Cosmopolitan localism as creative self-discovery: Greek Cypriot popular music in the 21st century

Abstract Since around 2005, an increasing number of songs have emerged in the Republic of Cyprus that use elements from the Greek Cypriot cultural heritage, like lyrics in Cypriot Greek, folk music features and other references to ‘tradition’. These songs belong to contemporary genres, including rock, metal, fusion and hip hop, genres that already existed in the country but became ‘localised’ in a different manner, owing to the socio-political context. This article presents the first attempt to situate the popular musicscape of the Republic of Cyprus within debates pertaining to global musical flows, describing this context and arguing that the turn to elements from the Greek Cypriot cultural heritage is a recent phenomenon. We argue that this process signifies a new era of music-making in the Republic of Cyprus that can be theorised as ‘cosmopolitan localism’.