Απρίλη μου, Απρίλη μου ξανθέ

[SBE]

And so many more.
As for your other question, Theseus, regarding what is Theodorakis' best, I doubt we can make a list. In a career of over 50 years, there are too many too mention. And they also differ in style, because like all artists he went through periods of different influences and styles. Which reminds me...
A few years ago (2003 to be exact), I was a guest at a wedding in Kavala and they had two musicians who played for about four hours and covered every period and style of Greek music you can imagine, excluding σκυλάδικο of course. It was like the history of 20th c. hits. After a 20-minute slot of ποντιακά, which is rather obligatory in that part of the world, they played a selection from Άστα τα μαλλάκια σου ανακατωμένα to the present. There were some French guests who said they were impressed that everybody knew the lyrics to all the songs. Maybe in France they have a different relationship with music.

 

[Theseus]

I am overwhelmed! I shall patiently trawl (an oxymoron?) through these songs and learn. I am indebted to you both for your patience and interest. Just to listen to these songs has me transported to different worlds I had not known existed. And Richard Dawkins and ilk have the temerity to suggest that science is the only way to truth!
It is interesting to note that one of Theodorakis's abiding influences was the music of the Orthodox Church. Currently I am listening to Myrtia. This seems a good selection of some of his greatest music. One of the most moving pieces of music I have ever heard comes from the liturgy of Great Saturday:

Ω γλυκύ μου έαρ,
γλυκύτατόν μου Τέκνον,
πού έδυ σου το κάλλος;
Υιέ Θεού παντάναξ,
Θεέ μου πλαστουργέ μου,
πώς πάθος κατεδέξω;
Έρραναν τον τάφον αι Μυροφόροι μύρα,
λίαν πρωί ελθούσαι.

This thread has given me so much. Words fail me.

 

[daeman]

...One of the most moving pieces of music I have ever heard comes from the liturgy of Great Saturday:
Ω γλυκύ μου έαρ...

Sung by Maria Farantouri, with Western notation and an English translation matching the meter: http://lexilogia.gr/forum/showthread.php?11098-Πασχαλινά&p=217334&viewfull=1#post217334

 

[Theseus]

Such music and words is beyond all description, 'Man. When I first heard them in Moni Toplou in Crete, I lost all sense of time and place and knew first what awe really was: mysterium tremendum ac fascinans--mystery aweful and yet drawing us towards it, like a hapless moth towards flame. We began with April and we end with γλυκύ έαρ. It is no coincidence that Crete took me to Orthodoxy. The owner of the Glaros villas that we rented for those memorable few days, Sophocles also a psaltis at the monastery, adopted me and gave me his service book containing all the liturgy of Great week. I still read his moving inscription in the front cover.

 

[SBE]

Το me, Theseus, the popular culture of Greece for my generation is the Saturday night Greek movie on TV (films from the 50s to the 70s) and the music hour(s) on Δεύτερο Προγραμμα (and elsewhere on radio, but mainly there). Yes, I know, this is perhaps a simplistic approach and there are other cultural markers, but this is something we all have in common. If you missed the songs on radio, you still heard them in the films.

Going back to your question on Theodorakis, it might be best to think of song cycles, instead of individual songs. For example. most of the Theodorakis songs we discussed earlier are from Πολιτεία Α' So I'm going to intensify your homework by sending you to listen to all of it.
From Theodorakis, Πολιτεία Α', Β',
Αρχιπέλαγος (the whole set) and here's an extra bonus piece.

 

[SBE]

Οh, and of course the song that set off this discussion is from a theatrical play, and here is the whole soundtrack of the play (is that what they call in in theatre?)

So yeah, I would argue that there is no Φραγκοσυριανή moment for Theodorakis, but that may be just me. For Tsitsanis there's Συννεφιασμένη Κυριακή, for Hadjidakis Είμαι αητός χωρίς φτερά, maybe. Of course all of the above cannot be defined by just one song, but these are probably their most popular work. For Theodorakis, maybe Βράχο βραχο τον καημό μου? Or Βρέχει στη φτωχογειτονιά? Not sure.

 

[Earion]

Theseus, your question is a big temptation, to which it would be a pity not to succumb. I intend to respond, although I know that everybody else is going to protest and suggest other selections of songs, wich means that you will end with a full list of a thousand songs (indeed the composer himself vouches for the accuracy of that number). Now, without further ado, here’s my list, reflecting my very personal taste. And please remember that I have chosen individual songs, not songs belonging to a song cycle.*

* Theodorakis loved to compose entire song cycles; there are plenty to choose. But the most celebrated and appreciated ones are based on verses of well-known poets: Axion Esti (on the poetry of Odysseus Elytis, 1964) and Epitaphios (poetry of Yannis Ritsos, 1960).

For the period before 1967 (the beginning of the military dictatorship), I say:

Χάθηκα (1962)

and

Αγάπη μου (Φαίδρα) (1960)

For the period of the military dictatorship (1967-1974) I choose:

Το παλικάρι έχει καημό (1969)

And for the period after 1974, I recommend three songs form the best record of that period, The Ballads (poetry of Manolis Anagnostakis, 1975):

Δρόμοι παλιοί

Όταν μιαν άνοιξη

and
Οι στίχοι αυτοί

That was a sample of the lyrical Theodorakis, not the epic one, the political.

 

[Theseus]

Thanks so much, SBE and Earion. I'm currently in Wales for a long weekend, my first holiday for two years. I'll be back Tuesday. Thanks for all your suggestions; if I followed them all up, I would be silent on Lexilogia for a long time to come! But I shall pick and mix my way through. The signal is poor here but I've taken my volume of Seferis's poetry to read. So many songs, so little time. Hippocrates wrote at the beginning of his aphorisms:

Ὁ βίος βραχύς,
ἡ δὲ τέχνη μακρή,
ὁ δὲ καιρὸς ὀξύς,
ἡ δὲ πεῖρα σφαλερή,
ἡ δὲ κρίσις χαλεπή.

In a word, “it takes a long time to acquire and perfect one's expertise (in, say, medicine) and one has but a short time in which to do it”. It can be interpreted as “art lasts forever, but artists die and are forgotten”. It is as true of the listener as of the artist.