[ARSCLIST] "Rekorde Shqiptare"

[Lou Judson <inaudio@xxxxxxxxxxx>]

Hope this is not too off topic:

Just trying to help out someone from another list I am on about Balkan 
music and culture. Does anyone here know anything about this?

Does anyone know anything about the series of 78 records issued by
Balkan Records of Chicago under the label "Rekorde Shqiptare"?  This
was done probably around 1950.  They are of Tosk music, polyphonic.
The singer on some is given as Ibrahim Lleskovikut, but most seem to
be violinists Demka Hajros (or something like that).  The Balkan
Records owner, Adnan Asllan, was Albanian and played the llaut, from
what I have heard, and he recorded some on this label.



On this site:
http://www.vasiltole.com/Albanian/Encyclopedia/EncyclopediaD.html,
under "Demka & H," there is an article about them.  I can't read
Albanian, but it appears that Demka and Hajro, father and son, left
Albania and recorded several titles on the Odeon label in Italy.  I
don't know what happened to them later, but I have an LP from the '50s
(on the Rekorde Shqiptare label) and it has a picture of Demka Hajros,
with an address in Detroit.  Most of the 78s on this label I once had,
incidentally, I traded away.  But it now appears that these Rekorde
Shqiptare records were mostly reissues of pre-war recordings made on
the Odeon label in Italy.  Perhaps one of the performers made his way
to Detroit and Asllan (in Chicago) then reissued them.  Is any of this
familiar to anybody?

Let me know and I'll relay it...

Thanks
Lou

Lou Judson • Intuitive Audio
415-883-2689