In the footsteps of Hubert Pernott! An innovative and pilot program of music digital documentation in Pitios:
35 melodiess, songs, dances, obituaries, carnival customs, wedding poems and carols from Pityos of Chios, videotaped in two phases:
First in 1990 by the Cultural Association of the village (from the family archive of Nikos Fragos) and then in 2021 by the ethnomusicologist researcher, Dimitris Gianniodis. The program of “AMKE Museum – Musical Practices of the Aegean” gives the visitor the unique opportunity to experience Pityos through the richness of its folk tradition.
The visitors to the village can scan the QR Codes that are placed on the streets and houses in the settlement and watch the Pityan men and women singing and dancing, as if they were right in front of their eyes!
The audio-visual material comes from field research (2018-2022) in the context of the doctoral thesis of the social anthropologist Dimitris Gianniodis at the University of Paris-Nanterre, France (department of ethnomusicology) and from recordings by various researchers. In order to document the contemporary music reality and to attain the music map of the island, systematic interviews, recordings, video recordings as well as the collection of relevant supporting and documentary material are carried out in each village with the help of the residents, local researchers and cultural instit;utions.
A significant part of the digital archive is housed in the Center for Research and Ethnomusicology (CREM) and the archive of the Museum of Mankind in Paris. The Digital Encyclopedia “Museion” aims to contribute to the preservation of the cultural heritage of the Northeast Aegean (Chios, Psara, Oinousses, Erythraea), to rescue, disseminate and highlight the masterpieces of folk culture.
In the ancient Greek world, the term “Museion” (Museum) referred to a shrine dedicated to the worship of the Muses and to the house where activities related to music, poetry or philosophy took place under the protection of the Muses who were deities intertwined with the arts and sciences.
Therefore the main concern of this effort is to approach the cultural heritage of the Northeast Aegean with an innovative anthropological eye so that tradition remains what it has always been: a “culture in action”, a treasure full of knowledge and practices that is being built daily, is transmitted from generation to generation and is changing over time.
Scientific research: Dimitris Gianniodis
Pityos Youtube channel: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5V3M7_F0nio&list=PLJWzkk7istPRm2Wf6gohMQdQKqy6pPj1y
Bilingual “Museum” page in Greek and French: https://mouseion.huma-num.fr/el/welcome