PROMETHEAS NEWSLETTER 001-06-2000

June 2001

INTRODUCTION

Prometheas is pleased to inform you that starting the first of June 2001, we have added a Newsletter to our web site, which we plan to update at least monthly. The Newsletter includes mainly Greek cultural news and events, as well as activities of Prometheas. So, please look for it the first week of each month. Also, more content will be added, but whenever it is available. Look for a mark ("current") next to the main topics of the homepage, which indicates that new material has been added in this topic since the last month.

We encourage all "visitors" to our web site to provide us with your feedback if you have any comments to make on both content and the web site structure in general. Send comments to comments@prometheas.org

Elections of Prometheas were held on April 27th and in its first Board meeting of May 3rd. The new Board, consisting of the President and 14 members, was installed and responsibilities assigned. 

On May 9 and 12, Prometheas presented the film "Rebetiko" at the Cineplex Odeon Foundry in Washington, DC. "Rebetiko" was directed by Costas Ferris with music by Stavros Xarhakos and lyrics by Nikos Gatsos. At least 250 attended the two shows launching successfully a series of Classic Greek films to be presented in DC. Stay tuned for more films later in the Fall ’01.

64 Students from the Mid-Atlantic States Take Part in this Year’s Test for Certificate of Greek Language

The tests for the Certificate for Greek Language took place on May 15-16. The Center for Greek Language of the Ministry of Education announced that 64 students from the mid-Atlantic States (incl. Washington DC) took part in these tests. To see the complete announcement, please click here . It should be emphasized that students who pass these tests are entitled to credits in most US universities. For more information on next year’s tests, interested students may call Ms. Ergini Batistatou (ergini@aol.com) or Ms. Lena Petropoulou (skpetrop@worldnet.att.net), both members of the Prometheas’ Board.

The Choir of Corfu that visited the Washington DC area a few months ago (Fall ’00) and under the auspices of Prometheas presented an excellent program, celebrated its 20^th anniversary in Corfu. On the occasion of this anniversary it released its anniversary poem that reflects the choir’s history and personality in a simple yet colorful way.

A team of naval historians and the Nautical Museum of Chania in Crete joined forces to launch an ambitious project: to reconstruct a Minoan wooden galley of around 1500 BC and sail it from Crete to Piraeus in 2004.

The Karamanlis Foundation and Tufts University of MA established the Constantine Karamanlis Chair of Hellenic and Southeastern European Studies at the University’s Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy. The first occupant of the chair will be Dr. Thanos Veremis, professor of political history at the University of Athens.

The School of Comparative Arts and the Department of Classics at Ohio University will hold their Third Annual Panathenaea in Athens Ohio on May 11 and 12. The original Panathenaea were celebrated in ancient Athens during the summer months to honor the birth of goddess Athena. The Ohio University program included:

• Outdoor reading of Homer’s Odyssey in its entirety in both Greek and English. The translation used was Prof. Stanley Lombardo’s of the University of Kansas.
• Virgil’s Aeneid with readings in Latin and/or English. The translation used was by Allen Mandelbaum.

For more info see here.

Odyssey Magazine (May/June 2001) reports on the destruction of Hellenistic artifacts in Kabul’s National Museum. While most attention is being focused on the demolition of the Bamiyan Buddha sculptures, repeated bombing and looting of the museum is wiping out entire collections of artifacts. Greece offered to buy some of Afghanistan’s pre-islamic "idols" that Teleban planned to destroy, but the offer was rejected. A similar offer by New York’s Metropolitan Museum was also rejected.

Steven Karidoyanes, music director of the Plymouth Philharmonic Orchestra since 1994, will continue to conduct the orchestra at least through 2004, after signing multi-year contract. Karidoyanes brings a rich and varied wealth of musical experiences to his post. As a composer, his most recent commission "Café Neon: Fantasy on Greek Songs and Dances" premiered in November, ’00, with the Quincy Symphony Orchestra.

Filmmaker’s Phillipos Koutsalis "Mourning Rock" is proving to be the most successful documentary in recent years. "Mourning Rock" is a lyrical tribute to a decade of destructive development in Elefsina where many archeological findings have been buried. After receiving several awards at Thessaloniki’s Film Festival, it was translated into French and could be heading for the Cannes festival. An English translation is being prepared, too.

MUSIC: " Exploring the Song Music for Solo Voice by Mikis Theodorakis: Music from Phaedra and Veatriki stin Odo Miden ".

Featuring special guest artist from the Concert Stage.

Guest Speaker Gail Holst-Warhaft, professor of Compar. Liter. & Classics, Cornell U

Introduced by Peter Tiboris, music director and conductor of the Manhattan Philharmonic. Thursday, June 7 2001 at 7:30pm.

For Reservations call (212) 486-4448 or contact by e.mail at info@onassisusa.org

Other events by the same center: Jazz concert by Dimitrios Vassilakis on June 14.

For more information call (703) 684-7990

For more info, call 202-393-7790

Grand Hotel, New York City

New York Hilton Hotel, New York City

Dramatic reading of Iakovos Kambanellis’ "Monologues" and "The Road from Within" at the annual C. Fenno Hoffman Evening of Greek Theater. The Greek Institute, Cambridge, MA, June 18.

The Greek Music Society of Boston, MA, presents "The Violin and Bowed Instruments in Greek Music", by Beth Cohen. Maliotis Cultural Center, Brookline, MA, on June 19. For more info, call Chris Pantazelos at 617-489-4939

"Opera Aegean" with 24 promising young singers from across the globe, will perform this summer in Athens, Andros, Paros, Syros, Samos and Patras. For more info, see http://www.midamerica-music.com or contact bjstein@midamerica-music.com

• "Running with Pheidippides: Stylianos Kyriakides and the Miracle Marathon", Syracuse University Press, 2001. The story is about Stylianos Kyriakides who was characterized as "the modern Pheidippides" and was the favorite to win, lost the marathon in the 1938 Olympics in Boston. Determined though to win, he left Nazi-occupied Greece to come to the US and he won the 50^th Boston Marathon in 1946 at age 36.

• "Greece: An Illustrated History", Tom Stone, Hippocrene Books Inc., New York, 2000. Tom Stone went to Greece in 1970 and stayed for 22 years. In his "Illustrated History of Greece" he covers the period from the first wave of settlers around 6500 BC to today’s immigrants from the Balkans.

• "Athos: Heaven and Earth", Thessaloniki, June, 2000. Superb collection of photographs by Monk Gabriel Filothetou intended to convey the life in Athos.

• "Monks of Dust: The Holy Men of Mount Athos", Xavier Zimbardo, Rizzoli International Publications, 2001.

ΓΕΝΕΘΛΙΟΣ ΥΜΝΟΣ

Αυτή την όμορφη βραδιά
γιορτή μας πρέπει μόνο
γιατί διαβήκαμε μαζί
είκοσι χρόνια δρόμο.

Επιτυχίες κάναμε
επήραμε βραβεία
την Κέρκυρα δοξάσαμε
στα τέσσερα σημεία.

Στον Πάπα τραγουδήσαμε
στην Κύπρο την γενναία
και φέραμε στην Κέρκυρα
της U.S.A την σημαία.

Σας δίνουμε υπόσχεση
μέσα από την καρδιά μας
πως θ'άμαστε ψηλότερα
στα τριαντάχρονά μας.

 Στα πλαίσια της προσπάθειας προβολής και στήριξης της ελληνικής γλώσσας το Υπουργείο Εθνικής Παιδείας και το Κέντρο Ελληνικής Γλώσσας υλοποιούν ένα πάγιο αίτημα των απανταχού ελληνόγλωσσων και ελληνομαθών: τη θεσμοθέτηση και χορήγηση ενός κρατικού τίτλου πιστοποίησης ελληνομάθειας.