Carnegie Hall Presents Celebrated Greek Singer Eleftheria Arvanitaki on February 1st at Stern Auditorium/Perelman Stage

On Saturday, February 1 at 8:00 p.m., internationally renowned Greek singer, Eleftheria Arvanitaki makes her Carnegie Hall debut bringing a distinctive blend of the urban music genre rebetiko and contemporary Greek music to Stern Auditorium / Perelman Stage. In addition to her reputation for seamlessly transitioning between these genres, Arvanitaki is also well known for high-energy live performances and eclectic collaborations including her interpretations of the works for contemporary composers and poets whose works she sets to music.

 

Rebetiko has its origins in an oral tradition where improvisation played an important role in both the music and lyrics. The music often features a rough, almost raw sounding vocal performance which reflects the musical tradition born during turbulent times in the large ports in and around Greece—specifically the resettlement of over a million Greeks refugees from Asia Minor in the 1920s—as well as the realities found in Greek underground culture and shanty towns grew up around Athens, Piraeus and other cities. These refugees brought their music with them, and it had a prominent effect on the urban music of Greece. The songs explore the collective human experiences with themes of pain, nostalgia, tenderness, death and love. Arvanitaki’s voice and musical style has been shaped by the living tradition of rebetiko as she takes the intense emotions found in the rhythms from the Mediterranean and the Oriental worlds and fuses them with the rhythms existing in the dances of the traditional Greek feasts (or glentia). 

 

Eleftheria Arvanitaki’s musical career began in the early 1980s in Athens where she made a name for herself fronting her own group, Opisthidromiki Kompania, before launching her solo career in 1985. By the mid-1990s, she had gained an audience in Greece and beyond when the historic jazz label Verve issued her album, Eleftheria Arvanitaki—The Very Best of 1989–1998. This proved to be a springboard into her international acclaim and started her along the road towards years of celebrated musical collaborations and appearances at international music festivals and concert halls the world over. 

 

Throughout a career spanning three decades, Arvanitaki has toured extensively, performing in celebrated concert venues including: La Cigale in Paris; Madison Square Garden and Town Hall in New York; Royal Festival Hall, Queen Elizabeth Hall and Barbican Centre in London; the Sydney Opera House in Australia; Teatro Albeniz in Madrid and Palau de la Música in Barcelona; Wiener Konzerthaus in Vienna, Carré in Amsterdam and many more.  Festival appearances include performances at Womad, the Montreux Jazz Festival, the North Sea Jazz Festival, the Sfinks festival in Belgium, the Millennium End Festival in Barcelona, “Los Veranos de la Villa” Festival in Madrid, and the Stimmen Festival in Germany, among others.  Notably, in June 2006, she opened the renewed Greek Festival, giving two sold out concerts at Greece’s renowned Odeon of Herodes Atticus in Athens in which she performed the songs for films created by Greek Academy Award-winning composer Manos Hadjidakis.  In 2000, she had the honor of singing for the Pope as part of the Jubileum della Terra, and in 2004 sang as part of the closing ceremony of the Athens Olympic Games. 

 

Notable collaborations include performances with Cesaria Evora, Buika, Dulce Pontes, Teofilo Chantre, and Amaral among others. She performed the traditional Greek song Tzivaeri as part of composer Philip Glass’s work Orion—a piece inspired by the musical traditions of the five continents.  She also collaborated with Spanish composer and Grammy award winning-producer Javier Limón on two albums—her own Mírame, which combines sounds and rhythms from Greece, Spain, Cuba and Northern Africa, and his album. Mujeres de Agua alongside vocalists Mariza, Estrella Morente, and Buika. 

 

In September 2010, Arvanitaki travelled to Ivory Coast as a UNICEF Ambassador for the Campaign to eliminate maternal and neonatal tetanus.  Her forthcoming album is expected in the spring of 2014.

 

 

 

Stern Auditorium / Perelman Stage

ELEFTHERIA ARVANITAKI

Eleftheria Arvanitaki, Vocals

Alexandros Arkadopoulos, Clarinet, Flute, and Kaval

George Georgiadis, Double Bass

Yannis Kirimkirides, Acoustic Piano and Keyboards

Thomas Konstantinou, Mandolin, Lute, Bouzouki, and Oud

Alexandros Ktistakis, Drums

Kostas Meretakis, Eastern Traditional Percussion

Dimitris Tsakas, Soprano Saxophone and Nylon Guitar

Special Guest Ara Dinkjian, Oud and Cumbus

 

Bank of America is the Proud Season Sponsor of Carnegie Hall.

 

Tickets, priced $30—$75, are available at the Carnegie Hall Box Office, 154 West 57th Street, or can be charged to major credit cards by calling CarnegieCharge at 212-247-7800 or by visiting the Carnegie Hall website, carnegiehall.org.

 

For Carnegie Hall Corporation presentations taking place in Stern Auditorium/Perelman Stage, a limited number of seats, priced at $10, will be available day-of-concert beginning at 11:00 a.m. Monday through Saturday and 12:00 noon on Sunday until one hour before the performance or until supply lasts. The exceptions are Carnegie Hall Family Concerts and gala events. These $10 tickets are available to the general public on a first-come, first-served basis at the Carnegie Hall Box Office only. There is a two-ticket limit per customer.

 

In addition, for all Carnegie Hall presentations in Stern Auditorium/Perelman Stage a limited number of partial view (seats with obstructed or limited sight lines or restricted leg room) will be sold for 50% of the full price. For more information on this and other discount ticket programs, including those for students, Notables members, and Bank of America customers, visit carnegiehall.org/discounts. Artists, programs and prices are subject to change.