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Lesson timetable: 17:00 - 20:00 in the afternoon (total of 21 hours)
In this workshop we will learn traditional songs from various parts of Greece. Songs of love and immirgation, songs related to the customs of the annual cycle but also to the customs of the cycle of life. In our journey through the musical landscape of Greece we will also encounter non-Greek-speaking songs (Vlach, Slavic, Sephardic). But above all we will unite our voices singing some of the most beautiful melodies and the most beautiful lyrics ever written.
* This lesson will be taught primarily in Greek. Terminology will be explained in other languages as well, according to the teacher’s disposal.
Full interpretation will not be provided.
Martha Mavroidi is a singer, lutist and composer from Greece. She has been singing and playing folk lutes from her childhood, performing music from Greece and the Balkans. Later she developed an interest in contemporary music, blending elements of folk music with contemporary harmony and improvisation.
She graduated from the Music High School of Pallini, and she has studied Musicology in Athens (University of Athens), Ethnomusicology in London (SOAS) and Los Angeles (UCLA), and Contemporary Music in Amsterdam (Conservatorium Van Amsterdam) with scholarships from the Fulbright Foundation and the Onassis Foundation.
She has collaborated with important musicians and ensembles such as the legendary Greek folk violinist Stathis Koukoularis, ECM artist Savina Yannatou, English folk singer and violinist Eliza Carthy, and the Greek National Opera. With her Quartet she has performed in various venues in Europe and the USA. She is a member of the vocal quartet "Yasemi", and she conducts the Greek Folk Choir "Rodia" and the “Happy Hour Choir”, a workshop in the form of a vocal orchestra.
She has composed music for prize-winning short and feature films, and for dance and theater productions, including “Hello to Emptiness” by German Dance Company Mouvoir with which she has toured in Greece, France, Germany, and Korea. She has been commissioned to compose musical works for the Greek National Opera (“Domna’s Song” for the 2021 bicentennial of the Greek Revolution, “Katalogi” 2022, “Lazarakia” 2023) and the Greek National Theater (“Blood Wedding” by F.G.Lorca 2022).
She has released five albums: The Garden of Rila (2009), Portaki (2012), Agiorgitiko (2014), Thread and Needle (2017), Magiatiko (2019) and she has published a book with compositions for vocal ensemble “Thread and Needle” (2019). Since 2013 Martha has been the artistic director of Tinos World Music Festival.