Meet the Artist Special: Dimitris Mystakidis from Greece
From Thessaloniki to Førde :
- Home is where the music is played loud
Dimitris speeds around on a motorcycle with his guitar in a bag on his back. "Home is where music sounds loud," says his t-shirt. He's always on his way home.
THESSALONIKI: Dimitris shows us around the city where he was born and still lives. In the background you can see the famous landmark, the White Tower.
He spins off to the university to teach undergraduate and graduate students. He swings by the local pub to warm up with a whiskey. He commutes to the airport to flit between gigs.
AT THE STAMPUB: Both young and old raise their glasses in a silent toast to Dimitris, who toasts back. "Everyone" knows Dimitris.
The phone rings all the time. There are conversations filled with laughter, text messages that are answered at lightning speed, and picture messages from the children. One of the sons is a drummer and has a sound wave tattooed on his arm. Of course, the father must be notified.
- You must have a lot of friends, we say.
- Not really. I have many acquaintances, but few I would call friends. In passing, I can only think of three.
A melting pot
Førdefestivalen has traveled to Thessaloniki, a leading port city in the shipping nation of Greece. The Greek fleet is the largest in the world measured in deadweight tons, more than twice the size of the Norwegian one. From the city's famous landmark - The White Tower - you can see the cranes grazing like dinosaurs on the horizon.
STREET SCENE: East and West merge in Thessaloniki.
Look at the map. Thessaloniki, Istanbul and Izmir form a geographical triangle between East and West. Historically, this is where Greek, Ottoman, Armenian and Sephardic cultures merged into a cornucopia that became the sprout of rebetika music. Later, several hundred thousand Greeks emigrated to America. There, the music received a further touch of color in the encounter with African-American fiddlers, and from this interaction came the Greek blues or Aegean blues. More on that later.
Dimitris and "Skymitris"
"I'm out of town at least two or three days every week, and it's not that easy to cultivate friendships," Dimitris says sincerely.
Theopoula, the samburian, is the safe anchor, as are the three children from a previous marriage. And then there is music, of course, the shadow friend who is always invited. When Dimitris is in the room, "Skymitris" is never far away.
Below you can see video of Dimitris in the studio at the brand new management Fishbowl Music Tank run by fellow Norwegian Theopoula Arvanitidou:
Dimitris has this immediate, natural musicality. Give him a guitar, and he becomes a whole band. Give him a microphone, and he transforms even the saddest shack into a begonia-blooming tavern. He is just as happy to play with students as with the biggest stars in Greece, and he is just as happy to play for refugees on the streets as for gala-dressed audiences in the biggest concert halls. Some of his best musical experiences have been with those who have a reputation for being the Greeks' greatest "enemies": the Turks.
- When we have the music, we have no problems. We sing and play and dance together.
POLITICALLY INCORRECT: - Music is not something you wear as an image, says Dimitris.
But in Greece, folk music is politics. As in so many other countries.
"The state wants an ethnic music to adorn itself with. They pick out what suits them and ignore the rest," says Dimitris. He keeps returning to this theme, that music is not something you put on as an image, nor is it a color on the political party book, but that it has artistic value in itself.
This must be understood against the background of the strong emotions that music stirs in most Greeks. Whether it is a wedding, a funeral or a baptism - or simply dinner at the local tavern - the soundtrack is Greek. It can be rebetika or later styles such as sirtaki (you may know the song "Zorba"?), but also - if truth be told - more watered-down soft pop variants.
One of the victims of the cut-and-paste policy is precisely Dimitris' instrument. The guitar has never received the deserved status as a folk music instrument and has always had to play second fiddle to the bouzouki. But the wind is turning. In the last couple of years, the guitar has been gradually lifted into good company and onto the stage.
It's no exaggeration to say that Dimitris will have his share of fame. For thirty years he has played and played and played - and shut up. Being politically incorrect can eventually become correct.
LIVE FOLK MUSIC: Dimitris helped establish Prinkípissa (Greek for princess), a small pub where there are rebetika concerts every single day.
Multiple strings to play on
Dimitris is coming. Førde with the solo project "America", an audiovisual concert experience. Through music and video, he tells of a time when the Greeks themselves were on the run, and of the music that came out of the situation they were in.
- Similar to tango and blues, rebetika emerged in the slums of America at the beginning of the 20th century, among the Greek diaspora, he says.
But we have to go back a little further in history to find the soul. Rebetika music began to sprout in the depths of the Aegean Sea on the eve of the Ottoman Empire, almost as a chemical reaction to the cultural exchange between East and West. It is said that the rebets (those who performed the music) came from lower social classes, they were vagrants, prison inmates and rag-pickers. The lyrics and melodies were imbued with longing, and they were performed in calm and hoarse voices. The singers layered their verses, and a song could last for several hours. The notes crept out from hash dens and through prison walls.
MARITIME NATION: The Greek fleet is more than twice the size of the Norwegian fleet measured in deadweight tons.
Then came the great migration to America. From 1890 to 1930, hundreds of thousands emigrated to the new continent. There they met African-American musicians and learned fingerstyle guitar, and they developed a completely unique style of playing, often called tsibiti or Greek blues. In the 1940s and 1950s, the mass production of LPs accelerated. The Greeks of the diaspora embraced the new technology, and their recordings found their way back to the old country. There, this musical "bastard" was frowned upon by both nationalists and religious Greeks, but during a couple of flourishing periods in the latter half of the twentieth century - and after a couple of rounds in the political washing machine, one might say - the music became a staple of the Greek state.
The former prisoners and emigrants knew little about the role they would play in Greek nation-building.
History repeats itself.
Today, Greece is the safe haven for refugees. The number of refugees fell sharply in 2017, but surged again in March and April of this year. This is especially noticeable in a country where the economy is in shambles, and despite many Greeks showing an impressive willingness to help, there are murmurs.
Dimitris is among those who want refugees to feel welcome. Or to put it another way: he doesn't plan on stopping being politically incorrect just yet.
- My ancestors came wandering from Asia Minor (then Greek territory) to the Greek mainland, but they were not welcome. I can't stand the thought that people in a similar situation today will experience the same.
ON THE MAP: From 1890 to 1930, hundreds of thousands of Greeks emigrated to America. Today, Greece is a haven for refugees.
Dimitris feels strongly about the America project. He wants the audience to join him on the journey, even if they don't understand the words. That's why he has created videos that are shown on a big screen. The videos are based on old letters and photos, but also new material. They start with us walking up the gangway. Then comes the trip across the ocean and the arrival at Ellis Island. The new construction on the American continent. The problem and racism.
It is a statistical fact that many Greek settlers got into trouble with the law, but a persistent myth that they were so much worse than everyone else.
- In America, Greeks were not seen as white Europeans. They were discriminated against on the same basis as blacks, and it was not safe for them, for example, to travel south to Ku Klux Klan country.
WARM IN A T-SHIRT: Dimitris has great knowledge and strong feelings for rebetika.
The hash-smoking rebel
We attempt a summary and say: - Rebetika is often associated with struggle and protest, not least during the military junta in the 1960s and 1970s.
Dimitri's formality grows before our eyes. The music professor steps forward.
- It's true that rebetika was used as a protest against the military government, but since then the hash-smoking rebel has become an image, a jacket that artists put on. You can't use music to define who you are as a person. It's not good for those who try to do that, and it's certainly not good for the music. It's far too superficial. The music goes deep and should help you remember, not forget, he says, now warm in his T-shirt.
TWO FACES: In the next instant, his face cracked into a smile.
Dimitris has two faces: one when he fights for music, and one when he can throw the heavy baggage off his shoulders and just be himself.
Dimitris grew up in a working-class neighborhood. His father worked in the steel industry, and his mother was a stay-at-home mom. They hoped their son would use his sharp mind to study law or medicine, and they never found themselves in a position to buy him a guitar. Dimitris taught himself to play on borrowed instruments.
- I bought a guitar with my first paycheck, as soon as I got a job!
In the last ten years, life has taken several turns. He has followed both parents to the grave after a long illness and daily hospital visits. He has been divorced. And he has gone solo. But he still teaches. Teaching is as necessary as eating, he cannot stop. We join him at the University of Macedonia where the students are putting the final touches on their exam papers.
MUSIC PROFESSOR: - Dimitris is different from other teachers, say the students.
Before class, Dimitris stands and hangs out with the students outside the classroom. There is laughter and friendly pats on the back. Cigarette smoke.
"Dimitris is different from other teachers. He has a background as a musician, not an academic. He is a normal guy, one of us," says Lakovos Moysiadis.
"But I must admit that I'm afraid of making a mistake. I want him to be happy," Lakovos continues. And then he laughs, perhaps to himself.
Greek musicians have a heavy load to carry. But sometimes they drop their burdens on the floor, making them rattle between the walls.
REPLAY: When Dimitris arrives Førdefestivalen in July, it's the second time he's visited Førde . He was here in 2012 with the collaborative project Apsilies. Dimitris will never forget the approach in a small Widerøe plane that dropped down between the mountains. "Did I come to the right place?", he asked himself silently. He did. Lucky are we who remember the concert.
Text, photo and video: BlackStarJournal