Rembetika

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Rembetika (sometimes transliterated rebetika (Greek τα ρεμπέτικα) is a kind of popular urban Greek music.[1] The musicians were known as rembetes (Greek: ρεμπέτης).

The roots of rembetika

Rembetika has its roots in two musical traditions of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries: the music of the urban Greek social fringes, especially in the Piraeus (often compared to the blues sub-culture in the United States at about the same time), and the cafe aman (Smyrnaika, or Smyrneika) of the Asia Minor cities of Smyrna and Constantinople.

The music

The musicians and singers

Rembetika's influence

Notes

  1. Strictly speaking, rembetika are the individual musical works, rembetiko (Greek: ρεμπέτικο) being the genre, but the plural has come to be the standard form for both.

Reading

  • Gail Holst Road to Rembetika: Music of the Greek Sub-culture. Athens: Denise Harvey, 1975. ISBN 960-7120-07-8

External links