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Motel Selenik is a colourful band of 17 young people who play modern folk music from the Balkans, Spain, Turkey, Serbia. The members of the orchestra have music or polytechnic education and almost all of them play at fairs and weddings across the Balkan countries in order to earn some money. The band was formed two years ago when the friends-musicians decided to make a band for composed music and began rehearsals. Some live in Thessaloniki, while the vocalists live outside the city – Elena lives in Spain, Matina lives on the island of Rhodes, and Christos lives in Soufli. They agree on the Internet which songs to make and gather with the singers a week before the concert to learn the new songs. All Motel Selenik members have their nicknames and functions at the motel. Kostas Poulianakis is one of the older generation, as he himself says and one of the four band members who played together for ten years. We met with him on the occasion of their concert in Athens to tell us about the group and about the tradition - the good combinations of musical instruments they do not follow in their group but on the contrary - they even mix drum with uti. And the unexpected result is a special combination of sounds that takes the audience on a magical journey through the rhythms of the Balkans and the East.

Tell me about the group first – how did you get together and decided to play music, which we listen to at fairs and weddings in its raw, in clubs or concerts?

We who are the older generation of the band got acquainted and started playing together ten years ago. We met at a concert of the Photographic Club at the Aristotle University of Thessaloniki - four people from the Polytechnic department. The music we play is not folk one. We could say it is a modern vision of folk music as there are folk influences from the Balkans, Turkey, Spain, from anywhere. We play remixes of old songs, but we have our songs – we have songs from Arab countries, from Andalusia, from Serbia, Turkey. A song should appeal to all of us to make it but we have common tastes in music. We are not a group that will decide that we need a particular instrument and will look for someone who play this particular instrument. We are a large company that wanted to make this band and we just made it. It's nice that we are a company. But we all exist in great balance - there are four wind instruments – wooden flute, accordion, clarinet, trumpet, we also have cello, guitar, violin and uti, we have drums – rek, bendir, goblet drums, and drums, three singers and two dancers. But the dancers are not in the band permanently.

All people listened to electronic music in Thessaloniki ten years ago. Even you toured as a DJ but something happened suddenly and many young people turned to folk music, to folk instruments and you started playing and spending endless hours in rehearsals. How did it all happen?

I went to Spain for a few months then where I heard the djembe and decided that I want to learn to play percussion instruments. I returned to Greece and instead of learning to play djembe I began to play goblet drums. The four of us are alike - we started from the polytechnic department and became musicians. However, Panagiotis (plays uti) and Alexander (plays drums) are still active in engineering. The four of us (Kostas, Alexandros, Panagiotis and Stathis) from the older generation met the others who are younger than us at the University of Macedonia, where there is specialization in music. At one point, Stathis and Alexandros began to attend some music lessons at the university because they are open to all and got acquainted with the other boys. So, we all met. I still play different instruments but it seems that I do the drums better than the others.

What did you do before getting down to the music and decide that this is your calling?

Stathis was a good basketball player, then he became a good climber and then - a very good musician. But he was always good at women. He is graduated engineer but engaged with music. Now he is drummer, but plays other percussion instruments. At the same time he is attending flamenco lessons and learning Bulgarian language. He travels very often across the Balkan countries and plays at various festivals. Panagiotis started playing uti ten years ago and never left it and we are friends ever since we all met. After graduating from the University of Thessaloniki and taking my engineering diploma I went to Crete as I'm from there. But one day my friends called me and told me they had made a band and I was in it. They told me that they started rehearsals. It was a little strange because I do not live in Thessaloniki but Elena also travels all the way from Spain to come to the concerts. Matina comes from the island of Rhodes. It's funny because we were searching the group name for a long time. We liked ‘Selenik’ first (as they say in their site "We hope this name means Thessaloniki in a local dialect, but the truth is that they liked it because it sounds like a melody - editor's note). Then we came up to ‘motel’. We all lived in Thessaloniki, but no one was born there, so that Thessaloniki is where we are guests - something like a motel. Alexandros is also a drummer and he is also going to play at fairs, weddings, festivals, celebrations and thus supports himself. Except for me because they all play at fairs and now I teach percussion folk musical instruments and rhythm at the University of Macedonia.

How did it happen to teach music at the university? It sounds like a dream that has come true to you - to play and be able at the same time to give your knowledge to people who are really keen on dealing with music...

It happened by chance. For the first time I am teaching music to people who have a true desire to learn. For me this is paradise. It couldn’t be better. I have enough spare time to learn different songs, which is part of my job. I was offered to teach at the university, because those who taught traditional percussion instruments before did not have higher education diplomas and they could not teach according to the law. And because they knew me with the company and with my work in Crete they offered me to teach at the Faculty of Music and Arts. I teach traditional percussion musical instruments to those who specialize and a rhythm course too.

Well, how did you decide to do something different out of the weddings and fairs?

We decided later that we want to play something more substantial so that people could listen to a music composition, not to get drunk, dance and rage. It is different to go to play at a fair - you need no rehearsal, you go there and play what you know and whatever. But endless rehearsals are needed for what we are currently doing to make it. We have our maestro who writes the songs and is the leader of the band - Stamatis Pasopoulos. He is one of the four people from the band who are from Serres. What I feel is good in the band is that there is no someone famous or virtuoso musician to be the leader in the concerts. We are a company, we are very bound to each other and what we do is the result these good relations we have with each other.

If someone wants to learn to play traditional instruments, where to do it?

There are many schools in Athens and Thessaloniki. There is a very good school in Crete - Ross Daly’s Labyrinth. Ross Daly plays the strings, however, he specializes in music of the Cretan lyra. He holds seminars in Crete every summer for two months. People come from around the world and pay very low prices. It costs 250 euros including breakfast and stay and the seminars are held for six days between 6-10 hours a day. I was lucky because I went to Crete, I went to a village called Ahranes, which is very close to the school of Ross Daly, and I found myself to the fountain of music. He has influenced many people. Many think he earns much money from this whole story, but it is not true. He is just wasting his time because he is permanently dealing with bureaucracy. He also has founded a museum of music organs from around the East - from Greece to China.

What do you find in traditional music and how does Motel Selenik develop it and make it modern?

I find only wisdom in musical traditions which is due to the fact that people were playing together for thousands of years and different groups of musical instruments which fit as sound have formed not coincidentally. For example, the sound of the bagpipe fits the drums but uti does not fit the drums. But we in our band play drums in combination with uti, which is modernization. This can not happen at a fair because the drum has ten times stronger sound than the uti, while the drum with the bagpipe or the zourla sounds equally strong. If you want to involve a traditional guitar in a band from Crete for example, it will not happen, it doesn’t fit, although there are many good guitar players who play Cretan music. What fits is lyra with lauto. There is wisdom in this, it is not by chance.

What is funny in our group is that in Motel Selenik we all have nicknames and occupation in the motel. We have a receptionist, waiter, maid, responsible for the lift - that's me; we have a savior, driver of the mini-van. We have nicknames - I'm Julio, Stathis is the Thick, Stratis is the Low, Stamatis is the Long, Panagiotis is Patagos, Kristos is Kavála, Dimitris is Bekos. I even forgot to congratulate Dimitris for his name day because I know him as Bekos. We even joke that we could build a motel one day because there are several engineers and architects in the orchestra.

Tell me about the folk music and the young people – how do they identify with it and accept it?

There are many types of traditional music - some types could be listened and also perceived as easy as Balkan music which involves trumpets, wind instruments and could be easily adopted by anyone.You don’t need to be lighten up. You listen to a Balkan rumba and start dancing. Rumbas are played during ‘rakutsaria’ - this is a holiday in Kastoria, which is celebrated after the New Year, on January 6, 7 and 8. Then bands from all parts of the Balkans come to Kastoria. They play in the streets and all the people run after the bands, drinking and dancing. All are fancy dressed and there is fun everywhere. There are similar happenings during the carnivals too some of which have been preserved since ancient times. Everyone could go and have fun without having any idea of folk music. There are other types of folk music such as the Macedonian and if you go to a fair without being able to dance you will get bored because there are round dances that are complex and difficult to dance. It is not like the music of Asia Minor that is also easy with its belly-dances. It doesn’t make sense to listen to music from Ponta if you do not know how to dance. The question is whether you want to learn and to come to this knowledge.

What are your future plans with the group?

We want to tour the Balkan countries and to play, and to do concerts in Spain. Now we have 25 finished songs some of which are remixes, but are very valuable. We decided to make a CD and have concerts meanwhile. It is still early – the band was formed two years ago but because of the Internet we have become more popular – we have over 30,000 visits in myspace.