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Last night I visited Parakalamos, near the Greek-Albanian border, not far from Kalpaki in North West Greece. See map http://www.tageo.com/index-e-gr-v-17-d-m1215289.htm
I had made an appointment to conduct an interview with an outstanding Gypsy (Rom) clarinet (klarino) player called Yiannis Chaldoupis, with the help of his wife Nellie Chaldoupi. I had met them at a festival in Ano Pedina at the end of May, when Yiannis was playing with his dynamic group called Moukliomos, which means ‘freedom’ in the Romani language dialect he speaks (Romacilikanes), in addition to Greek.
See my blog posting http://corfublues.blogspot.gr/2012/05/moukliomos-gypsy-folk-rock-jazz-live-at.html.
For a scholarly study of the Gypsy musicians of Parakalamos, see this fascinating pdf file by Aspasia Theodosiou. (if no longer available online, see book by Aspasia Theodosiou:
Authenticity, Ambiguity, Location: Gypsy Musicians on the Greek-Albanian Border*)
Authenticity, Ambiguity, Location: Gypsy Musicians on the Greek-Albanian Border*)
A great evening. I learnt a lot. Thanks Yianni and Nellie!
*"The book addresses how tensions around the politics of othering and 'difference' unfold in a historically constructed ambiguous/marginal place and around people who figure ambiguously in the national imaginary. Drawing on her fieldwork among the Parakalamos Gypsy musicians on the Greek-Albanian border, the author explores how these are reformulated within the recent emphasis on multiculturalism and cultural heritage in Greece. A key concern is how place and its locatedness are implicated in processes of othering and are played out in music. It is argued that the ambiguities embedded in gypsy music playing resonate with the same ambiguities that permeate the construction of place and do not relate to a 'separate' gypsy 'culture' or identity. The book also explores the ways such marginality impinges on Gypsies' processes of identification and its implications on the way interethnic relations are experienced and practiced. Situated where performativity theory and phenomenology merge the analysis centres around the notion of location in-between, in order to capture the unstable, partial and situated character of the intersubjective relations between place, people and music".
See also, Bright Balkan Morning
*"The book addresses how tensions around the politics of othering and 'difference' unfold in a historically constructed ambiguous/marginal place and around people who figure ambiguously in the national imaginary. Drawing on her fieldwork among the Parakalamos Gypsy musicians on the Greek-Albanian border, the author explores how these are reformulated within the recent emphasis on multiculturalism and cultural heritage in Greece. A key concern is how place and its locatedness are implicated in processes of othering and are played out in music. It is argued that the ambiguities embedded in gypsy music playing resonate with the same ambiguities that permeate the construction of place and do not relate to a 'separate' gypsy 'culture' or identity. The book also explores the ways such marginality impinges on Gypsies' processes of identification and its implications on the way interethnic relations are experienced and practiced. Situated where performativity theory and phenomenology merge the analysis centres around the notion of location in-between, in order to capture the unstable, partial and situated character of the intersubjective relations between place, people and music".
See also, Bright Balkan Morning
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