Pavlo

Pavlo: Plays Well with Others

On January 31, the Historic Holmes Theatre will host an intimate evening of music. Canadian acoustic guitarist Pavlo will take the stage with five ethnic musicians to bring a program of his original music.

Pavlo was named World Artist of the Year in 2004 by the Canadian Independent Music Awards and his second album, Fantasia, won a Juno for the Best Instrumental Album in 2000.

He is currently touring in support of his seventh album, “Live at Massey Hall.” He will also be publicizing his new PBS special, being taped at the Ford Community and Performing Arts Center in Dearborn, Michigan, this Friday. That concert extravaganza, “Pavlo’s Mediterranean Nights,” will have sixteen musicians and dancers and will be aired on PBS stations across the country later this year. It will also be available on DVD.

“After coming off of a huge show like the one we’re doing, I long for a more intimate setting,” Pavlo said in a recent interview. Immediately after the taping of that concert, he will be performing on a smaller stage in three cities, including Detroit Lakes. “I’m actually looking forward to it. There will be five musicians on stage. It’s going to be fantastic. Sometimes, the music is even more well-received when it’s a little bit more naked,” he admitted.

Pavlo is Canadian-born but his parents came from Greece in the mid-60s. Two of his band members are of Greek descent. Spryos Gazetos, the longest serving member of his band, plays bass, keys, and bouzouki, a mandolin-type instrument, and George Vasilakos also plays bouzouki and guitar. Gino Mirizio, percussionist and piano player, is Italian and is adept at a variety of hand-drums, including timbale, congas, cajon, djembe, doumek, and ud. Randy Rodrigues, bass, is of Portuguese descent, and Densil Femdios, the keyboard player, was born in Kenya and is of Portuguese descent. These musicians add flavor to Pavlo’s already rich mix of flamenco, classical, and Greek-inspired melodies.

Pavlo started playing guitar in earnest when he was ten. In fact, he played so much that his mother began to worry about him, encouraging him to go outside and play. “I enjoyed playing guitar that much,” he said. But it was more than just learning his instrument. “I also started to create. Obviously, writing songs at the age of twelve—they were pretty bad. But the intention was the there, the need, the desire to create music, to write music, to come up with my own melodies was sort of innate right from the start. This is some of the craft that I have built over the years, not playing my guitar behind my head and all this kind of stuff. It is writing music that means something to me.”

Though Pavlo played in a few rock bands in his teens and twenties and was writing melodies for them, it was a trip to Greece that made the essential connection for him. He discovered what he called Mediterranean music, a joyful, celebratory music that moved him and began to move others. He wasn’t able to attract a record label but toured all over North America and sold CDs out of the trunk of his car. Eventually, his second album a sold a million copies. In the ten years since he has started recording, his music has been recorded on soundtracks for The Chris Issak Show, The L Word, and the film “Marine Life,” starring Cybil Shepherd. He also has performed for His Royal Highness, Prince Charles.