polyphonic singing from Epirus
Deropoli and Politsani, Albania
These seven enthralling singers announce their purpose with their name, Isokratisses, which means “the women who sing the iso (the drone).” The unaccompanied polyphonic music they sing is among the oldest living forms of traditional music in Europe, recognized by UNESCO as an “intangible cultural heritage.” Its profoundly moving mirologi (pentatonic laments) are an essential accompaniment to life in the isolated mountain villages of Epirus, the region bridging northwestern Greece and southern Albania. The region’s polyphonic singing tradition had declined in the last half of the 20th century, until experiencing a resurgence through communal singing groups like Isokratisses. This breathtaking ensemble forges a new path for women’s voices often unheard in the current political climate, by means of a music so old and deeply rooted that it touches something elemental in the listener.
Members of Isokratisses live in Athens now, yet like so many from Epirus who have moved to larger cities, they follow the tradition of returning home for their ancestral village’s annual panegyria. Multiday, music-filled festivals with pagan roots, the panegyria combine religious observance of the locale’s Greek Orthodox patron saint with mourning for the departed and celebration of the familial and communal bonds that remain, providing a powerful emotional release. Each village’s unique musical style comes through in the mirologi and the dance music of the annual panegyria but is also passed on in more daily contexts around the kitchen table, in the unaccompanied voices of men and women. The members of Isokratisses have been singing in these intimate contexts since childhood.
Different villages across Epirus produce harmonies in as few as two and as many as four parts; Isokratisses carry on their local tradition, which divides the song into typically three but occasionally four parts, here shared among seven voices. The song begins with a soloist called the partis (taker), who presents the narrative and whose musical choices structure the performance. The turner (gyristis) sings responsively, commenting on and expanding the song, dipping to the subtonic and providing atmospherics and embellishments. The iso, the drone, serves as an anchor, as one or more singers weave the tonic (first note) or its octave through the song. A fourth role, the launcher (richtis), sometimes appears, rising the melody to unexpected heights. The overall effect has an emotional resonance that even first-time listeners find astonishing; as one reviewer of Isokratisses’ first international performance described it, “It felt as if new synapses started firing across unmapped areas of the soul.”
The women of Isokratisses hail from the Greek-speaking villages around Deropoli and Politsani, Albania. Although the group only formed officially in 2015, at the encouragement of member Anna Katsi, they had been singing together in various informal configurations long before that. The women, who range in age from 19 to 56, count among their number two sets of sisters, and an aunt-niece pair. In addition to Katsi, the members of Isokratisses are Iris Nourentini, Artemis Isou, Agathi Tzouti, Panagio Tseliki, Chrysoula Konomi, and Sofia Isou. They are presented on tour by their friend, the musicologist and producer Chris King, who describes Isokratisses’ music “as a balm for the unknowable and inevitable.”