Greek Music Express

This week on Greek Music Express we will be drawing inspiration from International Women's Day, listening to some special female voices that have already left a remarkable footprint on Greek singing. First stop? Our beloved performer Chrysoula Kechagioglou, who stands out not only for her unique timbre...

Dionysis Tsaknis is a Greek composer, lyricist and singer. His first album was released in 1982, titled The Traveler's Ballad. The following year he released his second album together with Sofia Vossou titled Kali Akroasi. This was followed by the albums Trito Mati in 1987, Ftaine Ta Tragoudia in 1989...

2000. Two dear friends of Thanos Mikroutsikos, Alexandros Myrat and Haris Alexiou, propose to the composer to orchestrate some of his songs for a symphony orchestra, so that they can be presented in a concert at the Athens Concert Hall. Despite his initial reservations, the creator gives in to the pressure....

Composer Ilias Andriopoulos notes: “I introduced the symphonic orchestra for a reason. I didn't do it superficially to play songs that don't lend themselves to such treatments by big orchestras. I don't want to mention now neither colleagues, nor singers who do this simply to show off. In art, things a...

In his lavishly scored oratorio The Liturgy of Orpheus, Yannis Markopoulos combines fragments of Orphic poems with a narrative text by Panos Theodoridis to create a work brimming with melodies, rhythms and instrumental tone colours. The latter include those of guitar, lute, kanonaki, lyre, harp and...

Today,  we shall be listening to a very powerful live recording of a concert of Dionysis Savvopoulos titled Savvorama. Savvopoulos, one of the few "revolutionaries" of the Greek music scene, gave a series of concerts in December 2000 at the Athens Concert Hall. Savvorama is a panorama of Savvopoulos ...

Lena Pappa’s songs have been set to music by the Katsimihas brothers and Yiannis Nikolaou, among others. Pappa notes: “This is something that I consider important because composing music has an educational effect on the general public, through the marriage of two sensibilities, poetry and music”. As fo...

Nikiforos Vrettakos was a Greek poet whose literary career spanned nearly sixty years, along which he published several collections of poetry, prose works, and a long series of articles and literary essays. David Connolly, who has translated several of Vrettakos’ works, writes that his poems are “firmly roo...

Napoleon Lapathiotis is one of the cursed figures of Greek literature, considered an important poet of the neo-symbolist and neo-romantic schools. In his early poems he is influenced by aestheticism and sensualism, while in his last poems he ends up in desperate and melancholic tones, dominated by the...

Karyotakis influenced many of the poets who came after him and created a literary fashion, Karyotacism, which flooded modern Greek poetry. Going against the sentimentality of his era, Karyotakis conveys a sense of the futile. He writes sarcastic poems about the inglorious and the insignificant as a...

Kostas Karyotakis was born in 1896 and died in 1928, committing suicide at the age of just 32. He is considered one of the most representative Greek poets of the 1920s, with his poetry adding a tragic dimension to the neo-Symbolist and neo-Romantic poetry of his time. Today, we are listrening poetry...

Today, our track list includes songs about seagulls – these lovely seabirds that have inspired several Greek music artists. Primarily, seagulls symbolise freedom, flight, departure, adventure, unconventional behaviour. Gulls are resourceful, inquisitive and intelligent, demonstrating complex methods o...

From antiquity and the Greek mythology, horses were associated with military might and prestige. However, in Greek music horses also become symbols of speed and dynamism, while also being humans’ faithful friends.  From the Red Horse of Dynameis tou Aigaiou band to the Twelve Horses of Costas Tournas, he...

Greece is a dog-friendly country and Greek song has been dog-friendly too! From Foivos Delivorias’ Dog in Kolonaki neighborhood to Stathis Drogosis’ Kanellos, there is a massive list of songs where dogs are the protagonists. And by the way, did you know that Ancient Greeks gave to the world not onl...

Today, we celebrate World Radio Day with a collection of songs that include references to our favourite medium. UNESCO writes: “For many generations, radio has remained the most far reaching, easily accessible communication medium that informs and entertains all sectors of society. While in some regions i...

This week, we shift our focus to animals and songs about animals, starting with …cats. In Greece, cats are everywhere, including music! Sensitive songwriters such as Arleta and Afroditi Manou, rock creators such as Lakis Papadopoulos and Vaggelis Germanos, and seasoned vocalists such as Vassilis Papakonstantinou a...

Giannis Poulopoulos sings immigration songs The songs of today’s GME are mostly taken from the album “The songs of foreign lands”, which was released in 1976. This unjustifiably forgotten collection was composed by Giorgos Katsaros, written by Dimitris Iatropoulos and performed by Giannis Poulopoulos. Ο Γιάννης Πουλόπουλος στα «Τραγούδια της Ξενιτιάς» Μια σημαντική δουλειά από το μακρινό 1976, με τη βελούδινη φωνή του Πουλόπουλου, τους εμπνευσμένους στίχους του Ιατρόπουλου και τις στιβαρές μελωδίες του Κατσαρού, που δεν ακούστηκε σχεδόν καθόλου. Πάντως, με το συνεχιζόμενο δράμα της προσφυγιάς και της μετανάστευσης να ξεδιπλώνεται σήμερα, διατηρεί όλη τα διαχρονικότητά της.

Giannis Poulopoulos sings immigration songs The songs of today’s GME are mostly taken from the album “The songs of foreign lands”, which was released in 1976. This unjustifiably forgotten collection was composed by Giorgos Katsaros, written by Dimitris Iatropoulos and performed by Giannis Poulopoulos. Ο Γιάννης Πουλόπουλος στα «Τραγούδια της Ξενιτιάς» Μια σημαντική δουλειά από το μακρινό 1976, με τη βελούδινη φωνή του Πουλόπουλου, τους εμπνευσμένους στίχους του Ιατρόπουλου και τις στιβαρές μελωδίες του Κατσαρού, που δεν ακούστηκε σχεδόν καθόλου. Πάντως, με το συνεχιζόμενο δράμα της προσφυγιάς και της μετανάστευσης να ξεδιπλώνεται σήμερα, διατηρεί όλη τα διαχρονικότητά της.