Τρία πρόσφατα "Καππαδοκικά" τραγούδια από τη Νέα Σινασό

Abstract

In 1962 the Belgian musicologist Paul Collaer, in collaboration with the
«M. Merlier Folk Music Archives», recorded among other items, about a
dozen songs from a female refugee from Cappadocia in Asia Minor, then
living in the northern part of the island of Euboea (Néa Sinassós). The
present article examines only those of the above songs which are
unknown. All three of them have certain characteristics in common: their
texts are recent (late 19th - early 20th centuries) and more or less of an
improvisatory nature; they deal with subjects concerning illness, death
and the grief of the refugee; and in spite of the interest of their themes
and the importance they have for the study of the later stages of the
development of Greek folk song, they display certain weaknesses in their
phrasing and versification. The relation of N° 1 with a certain type of
rébétika (songs of illness) is noteworthy. N° 2, belongs to the category of
the so called «incidental» (peristatika) songs, while at the same time it is
distantly related to the rébétika of the underworld. Moreover N° 3 is the
only dirge (mirológi) from Cappadocia which has come down to us in its
complete form, i.e. both with its text and tune. The article is completed
by a detailed study of the unfolding patterns of the melodies, their modality,
rhythm, architectonic structure and form.