It’s a long way from Montana to Piraeus, where the rebellious “Greek Blues,” of rebetiko, the music of refugees who fled the aftermath of the Greco-Turkish war in Anatolia, settled and sang of poverty, love and loss and sorrow, but those rhythms were heard at the festival of the norther U.S. state played by the Greek Rebetiko Trio out of Los Angeles.

John Floridis, the host and producer of Musician’s Spotlight on Montana Public Radio, wrote incisively about the sources of rebetiko and the musicians in the trio, including singer and bouzouki player Dimitris Mann, who grew up on the island of Mykonos and discovered the music on 78 rpm records in the attic of his grandfather’s barbershop in Piraeus.

Mann teamed with Panos Tsigkos and Giorgos Galanakis to form the trio who want to bring the beloved soulful Greek music to a broader audience.