "Diamontoula Mou" for her daughter Diamond. Unlike her contemporaries Marika Papagika and Coula Antonopoulos, she did not sing much of the world of hash, manges and rebetes- most of her recorded songs are about love. In her long experience singing for live audiences in the small clubs she developed a very personal and intimate style. She understood and exploited the subtleties of the electric microphone from its first years in the recording medium to bring a palpable closeness and immediacy to her recordings.

Remarkable within ordinary circumstances, her story is almost incredible when her own background is considered. Uprooted and cast to sea on a floating skyscraper to make her way in a boisterous and challenging world, she responded with an indomitable, creative and generous spirit that is still left in her songs.

David Soffa, Berkeley, 2002