Stavros Xarhakos - Markos our teacher (1987)

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Stavros Xarhakos - Markos our teacher (1987)

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Markos Vamvakaris (10 May 1905 in Ano Chora in Syros – 8 February 1972) (Greek: Μάρκος Βαμβακάρης), was a rebetiko musician. He is universally referred to by rebetiko writers and fans simply by his first name, Markos. The great significance of Vamvakaris for the rebetiko is also reflected by his nickname; the "patriarch of rebetiko". Vamvakaris was born on May 10, 1905 in Ano Chora, Syros, Greece. His family belonged to the sizeable Roman Catholic community of the island, the Frankosyrians, a name deriving from the common Greek reference to West Europeans collectively as "Franks". At the age of twelve, believing he was wanted by the police, Vamvakaris left Syros and went to Piraeus. He worked as a stevedore, employee at a pit-coal mine, polisher, paperman, butcher and other jobs. He heard a bouzouki player playing, and swore that if he did not learn to play the instrument in six months he would cut off his hand with a cleaver (he was working in the Athens slaughterhouse at the time). He learned bouzouki, becoming an innovative virtuoso player, and began to compose music, and write songs. At first he often played in hashish smoking establishments known as Tekes, later he and his band, which included Giorgos Batis, Anestis Delias and Stratos Pagioumtzis played in more legitimate clubs.

They were extremely popular, and Markos made many recordings. Vamvakaris recorded his first rebetiko disc, Na 'Rchosouna Re Magka Mou (Να 'ρχόσουνα ρε μάγκα μου) in 1932. Among other songs in that period, he wrote the classic love song "Frangkosyriani". After the liberation of Greece from the occupation of Nazi Germany, difficult times arrived, since his kind of music was no longer fashionable. He also suffered badly with arthritis in his hands that crippled his bouzouki playing and asthma that hampered his singing. The slump in his fortunes lasted until the early 1960s, when after initiatives by Vassilis Tsitsanis, many of his old songs were revived, sung by modern singers including Grigoris Bithikotsis, and Stratos Dionysiou. Vamvakaris died on February 8, 1972 at the age of 66. Markos' composing style was utterly simple: minimal orchestration, melodic lines stripped of any embellishment, and lyrics as devoid of ornamentation as possible. His strophic masterpiece "Your eyelashes shine" is a typical example of his art. It consists of just three short sentences, each sung twice with clauses reversed for the second time:

Your eyelashes shine
like flowers on the field.
Your eyes, sister,
crack my little heart.
Search till you're blind:
you won't find one like me.

As the years pass, his towering contribution to Greek music emerges. All other laiko composers, of his time and afterwards, revered him as their master teacher, and Mikis Theodorakis remarked: "We all, we are but branches of a tree. Markos is that tree".