Smyrna Trio were a

Rebetiko Rebetiko ( el, ρεμπέτικο, ), plural rebetika ( ), occasionally transliterated as rembetiko or rebetico, is a term used today to designate originally disparate kinds of urban Greek music which have come to be grouped together since the s ...

trio consisting of

Roza Eskenazi Roza Eskenazi (mid-1890s – 2 December 1980, Greek: Ρόζα Εσκενάζυ) was a famous Jewish-Greek dancer and singer of ''rebetiko'', Greek folk music, Kanto and Turkish folk music born in Istanbul, whose recording and stage career extend ...

(vocals, percussion), Agapios Tomboulis (

Oud , image=File:oud2.jpg , image_capt=Syrian oud made by Abdo Nahat in 1921 , background= , classification= * String instruments *Necked bowl lutes , hornbostel_sachs=321.321-6 , hornbostel_sachs_desc=Composite chordophone sounded with a plectrum , ...

) and Lambros Leondaridis (

Classical kemençe The classical ''kemenche'' ( tr, Klasik kemençe), ('pear-shaped kemenche') or ( el, πολίτικη λύρα, 'Constantinopolitan lyre') is a pear-shaped bowed instrument that derived from the medieval Greek byzantine lyre. It was mainly u ...

). The trio would briefly become a Quartet in 1932 when violinist

Dimitrios Semsis Dimitrios Semsis, also known as Dimitrios Salonikios ( el, Δημήτρης Σέμσης; 1883 – 13 January 1950), was a Greek violinist born Dimitrios Koukoudeas (Δημήτριος Κουκουδέας) in Strumica, in the Salonica Vilayet ...

joined soon after the quartet would return to a trio when Lambros Leondaridis left the group some time in 1932.

Background

Roza Eskenazi started her career sometime in the 1920s as a solo performer where she would sing for patrons of the clubs in Greek, Turkish, and Armenian. It was in the club scene where she was first "discovered" by well-known composer and impresario Panagiotis Toundas in the late 1920s. Toundas immediately recognized her talent and introduced her to Vassilis Toumbakaris of

Columbia Records Columbia Records is an American record label owned by Sony Music, Sony Music Entertainment, a subsidiary of Sony Corporation of America, the North American division of Japanese Conglomerate (company), conglomerate Sony. It was founded on Janua ...

. Roza, in 1929, cut four sides for Columbia, three of which were amanedes (Tzivaeri, Minore, and Matzore) and one demotic (Emorfi Pou Ein I Leivadia). It was around 1929 when Rosa first met Oudist; Agapios Tomboulis. Tomboulis began playing for Roza on the club scene for the rest of 1929. The following year they both met

player Lambros Leondaridis, after the pair's meeting Leondaridis he began playing with them in the clubs. That year they formed the Smyrna Trio.

Early years (1930-32)

Roza continued recording records for Columbia with Tomboulis and Leondaridis playing the instrumentation on the record tho they were officially a trio Columbia credit the recordings to just Roza. Some of the music was folk songs, especially from Greece and

Smyrna Smyrna ( ; grc, Σμύρνη, Smýrnē, or , ) was a Greek city located at a strategic point on the Aegean coast of Anatolia. Due to its advantageous port conditions, its ease of defence, and its good inland connections, Smyrna rose to promi ...

(

İzmir İzmir ( , ; ), also spelled Izmir, is a metropolitan city in the western extremity of Anatolia, capital of the province of the same name. It is the third most populous city in Turkey, after Istanbul and Ankara and the second largest urban agglo ...

) in Turkey. Her most important contribution to the local music scene, however, was her recordings of Rebetiko and especially the Smyrna school of Rebetiko. She was, almost single-handedly, responsible for the breakthrough of this style into popular culture, and even today her unique sound is still identified with the genre but as they were not credited as a trio Agapios Tomboulis and Lambros Leondaridis were over shadowed as to their contribution to the genre becoming into popular culture. {{Rembetika Greek musical trios Rebetiko musicians 1930s in Greece