The artistic world is saddened by the news of the death of the Greek musician and composer, Vangelis Papathanasiou.
According to reports, the Greek musician and composer of electronic, progressive, ambient, jazz and orchestral music, also known as Vangelis, was hospitalized in France with coronavirus.
The news was confirmed by the law firm representing Vangelis Papathanasiou.
"It is with great sadness that we announce that the great Greek Vangelis Papathanasiou passed away late Tuesday night, May 17," the statement said.
Who was Vangelis Papathanasiou
Vangelis Papathanasiou was born on March 29, 1943 in Agria Volos. He started composing at the age of four and gave his first public performance at the age of six, without any musical training.
He was self-taught despite the pressure of his parents and his teachers, who urged him to take music lessons. However, he studied classical music, painting and directing at the Academy of Fine Arts in Athens.
He has influenced the development of different musical genres and is considered a pioneer of electronic sound.
He was awarded an Oscar for the music of the 1982 film The Roads of Fire. He has also scored numerous other films such as Blade Runner, 1492: Christopher Columbus, Alexander, El Greco, etc. He has collaborated with Demi Rousso, Irini Pappa and Jon Anderson.
In 1997 he directed the opening ceremony of the 6th IAAF Open Athletics World Championships held at the Panathinaiko Stadium in Athens, His work Mythodia was selected by NASA as the official music for its mission: 2001 Odyssey to Mars, while in 2002 he created the official music for the 2002 Football World Cup in Korea - Japan.
Participation in bands
In the early 1960s he took his first steps in music with his participation in the band Forminx. The vehicle for the group's success was the song Jeronimo Yanka which was a huge success as the 45 album went gold in its first week of release.
In 1968 he moved to Paris and together with Greek artist Demi Russo he formed Aphrodite's Child. The successful double album 666 is considered to have given him the impetus for the beginning of an international career.
While still a member of Aphrodite's Child, he timidly began to dabble in other things. The beginning came in 1970 when he wrote the music for a film by Henry Hapier.
This was followed by an acoustic documentary influenced by the student uprisings in Paris in 1968. In 1973 he began a successful collaboration with director Frederick Rosif on a wildlife documentary series, and shortly before moving to London he released the solo album Earth.
Solo career
In 1975 he left Aphrodite's Child to settle in London. There he established a state-of-the-art music recording facility, Nemo studios.
He released his first collection, Heaven and Hell (1975), followed by other successful albums such as Albedo 0.3 (1976), Spiral (1977) for which he won the international MIDEM Instrumental award, Beaubourg (1978) and China (1979). It was during this period that Papathanasiou began to become known worldwide.
In 1978 he collaborated with the Greek actress Irini Pappa on the album Odes, containing traditional Greek songs, and in 1986 they collaborated again on the album Rhapsodies.
Papathanasiou also made another major collaboration with Jon Anderson on four albums, Short Stories (1978), The Friends of Mr Cairo (1981), Private Collection (1983) and Page of Life (1991).
Compositions for films
A large part of Papathanasiou's compositions were created to accompany film productions as soundtracks. A top soundtrack is Chariots of Fire for the 1981 film of the same name, which won the Academy Award for Best Original Score in 1982.
The film tells the story of the efforts of three British runners at the 1924 Paris Olympics. Papathanasiou has composed music for several fiction films, documentaries and television productions, among which stand out:
- Vortex - The Face of the Jellyfish (1967) by Nikos Koundouros,
- Missing (1982) by Greek director Kostas Gavras,
- Blade Runner (Blade Runner: Extermination Teams, 1982) science fiction film by Ridley Scott,
- The Bounty Mutiny (1984) by Roger Donaldson,
- Francesco (1989) by Liliana Cavani,
- 1492: Christopher Columbus (1492 - Conquest of Paradise, 1992) for which it won both the Echo Awards and the Golden Lion,
- Bitter Moon, (1992) by Roman Polanski,
- Cavafy (1996) by Yannis Smaragdis,
- Alexander (2004) by Oliver Stone,
- El Greco (2007) by Yannis Smaragdis.
- Music about space
The exploration of space has fascinated him since his early childhood, as he has stated himself. Much of his work is devoted to it, and over the years leading space organisations have trusted him to set their hits to music.
In 1980 Carl Sagan's American television series Cosmos: A Personal Voyage began airing, focusing on the place of humans in the universe and the existence of extraterrestrial life. The musical score for the episodes was created by Papathanasiou, and the series won an Emmy Award and was broadcast in 69 countries to 500 million viewers.
In the summer of 2001 Papathanasiou presented the work Mythody on the Pillars of Olympian Zeus. The music for the work was created to accompany the NASA 2001: Odyssey to Mars space mission. It was a spectacular musical performance, during which special visual effects were used to project depictions of mainly ancient Greek gods and NASA space images.
The solo parts of the work were performed by sopranos Jessie Norman and Kathleen Battle. Also participating were the London Metropolitan Orchestra, a 120-voice chorus of the National Opera House and the composer himself handled the keyboards. The work was televised around the world and there were giant screens at the Panathinaiko Stadium. At the end of the musical performance, the French government, represented by Minister of Education Jacques Lang, awarded Papathanassiou the Order of the Legion of Honor in a ceremony held on the peristyle of the Zappeion.
Two years later, NASA awarded him the Public Contribution Medal in recognition of outstanding contributions to its vision. The award is the highest honor from the American organization for non-governmental individuals.
In 2013, NASA adopted Papathanasiou's music for the second time with an original piece of music created to accompany the video from the Hera (Juno) mission, which simultaneously depicts the motion of the Earth and the moon together for the first time. The video was captured during the mission en route to the Jupiter system.
In November 2014, the European Space Agency (ESA) asked Papathanasiou to compose the music for the first historic comet landing. Thus, he composed a musical trilogy (Arrival, Philae's Journey and Rosetta's Waltz) which was presented by ESA after the successful landing of the Rosetta spacecraft on Comet 67P.
In 1995, as a tribute to his musical contribution and his love of space, the Minor Planet Center of the International Astronomical Union named the composer after the Main Belt Asteroid 6354, now called 6354 Vangelis.
Various musical creations
- 1982: Creates the ERT news soundtrack, which has continued to be heard on television newscasts to this day, with the exception of the period 2013-2015.
- 1991: Takes on the music for the documentaries of world-renowned oceanographer Jacques-Yves Cousteau.
- 1998: Writes the album Homage to Greco, the proceeds of which were used to support the National Gallery's campaign to acquire El Greco's painting Saint Peter.
- 1999.
- 2002. In 1983 he created the music for Michael Cacoyannis' performance Electra at the Ancient Theatre of Epidaurus, starring Irini Pappa.
He has also worked with the Royal Ballets, creating the music for three plays, The R B Sque (1980) performed at the Royal Drury Lane Theatre, The Frankenstein (1985) and Beauty and the Beast (1986).
Other works
His interest in the arts was not limited to composing music. In 1997 he made his first attempt at directing, as he planned and directed the opening ceremony of the 6th IAAF World Open Athletics Championships held at the Panathenaic Stadium in Athens.
In 2003 he revealed his talent for painting by presenting 70 of his own paintings at the Valencia Biennial in Spain. Following the success of the Vangelis Pintura exhibition, his works were exhibited in major galleries around the world.
In the same year, Papathanasiou also presented a book containing some of his finest works, entitled Vangelis.
Awards and distinctions
- Oscar for Best Original Song 1982 For the music in the film Roads of Fire.
- Golden Lion at the Cannes Lions International Advertising Festival, for the music Ask the Mountains in a television commercial.
- Max Steiner Award in 1989, for composition and presentation of distinguished film music.
- Echo Award (Germany) for International Artist of the Year 1992.
- Flanders International Film Festival (Belgium) Award for best soundtrack for a film.
- Valencia International Film Festival Award for best soundtrack for a film.
- Valencia International Film Festival Award for best soundtrack for a film.
- Audience Award for best film soundtrack by the World Academy of Music Scoring in Flanders, Belgium.
- Apollo Award in 1993 for his contribution to music by the Society of Friends of the National Opera.
- Knight of the Order of Arts and Letters of the French Republic in 1992.
- Knight of the Order of Arts and Letters of the French Republic in 1992. The award was presented by the French Minister of Education.
- Twice the Monte Carlo World Music Prize for the best-selling Greek artist.
- The title of Knight of the Legion of Honour of the French Republic in 2001.
- RIAJ (Recording Industry of Japan) Award for International Song of the Year 2002.
- RIAJ (Recording Industry of Japan) Award for International Song of the Year 2002.
- NASA Public Contribution Medal in recognition of outstanding contribution to the vision of NASA in 2003.
- In 2013, Hellenic Post issued stamps depicting him.
- Honorary Doctorate from the National and Kapodistrian University of Athens in 2008, granting him the distinguished title of Professor Emeritus. His doctorate was awarded for his outstanding contribution to the musical education of the Greek people, as well as for spreading the message of
Hellenism throughout the world.
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