Cyprus Music

Cypriot music incorporates various traditional, Western classical and Western popular music genres. The traditional music of Cyprus is similar to the traditional music of Greece with Turkish and Arab influences and includes dances such as sousta, syrtos, ballos, tatsia, antikristos, arabiye, karotseris, sinalik, chiftetteli, zeimbekiko and mandra dance.

history
Medieval Music
Cyprus changed hands many times during the Middle Ages and became an important outpost of Christianity and Western European civilization during the Crusades. The island's peak as the cultural capital of Europe lasted from 1359 to 1432. During this period, Pierre I de Lusignan made a three-year European tour and brought with him the French Ars Nova and later Ars Subtilior styles when he returned to Cyprus. French musicians became well established in Cyprus and Nicosia became the capital of the Ars Subtilior style. During the reign of Janus I de Lusignan, Cypriot music developed its own unique style. After her daughter Anne de Lusignan married Louis, Count of Geneva, she brought to Cyprus a manuscript containing 159 folios and containing more than two hundred polyphonic compositions, both sacred and secular. This manuscript is now part of the collection of the National Library of Turin.

Renaissance Music
One of the important figures of the Renaissance period was Ieronimos o Tragodistis (Hieronymus the Cantor), a Cypriot student of Gioseffo Zarlino. Tragodistis, which developed between 1550 and 1560, made significant contributions to music by proposing a system suitable for the existing contrapuntal practices of Medieval Byzantine chant.

Byzantine Music
The music of Cyprus was also influenced by Byzantine music. Athanasios Demetriadis was a Cypriot deacon during the reign of his uncle Yerasimos, Ecumenical Patriarch of Constantinople. A secular song called "That Death Prefers the Young" has survived, included in a collection by Nikiforos Naftouniaris and written and composed by Demetriadis. Chrysanthos of Madytos, Gregory the Protopsaltes, and Chourmouzios the Archivist carried out important reforms in the notation of Greek religious music. These works, carried out in the early 19th century, enabled Byzantine musical symbols to be simplified and made more accessible.

This rich musical heritage reflects the cultural diversity of Cyprus and the different influences it has received throughout history. Cypriot music combines traditional and modern elements, forming an important part of the island's unique cultural identity.