Tolis Esdras, Albertos Nar

[Eva Broman <eva.bromanassouchidis...>]

Hi everyone,

It's been a while since I checked in, and I haven't been able to read all the 
posts from the summer yet. 
I would just like to share a few pieces of info that I found while in Greece. 
In the Greek music magazine "Metronomos" there was an interesting interview 
with Tolis Esdras (that's the way the name is spelled in Greek), one of the 
major accordion players in Greek rebetika and laika music. According to this 
article, Esdras was actually the first to play modern-style accordion in Greek 
music (there was a similar instrument in the earlier Smyrna music), and he 
performed with all the well-known composers and singer of the day, 
composers/bandleaders such as Mitsakis and singers like Stella Haskil and 
Stelios Kazantzidis. Esdras, who is a Sephardic Jew from the town of Trikala, 
doesn't dwell much on his background, except to give a few dates, and although 
he was born in 1930 there is no information on how he survived the Holocaust. 
On the other hand, there is lots of information about his musical career and 
about the popular music scene in the fifties and sixties. As the interviewer 
Elias Voliotis-Kapetanakis points out, Esdras is one of the "forgotten heroes" 
in Greek popular music, despite the fact that the accordion is a very important 
component in the typical 'laika' sound that developed in the late forties and 
fifties. 

Esdras is also mentioned in an essay by Albertos Nar, with his Hebrew name 
Mordochai (Tolis is actually a pet-name for Apostolos). The essay deals with 
"Jews and rebetiko". The article explores the relationship between the songs of 
the Jewish community of Salonica and the popular rebetika songs of the day, 
with many musical examples and rare photos of Jewish performers. I don't know 
if Nar has published anything similar in English. However, if there is anyone 
on the list who would like to know more about this particular essay (which 
unfortunately is in Greek!), please let me know off-list and I could give more 
info for those interested.

All the best, Eva