Argyris Kounadis

The Greek composer Argyris Kounadis, born on February 14, 1924, in Constantinople, had a broad body of work that spanned from folk music to avant-garde. He began his musical studies at the Athens Conservatory, studying under Dimitrios Makris and Spyros Farantatos. In 1952, he received a diploma in piano, and in 1956, he obtained a composition diploma from the Greek Conservatory under the guidance of Yiannis A. Papaioannou.

During the German occupation, Kounadis was involved with the National Liberation Front (EAM), and in 1943, he wrote the organization’s first anthem with lyrics by Giorgos Tsapogas. He was arrested for his activities and imprisoned in Kallithea. Fortunately, an Italian musician, who was the prison commander, learned of Kounadis’ musical background and secretly released him three days after his arrest.

From 1950 onwards, he collaborated with Rallou Manou’s Greek Dance Theater, alongside Manos Hadjidakis and Mikis Theodorakis. In 1951, he performed Aram Khachaturian’s Piano Concerto with the State Orchestra of Athens in its first Greek rendition. Around the same time, he started composing for theater and cinema.

Kounadis is considered one of the first Greek composers interested in rebetiko. Rebetiko, along with the music of Bartók and Stravinsky, deeply influenced his early works from 1949 to 1957, most of which he later disowned. However, he preserved four works from that period: “Sketches for a Summer” (6 poems by Giorgos Seferis for baritone and piano, 1949), “Musical Moments” (for violin and piano, 1949-50), “Symphony in E minor with obligato piano,” and “Excerpt from the Lament of Antigone by Sophocles” (for female voice and 5 wind instruments, 1956).

In 1958, with a scholarship from IKY, he pursued studies in composition and orchestral conducting at the Music Academy in Freiburg under the guidance of Wolfgang Fortner and conductor Karl Feter.

After disowning his early works, Kounadis turned his musical focus to atonality, the twelve-tone system, serialism, and aleatoric composition. He embraced a postmodern musical approach with Byzantine rigor, emphasizing melodic expression and dramatic elements, even in purely symphonic works. His inherent lyricism persisted, along with his conviction that “art must continue tradition using contemporary means.”

Among his notable works are the “Chorale for Symphonic Orchestra,” the “Heterophonic Monologues for Symphonic Orchestra,” the “Quintet for Winds,” the “String Quartet,” and others. “Chorale” (1958) was the first Greek composition performed at the events of the Society for Contemporary Music in Cologne in 1959 and the first Greek work played by the Berlin Philharmonic conducted by Wolfgang Fortner in 1961. In 1963, he became Fortner’s assistant and, in 1972, a professor at the Freiburg Academy while also taking over the direction of the music ensemble Musica Viva.

Kounadis composed operas with a particularly satirical mood, such as “The Rubber Coffin,” “The Enchanted Clocks,” and “Teiresias,” which were staged several times in significant German theaters and venues in Athens.

In the ’70s and ’80s, he wrote popular songs that were sung by well-known vocalists and beloved by the audience. Notable songs include “In Plateia Avissinias,” “Do you like Greece,” “Ortsa ta pania” with the voice of Antonis Kalogiannis, and “Den perissevi ypomonii” with the distinctive interpretation of Sotiria Bellou. In the ’50s and early ’60s, he composed music for films such as “Ouranos” by Takis Kanellopoulos and “Antigone” by Giorgos Tzavelas.

Argyris Kounadis, who battled Parkinson’s disease in his later years, passed away on November 22, 2011, in Freiburg, Germany, where he spent most of his life.

Source: Sansimera.gr