by Manolis Spanakis

Angelique Ionatos


Of all stars, the loveliest
Poetry: Sappho of Eressos (Lesvos) circa 630-612 BC
Music: Angelique Ionatos

Aggelikí Ionátou (in Greek : Αγγελική Ιονάτου), known in France as Angélique Ionatos, was born in Athens in 1954. In 1969, her family emmigrated to Belgium, then to France. From 1989 to 2000, she was Associated Artist of the Théâtre de Sartrouville. Guitarist and composer, she puts music to poems by Odysséas Elýtis, (Nobel 1979; e.g. Marie des Brumes, Le Monogramme, Parole de juillet) and other poets, mainly Greek.

This poem is sung in its original version, in ancient Aeolic Greek.

Asteron panton o kalistos, hespere
panta pheron osa phainolis eskedas auos
phereis oin, phereis aega, phereis api materi paida

Evening-star, best of all stars
bringing all things that morning dawn scattered
You bring back the sheep, you bring the goat, you bring the child to its mother.


Persephone's nightmare and 2 other songs
Ionatos interprets 3 songs of other composers using bandoleon, violin, bass and guitar.

...
There, where the mystagogues washed their hands
before entering the altar
now, tourists put out their cigarettes
and go to see the new refinery

Sleep, Persephone, in the lap of the Earth
Never come out on the balcony of the world.
...


The tango of the personal pronouns
Lyrics and music: Katerina Photinaki

Declination of ancient Greek pronouns


The cycle of the water
Poetry: Dimitra Manda
Music: Mikis Theodorakis

From the album "A Sea" by Mikis Theodorakis with Angelique Ionatos

Every rain is a new music
just as the cycle of the water closes
and my lonliness blooms inside it.


Interview
with extract from Maria Nefeli (Mary of the Clouds)

Poetry: Odysseas Elytis
Music: Angelique Ionatos


Xeri o Ilios (The Sun Knows)

Poetry: Odysseas Elytis
Music: Angelique Ionatos
Vocals: Angelique Ionatos, Spyros Sakkas, Emmanuel Pousse

From the album Paroles de Juillet (Words of July)


The Sun knows!

It goes inside you to see
because the outside is mirror
nature lives inside the body
and, from there, it takes its revenge

The Sun knows!


Maria Nefeli (Marie de Brumes)
Poetry: Odysseas Elytis
Music: Angelique Ionatos
Interpreted with Katerina Photinaki

I live day by day
who knows what tomorrow will bring
from one hand, I crumble the money
from the other, I smoothen and restore them

You see, we need arms for communicating in our chaotic times
we also need to be in accordance with our so called national ideals

Don't look at me like that, you burocrat,
you never dressed soldier
the art of making money is also a warfare skill

You may stay awake and write thousands of verses
and fill up the walls with revolutionary slogans
Still others will treat you as an intellectual
and only me, who loves you, as prisoner of my dreams.


If it is true that 'eros' is, as they say, the common denominator,
then, I must be Nefeli (the cloud) and you, the cloud raiser


Your hand palm
Poetry: Dimitris Mortoyas
Music: Angelique Ionatos

Your hand palm
the wider than the universe
the wiser than the sleeplessness of the stars
is pulled up by the moonlight
and covered with the porphyry of death

The glorious naufrages of the seashores
the seashell, the white crocus and the sperms of the sand
are merged by the rumour of the waves

Who looked at the abyss of your heart
when the neglected song of the nightingale
was begging in the museums and in the encyclopedias?

The words bebrothered men
in the era of the dinosaurs
in the years of illegal fatterers, of crooks
of mankillers, of blackbulls
They separate them like military commands
At night, the dreems become silent


Hymne to the Sun
Poetry: Odysseas Elytis (from the Sovereign Sun)
Music: Angelique Ionatos

The Sun, the Sun-or (from Emper-or)
The pebble-playing-or
From the edge of edges
Rolls down to cape Taenaron
His chin is fire
His fork is gold

O ilios o iliatoras
o petropehnidiatoras
apo tin akri ton akron
katiforaï sto Tenaro
fotia ine to piguni tu
hrisafi to piruni tu