“Essentially, rebetiko songs are love letters. […] They are folk chants of love, and above all, of erotic abandonment. At least half of all rebetika take love as their subject, and most of these mourn the anguish of separation – the most bitter form of orphanhood. […] Where the rural ballad exalts the lover’s bravery, the rebetiko song gives us the lover who pleads, who supplicates, who wins sympathy through pity. Rebetiko has turned all-conquering love into a litany, where embraces are spiritual and memory reigns.