KËNGË KORÇARE: SONG-MAKING AND MUSICAL CULTURE IN THE CITY OF KORÇË DURING THE TWENTIETH CENTURY

This research is placed in the city of Korça (southeastern Albania). It focuses on Këngë Korçare (Korça’s songs), a repertoire that anchored in place from the early 1900s as outcome of urban changes (the city played a special role in the historical and cultural events of the region and of the Albanian nation during that period) and as a consequence of mobility, migration, regional interconnections, and westernization. Since then, it made an ‘active’ singing tradition close to urban repertoires like Kantadhes, Neapolitan songs, Dalmatian town songs, and Fado. My dissertation investigates the historical development of these songs from their anchoring in place up to the early 1990s. It studies the practice, the protagonists, musical behaviors, and recording legacies. Bordering the fields of popular music and urban ethnomusicology, these narratives show also the changeable traits through time of notions like tradition, folklore, and popular music. The socio- political situation of Albania during this period is integral to this study. Central however in the narratives is the musical culture of a local life-world and its interconnectedness with regional, interregional, national, and Mediterranean contexts.