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MUSIC SCHOOL OF AGRINIO-GREECE

Comenius Project

Of Folk Music and Men

GREEK FOLK DANCES Greek traditional music has deep roots in the music system of Ancient Greece and a direct relation with the Byzantine Ecclesiastical Music and the folk music of neighbouring nations in the East.

During ancient times, the space where the Ancient Greeks used to dance and sing was called chorus.Today chorus is the sum of movements and twitchings of the

body, what in Ancient times was called orchesis or chorea. Chorus is one of the

most ancient expressive means and chronologically predates or comes after the song. The roots of chorus in Greece can be found approximately in 1000 B.C.

The Greek chorus, as a form of a folk creation, which is directly connnected with the music and the song, is a result of the diversity of the life of the Greek people, which varies from place to place, and is considered to be the

creation of a people with a longlife cultural tradition. Greece, a crossroads of cultures, has synthesised every one of its influences creatively. The improvised concepts, its classical roots and ancestry, and its historical

course have created the basis for this highly aesthetic artistic result, which shows the artistic abilities of the Greek people and has marked its dancing identity.

DANCES

Syrtos of Asia Minor

Aptalikos Mesotopou Politikos Hasapikos Tataulianos

Tsamikos

Zonaradikos

Ballos-Pentozalli Sirtaki Zorbas Zeibekiko

KAMILIERIKOS

Kamilierikos is a kind of Greek traditional dance, similar to the fast zeibekiko and antikristos. The Kamilierikos was danced by imprisoned rebetes. Riders of the camels (kamilierides) used to dance it as well. Today,

kamilierikos is very widespread in the rebetiko and the laiko music traditions. HASAPOSERVIKO

The Hasapiko is a Greek folk dance from Constantinople. The dance originated in the Middle Ages as a battle mime with swords performed by the Greek butchers guild, which adopted it from the military of the Byzantine era. In

Constantinople, during the Byzantine times, it was called in Greek Mακελλάρικος Xορός (Makellarikos Horos). Some Greeks however, reserve the latter term only for the fast version of the dance.

The slow version of the dance is called hasapiko vary or hasapikos varys, from the Greek word vary meaning "heavy," and generally employs a 4/4 meter. The

fast version of the dance uses a 2/4 meter. It is also called Hasaposerviko, a reference to Serbian and other Balkan influences on this version of the dance. Hasapiko served as one of the bases for the Sirtaki.

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HASAPIKOS POLITIKOS

Hasapikos evolved into the Byzantine dance of makellaridon which was performed in neighbourhoods of Constantinople. It's not a coincidence that there is a sifneikos hasapikos and this is probably so because a lot of people immigrated

from Constantinople to Sifnos. It was danced by butchers in celebrations of their neighbours (esnaf). Most of the Arvanites who were wandering showed their guns so that the Genitsaroi were afraid of them. During the Turkish Occupation,

hasapiko was danced by Arnaoutides that's why hasapiko was called Arnaoutiko. The hasapiko was danced by having their arms on the shoulder of the other dancer and their legs making 4 steps on the floor and the fifth in the air.

TSAMIKOS The Tsamiko is a popular traditional folk dance of Greece, done to music of 3/4

meter. The name literally means dance of the Chams. It is also known as Kleftikos, literally meaning dance of the Klephts.

ZONARADIKO Zonaradiko is a traditional Greek folk dance from Thrace (Greece) that is named after the dance's handhold. Dancers hold the adjacent dancer's zonaria (belt)

during the dance. Zonaradiko is a line dance performed in one form or another in villages all over Greece. In each village the dance will look somewhat different, but the basic structure is essentially the same. The same dance is

done in Bulgaria under the name Pravo. The variations below are a collection of steps commonly done by folk dancers throughout the US and as seen done by various groups in Greece.

Many variations of the dance exist. In northern Thrace, zonaradikos turns into a fast tsestos dance. In western Thrace, the dance is led by the males, and the

females follow towards the end of the line. As the dance nears the end, the first dancer moves to the centre and the others twist around him, then they "untwist" and go back to their normal positions. The entire dance is done with

the knees bent. This position is especially evident in the Tsestos. BALLOS

The Ballos Sirtos (from the Italian ballo via Latin "ballo" which is derived from the Greek verb "βαλλίζω" ballizo, "to dance, to jump"), is one of the best known Greek folk island dances in Greece. There are also different versions in

other Balkan countries. The Ballos is of Greek origin, with ancient Greek elements.

The melody of a ballos is generally joyous and lyrical which is typical of the music of the Aegean Islands. This couples' dance incorporates all the elements of courtship: attraction, flirtation, display of masculine prowess and feminine

virtue, pursuit, and rejection followed by eventual capture and surrender. Its origin is in the island culture of Greece. Men could not approach women easily, so they created this dance in order to "flirt" with them. There are

various forms of the ballos around the islands. The simplest is one in which a single couple goes through a series of spontaneous figures. In another version many couples dance simultaneously as if alone on the dance floor. And finally,

in the most complicated form, a number of couples go through various figures, somewhat reminiscent of the European minuet. Ballos songs are popular and there are many of them.

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PENTOZALI

The Pentozali or Pentozalis is the trademark folk dance of the island of Crete. It takes its name from its five ("pente") basic steps and its sprightly and ultimately very fast pace ("zalos" being a rare Greek word for "jump"). The

name can thus be translated as "five-jumps", it’s typically Greek wordplay implying that dancing can make one jump five times over. Also in the spirit of wordplay, "zali" means dizziness, and the name of the dance can also be

understood ("five-dizzy") as one that can make the dancers dizzy five times over.

The Pentozali is a war dance, vigorous, with high jumping movements and allows for much improvisation. It starts at a moderate pace and accelerates progressively. The dancers hold each other by the shoulders and form an

incomplete circle, which rotates counterclockwise very slowly, or sometimes not at all, because most of the lively steps are semistationary. The first dancer is expected to improvise engaging in acrobatics; in this case he and the second

dancer hold hands, rather than shoulders, and the second dancer stands still and rigid, so that the first dancer has a stable base on which to perform. Once the first dancer has finished his part, he is expected to break ranks and

slowly dance his way to the back of the line, yielding his place to the second, and so on. Women also perform the dance, but their steps are more restrained because their dress does not allow for high jumps. Traditional Cretan menswear,

on the other hand, facilitates acrobatic dancing as it includes the black vraka, a variant of breeches that are worn tight around the waist and thighs and extremely baggy and loose around the hips.

Pentozali music is instrumental: the main tune is played by the pear-shaped, bowed Cretan lyre, to the accompaniment of a lute, played not in a melodic but

in a percussive-like fashion. It is the lyre player who usually directs the flow of the dance: he improvises to signal the first dancer to improvise too, and resumes the main tune when it is time for the first dancer to yield his

place to another. It has often been suggested that this may be the descendant of a Minoan dance,

perhaps that of the Kouretes, a mythical troupe of ancient warriors. There is a forgotten dance of the area of the Psiloritis Mountains where the Kouretes lived, called Empyrrikios (from the ancient dance Pyrrichios), whose steps are

very similar to Pentozali. SIRTAKI

Sirtaki or syrtaki is a popular dance of Greek origin, choreographed by Giorgos Provias for the 1964 film Zorba the Greek It is not a traditional Greek folk dance, but a mixture of the slow and fast versions of the hasapiko dance. The

dance, and the accompanying music by Mikis Theodorakis are also called Zorba's dance, Zorbas, or "the dance of Zorba".

The name Sirtáki comes from the Greek word: syrtos (from “syro to choro” which means "drag or lead the dance), a common name for a group of traditional Cretan dances of so-called "dragging" style, as opposed to pidiktos (πηδηχτός), a

hopping or leaping style. Despite that, Sirtaki incorporates both syrtos (in its slower part) and pidikhtós (in its faster part) elements.

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ZEIBEKIKO

Zeibekiko is a Greek folk dance with a rhythmic pattern of 9/4 or else 9/8 (broken down as 1/8 + 1/16 + 1/16 + 1/8 + 1/8 + 1/8 + 1/16 + 1/16 + 1/8 + 1/8 + 1/8).

The name is derived from Zeibek warriors of Anatolia, but old folklore said that the name of the dance comes from the words Zei, as a derivative of Greek

God Zeus, and the phrygian word bekos, which means bread according to Herodotus.According to this folk etymology, it symbolizes the union of the spirit with the body and it is believed that it was danced in honor of Greek

gods.

It is danced by one person only and is of free choreographic structure. In

older times the dance was strictly solo and it was considered offensive for a second dancer to enter the dance, which would result in conflict and possible violence. A certain dance etiquette requires others to wait until the present

dancer stops. Traditionally, applause was not sought nor commonly given, out of respect. This did not, however, lessen creativity, with dancers performing feats such as standing on a glass of wine or a chair or fireplace, or picking

up a table, adding a sense of a little braggadocio and humor.

AGRINIO, April 2013

Prepared by Spyridoula Yiannakou (P.E. Teacher)

& Christina Papadimitriou (Greek Language Teacher)