With a rich musical past, Thessaloniki is Greece’s cultural capital. Not only will you find a wealth of traditional music, but also a thirst for new sounds. James Williams reports.
It is 1am and inside the dark, smoky club the party is just getting started. Waitresses throw petals across the tables, and a man, with a glass of wine in one hand and a cigarette in the other, smiles and listens to the sultry, dark-haired singer. Suddenly, the music stops, and the flower girls step back. Up on the small stage the six-piece band, struggling for space, gets ready for the next song. All eyes are on a large, pony-tailed bouzouki lute player, poised to begin.
The tune is a massive hit, one that everybody knows, but no one at the Vendetta club sings along. It is Paint it Black by The Rolling Stones – yet this bootleg version is more haunting than the original. We are listening to Christos Mitrentzis, a renowned rebetiko player and champion of the ‘Greek urban blues’.
Rebetiko forms the backdrop to the colourful past of Thessaloniki – Greece’s second largest city and capital of its northern prefecture of Macedonia. Originally the music of the underclass, rebetiko flourished in the tekedes – Turkish-style hash dens – when two million ethnic Greeks returned to their homeland in the early 1920s, escaping the bloodshed of the Greco-Turkish War in Asia Minor. Arriving in Athens and Thessaloniki, the refugees lived a life of poverty and despair, something that was reflected in the lyrics and style of their songs.
The influence of those early years lives on. Alex Kapranos of Franz Ferdinand, James Sclavunos of the Bad Seeds, and Dick Dale, the father of surf guitar (think Pulp Fiction), are just some of those who have been inspired by the raw energy and expression of recordings from this time.
I ask Mitrentzis what this music means to the musicians living here today. ‘The original music stopped evolving in the 1950s, as conditions of poverty changed. But there is still a strong connection with modern artists,’ he says. ‘You can hear rebetiko in rock, and many people have remixed it and been influenced by it.’
We head to one of the local nightclubs. Music is part of the social fabric in Thessaloniki, and people come to the Vardia club every weekend to listen to local singers performing classic Greek songs. Inside the packed club is the tiny dressing room – with a bouzouki, some hand-written sheet music and a packet of cigarettes on the table. They belong to Sofia, a 19-year-old singer and musicology student. ‘I love performing here,’ she says. ‘There is a lot of music in Thessaloniki, and I listen to all types, but I especially love to sing songs that have a lot of meaning, and I like to compose, too.’ I ask about her favourite artists and she reels off a list of names so fast I can hardly catch them.
As well as a thriving traditional scene, the city has a thirst for the new. This is Greece’s cultural heartland, and is fast becoming a place for people to innovate away from the spotlight of Athens. A growing number of musicians and artists are coming to live here – and not just for the cheaper rent. Last year, Thessaloniki’s first contemporary art biennale was held, and each autumn Dimitria, a three-month festival of music, theatre and dance, draws thousands. There is also an annual international film festival that has attracted the likes of Francis Ford Coppola and Catherine Deneuve.
Later on, we take a stroll down Nikis Avenue, where every bar and club on the 1km stretch of seafront is filled with students and young people – sofas clutter the pavement and waiters carrying trays of cocktails criss-cross the pedestrians who throng the drag. Thessaloniki likes to party too.
A couple of streets up, forgettable downtown apartment blocks fade into the background as we pass stylish shop windows, a couple of fabulous Byzantine monuments and preserved Ottoman-era architecture. Inside the Modiano, the old market, workers have packed up and bustling restaurants are full of diners enjoying colourful plates of Thessaloniki’s famous Anatolian cuisine.
Inside another club, Kafotheio Elliniko, where we go to meet local musician Giannis Mitsis, we fight our way through the fog – the Greeks have an almost unrivalled passion for smoking. ‘This is a great place to live,
because it is a small city and there are so many
musicians here,’ says Mitsis. ‘It’s easy to meet
people and exchange ideas.’ He tells me that,
because of its position as a port and a crossroads
of different nations, Thessaloniki has always
been able to accommodate different music and
cultures – from Balkan and Oriental to rebétiko
and dance music.
Viewed from elsewhere in Europe, dance
music has been something of a niche market
in Greece, but small groups – such as
the NON Collective – hope to change all
that. ‘We set up our own festival, Reworks, three
years ago to show people something
more creative, through film, music
and installations,’ says Andreas, aka
DJ And.id, who I meet the next day
in Isalos bar on Aristotelous Square. ‘At first it wasn’t easy. But now we
are part of Dimitria, and have help
with sponsors from the municipality,
who saw how popular this event
was. They saw us and said this is
the future.’
And there are many new bands
on the horizon, too. Local band Your
Hand in Mine uses a Wurlitzer
piano, accordion, ukulele, mandolin,
glockenspiel to name but a few,and all performed by George and Manos, who I
discover are a pair of slightly cheeky 24-year-olds
with a passion for the unusual. Like the original
rebetes, many of their instruments are homemade,
such as their ‘half an electric fan in the back of a
guitar’. But their experimental mix of folk and
electronic works – they recently composed a
film soundtrack and are about to release a
debut album.
‘We grew up listening to music like rebetiko,
but are not doing anything consciously.
Our music isn’t rock, it’s more Mediterranean
than European – and closer to Greek culture
in a good way,’ says Manos. ‘We don’t want
our music listened to by people with their
car windows down,’ adds George, jokingly.
His words ring true: many young people here
say the commercial landscape is awash with
vapid pop songs that offer none of the depth
and emotion for which Greek music
is so famous.
Later, as I tuck into a lunch of
grilled meat served up without plates
at the Modiano, Serif, a Turkish man
with a small but noisy band, serenades
the diners. It is not exactly a place for
quiet reflection – but it is somewhere
a unique bunch of creative people
come together. Here in Thessaloniki,
there is a feeling of being on the cusp
of something special. And whatever
the future holds, like the lovable rabble
of musicians across from me, it is
sure to be as exciting and intoxicating
as the city itself.
Where to stay
Holiday Inn
Thessaloniki
8, Monastiriou
Thessaloniki
Tel: (+30) 231 056 3100
www.ichotelsgroup.com
Hyatt Regency
Thessaloniki
13 kilometres
Thessaloniki-Perea
Thessaloniki
Tel: (+30) 31 040 1234
www.hyatt.com
HOW TO GET THERE
Olympic Airlines and British Airways fly direct
from London Gatwick to
Thessaloniki Macedonia
international airport.
The Hellenic Railways
Organisation (OSE) has
a high-speed train from
Athens, which takes about
six hours.
www.olympicairlines.com
www.britishairways.com
www.ose.gr
WHERE TO STAY
Electra Palace Hotel
9 Aristotelous Square
Tel: (+30) 231 029 4011
www.electrahotels.gr
Nepheli Hotel
1 Komninon
Tel: (+30) 231 034 2002
www.nepheli.gr
WHERE TO EAT
Dore Zythos
Zythos offers superb Greek
and Mediterranean dishes,
along with fantastic wines.
Its trademark is the expert
use of seasonal produce.
7 Tsirogianni
Tel: (+30) 231 027 9010
www.zithos.gr
