Pavlos Karrer / Παύλος Καρρέρ

I grew old, guys. Fifty years a kleftis*
I did not get my fill of sleep, and now, at rest,
I want to go to sleep. My heart has run dry.
I have shed a fountain of blood, not a drop remains.

Who knows what tree will grow from my grave!
And if it is a plane tree that grows, in its shade
the young children of the Kleftes will come to hang their weapons.
to make their wounds sail away, to forgive Demo.

Run, my child, quickly, run up high on the ridge
and fire my rifle. On top of my sleep.

Demos heard the sound in the depths of his sleep,
His white lip smiled, he crossed his arms…
Old man Demos died, old man Demos is gone.

(translation: Eva Johanos
*Kleftis: a freedom fighter living wild in the mountains during the Greek war of independence from the 400-year long Turkish occupation)

In 1850 Pavlos Karrer traveled to Milan, where he took music lessons with Bosserone, Winter and Tassistri.
In many of his melodramatic works Pavlos Karrer used subjects inspired by Greek history. Of course, Karrer, like most of the composers from [that group of islands, the "Heptanese"], found it necessary to use Italian pieces in his works. Besides the use, however, of the Italian language in his works, it seems that Karrer usually made sure that a Greek translation of each piece also existed. This fact perhaps makes visible a conscious effort to create Greek ethnic music within the framework of the evolution of European music.

Karrer’s operas were performed quite a few times and with a lot of success in Greece and abroad. His works were published in Italy and in Greece, and he can be considered one of the most widely recognized- outside of Greece- composers from the Heptanese.”