Thessaloniki was founded in 316 BC by Cassander, a general of Alexander the Great, who named the city after his wife and Alexander's half-sister. Many invaders passed through the city, including Romans, Goths, Huns, Avars, Slavs, Arabs, Bulgarians, Venetians, Serbs, and Turks.

During the reign of Galerius, Thessaloniki was the imperial capital, a populous city with international influence and an important hub between East and West. It acquired the title of "co-capital" during the Byzantine Empire and was an important administrative and military center, while at the same time becoming a hub of intellectual and cultural development with a flourishing of education, art, literature, philosophy, architecture, and science, culminating in the 14th century, which is characterized as the Byzantine "golden age of Thessaloniki."

After the city was conquered by the Ottomans in 1432, it remained part of the Ottoman Empire until 1912, when it became part of the Greek state. With the expulsion of the Jewish population from Spain in 1492, Thessaloniki became one of the main destinations for refugees. Their settlement in the city made it an important Jewish metropolis until at least the early 20th century. Especially from the mid-19th century onwards, the city was one of the most cosmopolitan and multicultural urban centres of the Ottoman Empire.

After its incorporation into the Greek state, its population underwent changes in terms of its composition, mainly due to the settlement of many thousands of refugees from Asia Minor in 1922-1923. The departure of the Muslim population from the city in 1923 and the gradual migration until the disappearance of the most active part of the population, the Jews of the city, in 1943, changed forever the image of the "desirable" multicultural coexistence of two empires, the modern Greek state and the neighboring Balkan countries.

Although we can only speculate about music in the ancient city, the many archaeological finds related to music found in the city testify that music was present in the worship and life of the city's inhabitants. The Cabeirian mysteries were abolished in 392 AD and the "Demetria" were established in honor of Saint Demetrius, patron saint of the city.

During the "Demetria," which were revived in the 20th century as an artistic festival every October, merchants from all over the empire and other countries of the East and West gathered in the city and, according to folklorists and historians F. Koukoules (1881-1956), N. Veis (1883-1958), and S. Kyriakidis (1883-1964), celebrations were held and musical and other performances were presented.

There is a separate chapter on "Byzantine music," its development, and its presence to this day. Very little is known about music and musical life in the city until the 19th century. The coexistence of Armenians, Jews, Ottomans and Donmehs, Greeks, peoples of the Balkans and Western and Northern Europe certainly influenced the cultural and civilizational course of the city. The operation of tekkes and coffee houses, inns for travelers in the city, provided a space for the development of a musical "tradition."

In the Ferie tekke, Mevlevi Dervish, and Mevlevihane tekkes (places of worship where the Dervishes lived), the violin was used as an instrument along with the ney. The presence of instrument makers in Thessaloniki, including makers of the laterna (barrel organ), which was widely used for celebrations among the Levantines and Greeks of Constantinople.

Greek and Jewish merchants, even wealthier than the Frankish residents of the city, with close commercial and intellectual ties to Europe, became natural cultural agents. In 1873, the cream of this elite joined forces with European diplomats and founded the Cercle de Thessalonique, which provided facilities and organized high-quality events for their circle and distinguished guests.

For more than 80 years, the circle offered a model of social interaction and a luxurious meeting place for the city's innovative interfaith upper class and important foreign visitors. The railway connection of the city with central and northern Europe in 1887 and the arrival of the Simplon Orient Express in 1888 brought a new atmosphere to the city. Luxurious hotels and entertainment venues were created. At the same time, the first concert was held under the auspices of the Ottoman governor of the city.

The establishment of schools and educational institutions with libraries by communities such as the Alliance Israelite Universelle, the Greek Gymnasium of Thessaloniki, and their connection with European liberal currents gradually distanced the communities from the strict control of religious authorities. Western education gradually transformed the local educational traditions of Muslims. The strong presence of the donmeh ("Dönme": Jews who converted to Islam in the 17th century) in the city contributed greatly to this.

The Ecole des Arts et Metiers, the city's first vocational school, began to educate orphans, mainly Muslims, in music, among other subjects. The railway connection of Thessaloniki, initially with Constantinople and a little later with Vienna, brought troupes and artists who also toured other cities in the eastern Mediterranean, such as Constantinople, Smyrna, Beirut, and Alexandria.

In 1881, an important Greek composer, Dimitrios Lalas (1844-1911), a student of Richard Wagner, settled in Thessaloniki. Lalas, teacher of Sotiris Graikos (1880-1965?), founder of the first Conservatoire in Thessaloniki, and Emile Riadis (1880-1935), among others, greatly influenced the development of Western music in the city. In the 1870s, the first publications about Western music concerts appeared in the press.

The Colombo Hotel, a modern European-style hotel, was established in the Frankish district. It featured a café-santán, where an orchestra played excerpts from operas and foreign artists sang Italian canzonettas, French chansons, and German folk songs.

During the same period, the Italian owners of the Colombo Hotel created an Italian Theater next door, where Italian and French troupes performed opera and melodrama. Both the café-chantants, which increased in number after the Colombo Hotel, and the opera and melodrama performances by foreign and Greek troupes spread European music.

In 1880 an orchestra gave a concert under the auspices of the Ottoman governor of the city. The advent of cinema, despite resistance from conservative circles, gave a boost to the musical life of the time with small orchestras accompanying silent film screenings. At the same time, melodramatic troupes frequently performed famous works of the era, operas and operettas by Western and local composers. They stopped in Thessaloniki on their way to the major theatrical centers of the time, Constantinople, Smyrna, Alexandria, Bucharest, etc.

A characteristic work of the era is the operetta “Leblebici hor-hor agha”, composed in 1875 by the Armenian composer Tigran Choukhanjian.

In 1912 Thessaloniki and northern Greece was annexed with the Hellenic Kingdom. In 1914 Thessaloniki’s Conservatory (State Conservatory of Thessaloniki) was founded by government decision as part of the "westernization" of the city. Musicians, both Greek and foreign, who had come from abroad, were appointed to the newly established Conservatory. Among them were Loris Margaritis (1895-1953), who later became one of the founders of the Salzburg Summer Academy, Emil Riadis, and others.

In 1915, the Thessaloniki Music Society was created, followed by the Musicians' Association in 1923. A few years earlier, the first philharmonic and mandolinata orchestras had been created, the most important of which was the historic philharmonic orchestra of the Papafeio Orphanage. Additionally, from 1900 to 1912, more than 500 songs were recorded, mainly Turkish, fewer Greek, and very few Sephardic.

The musical life of the city after 1912 and its incorporation into the Greek state inevitably followed the changes in the composition of the population. The Greek inhabitants continued their lives as before. Many Greek folk singers began their careers there. The great fire that destroyed the city in 1917 led to the gradual exodus of many Jewish residents, who constituted the majority of the city's population.

The city, known as the "mother of Israel" and with its omnipresent Sephardic traditions, gradually became more homogeneous. The forced exodus of Greek-speaking Christian populations from Asia Minor in 1922 and the settlement of many in Thessaloniki influenced local traditions with their music. The Muslims, with their forced and permanent departure in 1923, took their music and traditions with them.

With the extermination of the city's huge Jewish community, which in the first decade of the 20th century made up more than 60% of the population, by the Nazis in 1943, a large part of its musical tradition was lost forever. After 1945, Thessaloniki bore no resemblance to the multicultural city of the early 20th century.

Turkish, Jewish, and other songs from neighboring countries have now been forgotten. Thessaloniki, once a multicultural city in the Balkans, is becoming homogenized. The establishment of the State Theater, the State Orchestra of Thessaloniki, new conservatories, and later the Schools of Music Studies, initially at Aristotle University of Thessaloniki and later at the University of Macedonia, along with the Thessaloniki Song Festival and the creation of musical groups in the city, brought a new musical aura to the city, leading it into the 21st century.

Aris Bazmadelis