Eleni Karaindrou | Artist
Eleni Karaindrou is a Greek modern classical composer born 1941 in Phocis, Greece. She is regarded by many as Greece's most eloquent living composer and is best known for scoring the films of the Greek director Theo Angelopoulos. Karaindrou moved with her family to Athens when she was eight years old, and she studied piano and theory at the Hellenic Conservatory. During the time of the Greek military junta (1967-1974) she lived in Paris where she studied ethnomusicology and orchestration, and improvised with jazz musicians. As an artist, her compositions have been deeply influenced by her immersion in ancient and modern Greek folk music, and the Byzantine melodies she heard in church as a child. Upon her return to Athens, she established a laboratory for traditional instruments and broadcast a series on ethnomusicology on Radio 3 of the Greek national broadcasting company. In 1976 she started collaborating with ECM and has continued to the present day with that label for all her releases. Her first soundtrack album was in 1979 for the movie Periplanissi by Christoforos Christofis. In 1982 she won an award at the Thessaloniki International Film Festival and was noticed by eminent film Director Theo Angelopoulos who was serving as president of the jury. Karaindrou collaborated with the Greek director on his last eight films, from 1984-2008. Karaindrou is prolific composer and recording artist. By 2008 she had composed music for 18 full-length movies, 35 theatrical productions and 11 TV series and television movies. Two of her recent compositions "Elegy for Rosa" and "Refugee's Theme" were featured prominently in the 2015 blockbuster film Mad Max: Fury Road. On her excellent 1986 album The Beekeeper she collaborated with Norwegian Jazz saxophonist and ECM label-mate Jan Garbarek, and on the 1995 album Ulysses' Gaze, she worked with American Violist Kim Kashkashian. Standout album releases include The Beekeeper (1986), Ulysses' Gaze (1995), Eternity and a Day (1998), The Weeping Meadow (2004), plus the live concert recordings Elegy of the Uprooting (2006) and Concert in Athens (2013). In 2021 Eleni Karaindrou was awarded the Lifetime Achievement Award of the Ghent Festival's World Soundtrack Awards.
Artist Website: wikipedia/Eleni_Karaindrou
Featured Albums: Eleni Karaindrou
Related Artists: Jan Garbarek, Maria Farantouri, Kim Kashkashian
