Roots Music in the Global Village: Cretan Ways of Dealing with the World at Large

This article discusses the role of local music industry within the changing physical, social and cultural landscape of Crete. Conducted over a ten-year period, my fieldwork was at its most intense during 1990, 1991, 1994, 1996, and 2000, and it is these years of research that I refer to in my discussion. These research trips enabled me to collect a range of information that has proven useful when considering globalization processes at work in Crete, and within the Cretan music scene. Informal music making, the presence of music at festive occasions, and talk and debate about music are still important in Cretan life. However, as I hope to show in this article, the impact and development of a local music industry along with a range of other phenomena has progressively and significantly altered the contexts in which Cretan music is heard, performed, talked of and thought about. Today, more than ever, the music industry and the media (from record producers to poster designers) are responsible for shaping a vision of 'traditional music' in Crete. During a period of enormous social and economic change on the island, the music industry has continued to underline and perhaps exploit connections between Cretan music and village life. Moreover, musicians and musical entrepreneurs continue to adapt their activities to the changing and globalizing marketplace whilst tapping into a nostalgic vision of 'tradition' where stock sounds, metaphors and images are used to make powerful statements about Cretanness, roots, authenticity and difference within the Cretan world at large.