Rebetiko is said to have been born when the musical culture brought over by the Greeks forcibly repatriated from Turkey in the 1923 population exchange with the Muslim Turks after World War I merged with the culture already present on the Greek mainland. It's early Greek street music, also beloved by sailors who drank wine and smoked hashish.
The material sung here includes Asian folk songs going back several centuries (presumably transmitted via Turkey), as well as traditional songs from his home island of Amorgos.
Having emigrated to America in 1917, he made his living touring and singing for Greek immigrant communities in Chicago, New York, and Philadelphia, before settling in a small Florida port town famous for the traditional sponge fishing brought there by Greeks from Kalymnos. Rediscovered in the '90s, he is said to have returned to Greece.
64 tracks from the early part of his career, mastered by Stereophonic in Portland. Mississippi Records' Greek reissues are perhaps best known for Marika Politissa, and this one comes courtesy of the same Greek researchers behind those, Stavros Kourousis & Konstantinos Kopanitsanos. Perfect with a drink — even drinking alone. Wonderful. (Original Japanese text by Shhhhh)