Friday, February 17, 2017

The Magic of Greek Music



Last Sunday we were fortunate enough to hear the riveting music of Orestis Koletsos and Athena Labiri, at the Greek Food Imports on Fulton Avenue (near Fair Oaks Blvd.) Athena sings and plays the guitar; Orestis plays the bouzouki and sometimes joins her in song. Together, they are a perfectly synchronized team, and for three hours Rajan and I were mesmerized. You may (or may not) be able to hear a few strains in this short video.






















We first heard Orestis Koletsos play the bouzouki last September at the Greek Festival, which for years has been at the Community Center on J Street at 14th, each Labor Day week-end. (This year it will be at the Greek Orthodox Church on Alhambra Blvd., across from McKinley Park in October, instead.) Since we enjoyed the music so much, we were delighted to learn of last Sunday's concert. We enjoy Greek food, so the Greek Food Imports was a great find for us. They have a deli, as well as imports from Greece. Being vegetarians, we were able to enjoy delicious snacks while we listened to the music (and the retsina was pretty good, too.) We also met some lovely people at our table. (Good music and food have a way of doing that.) I'm uploading a couple more videos, and I hope they will play well on this post. 



Meanwhile, if you enjoy Greek food, definitely check out the Greek Food Imports. (They have a page on Facebook, too, so you can learn of coming events as well as check out their menu.)

If you enjoy Greek music, definitely check out the Facebook Page for Orestis so you can learn of other performances, both in the Sacramento area and other towns.

And if you like both Greek food and Greek music, watch for the Greek Festival the first week-end in October. Opa!

Do you know of other festivals that offer good music and food? What are your favorites? 

12 comments:

  1. Sounds like a fun time. Ann Arbor has lots of fun events like this. I need to start taking advantage of them.

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  2. I enjoy these ethnic festivals. I think there's a Greek festival here soon in Jacksonville, FL., possibly this weekend. I'll have to check it out.

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  3. Hi, Natalie, it's really time well spent. I always find music so uplifting. It carries you out of yourself and opens up other worlds. And the food is a nice sampler of another culture as well.

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  4. Hi, Richard. That's great! Definitely take advantage of the opportunity. When we go to the Greek Festival, we feel transported to another time and place.

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  5. I love live music like this. At our community centre we have local fiddle players who come in, and sometimes a piano or guitar joins in. Always fun.

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  6. Hi, Tanya, that sounds like Irish music, is it? When we lived in Athens, Georgia, at a local area called The Station (after a previous train station was converted into a boardwalk with shops, On week-ends there would be fiddlers and banjo players and also cloggers. We loved that and looked forward to it all week.

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  7. You always find such fun things to do!
    I didn't realize you were a vegetarian! Me too:)

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  8. Hi, Sandra! Re: fun things to do — that may be because we live in Sacramento. Sacramento is the most multicultural city in the United States. More multicultural than even NYC. So there is always something ethnic going on, and the city also has a lot of artists and writers.

    On another note, we are vegetarian, but we also eat fish and seafood. Someone told me we're "pescadarians." I guess. 🙂 I wasn't always vegetarian, but discovered its joys when I married my husband and found out how many great veg recipes there are. Yum.

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  9. Sounds like fun! I've been to several Greek festivals. Always great food! I've been to Italian and Serbian ones too.

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  10. Hi, Theresa, I think there's a Serbian festival here, too, although we haven't been to it. It's smaller, and mostly food. We also went to the Italian festival one year, but now that we travel, our schedules don't coincide. I love cultural festivals.

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  11. So cool! I remember hearing great music when I went to Greece a few years back:)

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  12. Oh, wow, Mark! You went to Greece? I am so-o-o-o jealous! How long were you there?

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