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Needless to say, the current Greek government is celebrating with champagne. He wasn't only a great composer, he was also a staunch anti-fascist since the Colonels' dictatorship, and, like many democrat artists and poets of that time, had been deported to their political prisons - before being merely exiled thanks to his international support. He never stopped with his militant humanism, and he dies while many of the Colonel's heirs, admirers and denialists are currently at the head of the State. In a terribly polarized country, he was detested by conservatives - always an awkward situation, when it comes to a pillar of modern Greek culture and national renown abroad (France has the same problem with its greatest poets or most popular artists -Brassens, Ferré, Coluche, etc- being simultaneously national cultural symbols and, as they were alive, hated targets of nationalists). As the center-right political party of which Theodorakis was once a minister of became drifting to the authoritarian extreme-right (by harboring more and more members of a split far right party), he was becoming their boogeyman, especially since the economic crisis hit and he started railing along with Varoufakis against the Troika's punitive measures and the EU's economic system as a whole.
Of course Theodorakis is mostly known for the sirtaki of Cacoyannis' Zorba, which has somewhat become the soundtrack of Greece for tourists. But those who saw Costa Gavras' Z, his movie about the murder of Lambrakis and the rise of the Papadopoulos dictatorship, have in mind that irrepressible sounding march that evokes simultaneously a million steps' popular resistance, a hope for truth, and the well-oiled mechanism of a militarist coup.
He also composed a lot of non-cinematographic works, such as the Ballad of Mauthausen, his musical cycle about the Shoah, of which the haunting Asma Asmaton was interpreted so many times, from Joan Baez
to Ageliki Ionatos (deceased this year as well)
but was recently removed from commemorations, due to Theodorakis' legitimate support for Palestine drifting to stupidly antisemtic waters (of the "I'm not antisemitic but it's all because of the Jews' control of the world" kind). A very useless, embarrassing and sad last note for a career which had been dedicated to all the great causes of democracy and human rights throughout the whole world's last century.
It's an important life that ends now, musically and politically. Not a flawless person, not necessarily a great intellectual, but a great artist and a great heart, that wasn't made only of opinions, but also of actions, of life experiences, and of suffering and resistance under political regimes that we're lucky to deride from afar. But which still have their proponents and nostalgics. To whom I hope Theodorakis' music to stay an everlasting middle finger.
Of course Theodorakis is mostly known for the sirtaki of Cacoyannis' Zorba, which has somewhat become the soundtrack of Greece for tourists. But those who saw Costa Gavras' Z, his movie about the murder of Lambrakis and the rise of the Papadopoulos dictatorship, have in mind that irrepressible sounding march that evokes simultaneously a million steps' popular resistance, a hope for truth, and the well-oiled mechanism of a militarist coup.
He also composed a lot of non-cinematographic works, such as the Ballad of Mauthausen, his musical cycle about the Shoah, of which the haunting Asma Asmaton was interpreted so many times, from Joan Baez
to Ageliki Ionatos (deceased this year as well)
but was recently removed from commemorations, due to Theodorakis' legitimate support for Palestine drifting to stupidly antisemtic waters (of the "I'm not antisemitic but it's all because of the Jews' control of the world" kind). A very useless, embarrassing and sad last note for a career which had been dedicated to all the great causes of democracy and human rights throughout the whole world's last century.
It's an important life that ends now, musically and politically. Not a flawless person, not necessarily a great intellectual, but a great artist and a great heart, that wasn't made only of opinions, but also of actions, of life experiences, and of suffering and resistance under political regimes that we're lucky to deride from afar. But which still have their proponents and nostalgics. To whom I hope Theodorakis' music to stay an everlasting middle finger.
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Get working on your custom lists, people !
Get working on your custom lists, people !