Eleftheria Arvanitaki
Meno Ektos

LA RECENSIONE

We Mediterraneans have a weakness for tradition connected to contemporaneity. A sensory heritage
whose strong and deep roots will never cease to infuse us with that familial feeling—sometimes unconscious—that is part
of our cells.

One of the greatest interpreters of these sensations is Eleftheria Arvanitaki; a powerful Greek singer
who, first as a part of Opisthodromiki Kompania and then as a solo artist, released the most important album of her
career (the fourth, excluding collaborations) in a fortunate 1991.

In my lonely evenings, I sing Armenian songs,
I wish to go back but paradise has been closed to me

Μένω Εκτός (romanized as Meno Ektos) opens with a marvelous song of abandonment and inadequacy.
The lyrics are written by the famous author Lina Nikolakopoulou, while the crafting of the melodies is entrusted
to notable musicians, among whom stand out names like Nikos Xydakis and Ara Dinkjian.

The latter is credited with the composition of Dinata (the single that truly establishes Eleftheria).
The first version is an instrumental published five years earlier by the group Night Ark (of which Dinkjian was a part).
The introductory notes of the original played on the Cümbüş are replaced by a powerful choir that quickly gives way to the relief of

Possible, possible!
Everything impossible becomes possible

This album reveals various states of mind. The previous optimistic song is countered with a mention of death in
the gripping Prosopo Me Prosopo, which hints at dangerous passions.

Den Apanta accompanies and ends the sequence of tracks, leaving a bitter taste.

All of Meno Ektos can be translated into a successful compromise between Sappho and a new world to approach, mindful that we may have to accept the end of something significant, life, or even love.