Panorama of Rebetiko Songs | 3 CD Box from Greece

Listen to "Smirneiko Minore"

Get all three CDs in 256 luscious kbps here.

An incredible collection spanning from 1927-1940, found in the same Greek store where I got this. 

I had planned to post a couple more Cheb Khaled CDs this week, but then I discovered that both were already among the 52 of his albums posted here. (Also, in response to last week's Chebfest, Hammer posted a huge collection of early Khaled on his blog, дևծιστøρία.)

So, I thought and thought and thought about what would be a nice consolation prize. And, so ... here we are.

I had to upgrade my Divshare account as it expired and they no longer offer the plan I was under. Good news for you: I now have five times the storage space. Which means, from here on out, nothing less than 256kbps ... and maybe we'll even get super-fancy and bump it all the way up to 320. 

Poke around here while you're downloading ...

Rita Abatzi | 1930-1948

Another find from this weekend's visit to GMV, the Greek music superstore near my apartment in Astoria where I also found this fabulous CD by 60s rock band Olympians. Judging by the sound of this one, I'm guessing the whole CD was ripped from 78s. Lots of surface noise. Here is what Wikipedia has to say about her:

Rita Abatzi (Greek: Ρίτα Αμπατζή) (1914 – 17 June 1969) was a Greek rebetiko musician who began her career in the first part of the 1930s.

She was born in Smyrna, Asia Minor, now İzmir, Turkey. A versatile singer of rebetiko, Smyrneika and other music, she was a popular performer on gramophone records in the 1930s. During that decade, the only female singer of rebetiko who rivalled her in popularity, and in the number of her recordings, was Roza Eskenazi.

Abatzi performed with many of the most famous musicians including Panayiotis Toundas, Vangelis Papazoglou, Kostas Skarvelis, Iakovos Montanaris, Spyros Peristeris, Dimitrios Semsis, I. Ogdontaki up to Markos Vamvakaris and Vassilis Tsitsanis. Her career ended after World War II. She did not publish any discography. She died in Egaleo (Athens), Greece.

Her sister, Sofia Karivali, was also a notable singer of rebetiko.

Listen to the second track on this CD

Get it all here.