Michael Kapilidis' Haemus - Slippery Steps (feat. Vahan Galstyan)

********Michael Kapilidis' Haemus - Slippery Steps********

Composed and Produced by Michael Kapilidis
Co-composed by Vahan Galstyan
Co-Produced by Nikos Michalodimitrakis

It is with great pleasure that i present to you my solo project, Haemus.
I wrote all the music, as well as played/programmed the vast majority of the instruments.

The live drum performance was filmed by Panos Zenidis and recorded/mixed at MD Recording Studio in Athens by Nikos Michalodimitrakis.

My friend and colleague Vahan Galstyan played zourna on this track. He is an amazing musician. You should definitely check him out! You can start here:

   • ZRUITS ALBUM  by Vahan Galstyan & Lefteris...  



------Gear used for this track:----

|||| Gretsch Drums (Renown Maple) Toms: 10"x8" & 12"x9", Floor Tom:14"x14", Bd:20"x16"

Ludwig Hammered Bronze Snare Drum

|||| Meinl Cymbals (14" Pure Alloy Hats, 10" Byzance Traditional Medium Hats, 18" Pure Alloy Medium Crash, 12" SCH Stack, 21” Byzance Mike Johnston Transition Ride, 22" Byzance Jazz China Ride w/rivets with an old cracked cymbal underneath, 16" Byzance Jazz Thin Crash)

|||| Porter&Davies Bc Gigster Tactile Drum Monitor System

|||| Vic Firth Drumsticks (Keith Carlock Signature & 5A Double Glaze models)

The second tune in the series is called Slippery Steps. The title is a direct reference to the culture that partly inspired the music and the rhythms in the tune. Slippery Steps is the direct translation of the word Nastrtzini (Ναστριτζινι) which is a very popular dance from Serres, Greece. It is part of the repertoire of the zourna, one of the most popular and definitely the most beloved traditional instrument of the region.

As far as the drumming is concerned, i applied a lot of my own concepts in this tune also, but i got the foundation and the basics by listening and playing along to traditional music from Serres. I checked out and transcribed quite a lot of daouli players and especially the two undisputed masters of the instrument, Ilias Dimanos (Ηλιας Δημανος) and Giannis Dramalis (Γιαννης Δραμαλης). Τheir playing is infectious, virtuosic and full of improv and surprises but stil rooted and connected to the Dance. One of the things that struck a chord with me is that they tend to not play the bass sound on the downbeats. In the Balkans by and large, the percussion HAS to play the downbeats on the bass (or “boom” sound, because (more often than not) this is where the steps of the dancers fall. Interestingly enough, the daoultzides (daouli players) in the Serraic tradition not only avoid playing the downbeats with the bass sound very often but even more they accent “weird” parts of the rhythm, offbeats etc. In almost any other part of Greece one would expected the dancers to collapse under such ambiguous rhythms but the groove is so strong despite the syncopated playing and the melody is so strongly embedded in people’s heads, so it doesn’t mean a thing for them.

One other interesting fact from this tradition that i haven’t seen elsewhere in Greece is that the primary dancer, the one that leads the dance is in constant connection/conversation with the daouli player. Is one of the rare cases where the that role (from the band’s part) isn’t held by a melodic instrument (clarinet, violin, lyra etc.).

Evidence of all the above can be seen and heard in this absolutely amazing and inspiring clip. The group (zygia) of Giannis Dramalis play a local traditional festival (panigiri) in Aridaia. The dancers and musicians are in top form and they create absolute magic, rarely caught on camera. This is the Nastritzini dance. The music is of course in 7/8 (with e 3-2-2 feel) until it resolves majestically to 4/4 (Gaida Vasi) at about 1:45

   • Видео  

"Haemus Mons are today known as the Balkan Mountains. In ancient Greek, the Balkan Peninsula was known as the Peninsula of Haemus (Χερσόνησος τοῦ Αἵμου) probably named after King Haemus of prehistoric Thrace (Θράκη). "

---This track is the second in a series of tunes i wrote inspired by the traditional music idioms of the Balkans, Meditterenean and Middle East areas. There is so much music happening in this corner of the world and it amazes me that despite the advent of internet, youtube etc. not many people from the West have yet to become hip to it. One of my goals is to change that! ;)

Thanks for your interest.