Nikolaos Giannoukakis
Παλαιό Μέλος
Mr. Nassis, you also made the following points:
1) Just compare what 'mathemata' people influenced by Simon Karas chant to what most of the others chant.
Dear Mr. Nassis, unless you have some obscure book that has hymns the rest of the world has never seen or studied, please refrain from making such a nonsensical statement. All the material in the corpus of Byzantine music can be found the classic texts of the old masters (Petros, Iakovos Protopsaltis, Raidestinos, Ioannis, Konstantinos, Xourmouzios, Grigorios, etc.). A fifth-year student of any Byzantine Music Conservatory in Greece can easily chant all the hymns in the corpus.
But, even if one were to study and pat themselves in the back that they performed the "Mega Ison", I want to know how useful such material is in a church setting? Does your priest allow you to perform Kalophonic Eirmoi of Valasios of 20+ duration with kratema in your parish? How often have you introduced these mathemata in your parish?
You see, you make statements about "amanedes" etc., but you do not discuss how an ecclesiasma feels when it is subjected to 37 minutes of a terrirem/nennena/nennano. Is this the church service that you advocate?
Do you know WHY some hymns in the classic texts are called "mathemata" Mr. Nassis? Do you? Please answer this question.
The corpus of our ecclesiastically-practical hymns resides in the eirmologion Mr. Nassis. The eirmologion represents the most authentic expression of our hymnology. Not the "mathemata".
2) In my experience, they are the most reliable, disciplined, and professional individuals to work with.
So, if I understood your comment, only those who follow the Karas method are the most reliable people, the most disciplined people and the most professional people to work with.
The implication of this statement is that everyone else is unreliable, undisciplined and unprofessional.
Is your conclusion based on observation Mr. Nassis? Is it from some objective and published (or unpublished) study that measured the prevalence of reliable vs. unreliable people in a sample of Karas-followers vs. non-Karas followers? Or the prevalence of disciplined vs. undisciplined people in identical sample populations? Or in the prevalence of professional vs. unprofessional in the two sample populations?
How do you define reliable/professional/disciplined? And in what context?
3) And all they care about is the pure tradition of byzantine music....
The term "pure" is the key here. What do you define as pure? Other than Karas, which of the old psaltai (pre-1960s) do you consider "pure".
NG
1) Just compare what 'mathemata' people influenced by Simon Karas chant to what most of the others chant.
Dear Mr. Nassis, unless you have some obscure book that has hymns the rest of the world has never seen or studied, please refrain from making such a nonsensical statement. All the material in the corpus of Byzantine music can be found the classic texts of the old masters (Petros, Iakovos Protopsaltis, Raidestinos, Ioannis, Konstantinos, Xourmouzios, Grigorios, etc.). A fifth-year student of any Byzantine Music Conservatory in Greece can easily chant all the hymns in the corpus.
But, even if one were to study and pat themselves in the back that they performed the "Mega Ison", I want to know how useful such material is in a church setting? Does your priest allow you to perform Kalophonic Eirmoi of Valasios of 20+ duration with kratema in your parish? How often have you introduced these mathemata in your parish?
You see, you make statements about "amanedes" etc., but you do not discuss how an ecclesiasma feels when it is subjected to 37 minutes of a terrirem/nennena/nennano. Is this the church service that you advocate?
Do you know WHY some hymns in the classic texts are called "mathemata" Mr. Nassis? Do you? Please answer this question.
The corpus of our ecclesiastically-practical hymns resides in the eirmologion Mr. Nassis. The eirmologion represents the most authentic expression of our hymnology. Not the "mathemata".
2) In my experience, they are the most reliable, disciplined, and professional individuals to work with.
So, if I understood your comment, only those who follow the Karas method are the most reliable people, the most disciplined people and the most professional people to work with.
The implication of this statement is that everyone else is unreliable, undisciplined and unprofessional.
Is your conclusion based on observation Mr. Nassis? Is it from some objective and published (or unpublished) study that measured the prevalence of reliable vs. unreliable people in a sample of Karas-followers vs. non-Karas followers? Or the prevalence of disciplined vs. undisciplined people in identical sample populations? Or in the prevalence of professional vs. unprofessional in the two sample populations?
How do you define reliable/professional/disciplined? And in what context?
3) And all they care about is the pure tradition of byzantine music....
The term "pure" is the key here. What do you define as pure? Other than Karas, which of the old psaltai (pre-1960s) do you consider "pure".
NG