Thanos Mikroutsikos facts for kids

Quick facts for kids Thanos Mikroutsikos
Mikroutsikos in Athens 1991
Background information
Birth name	Athanasios Mikroutsikos
Born	(1947-04-13)13 April 1947 Patras, Greece
Died	28 December 2019(2019-12-28) (aged 72) Athens, Greece
Genres	Éntekhno
Occupation(s)	Composer, Musician, Politician
Instruments	Piano
Years active	1975–2019
Labels	Lyra Records, Minos EMI, CBS Records International, Polydor Records

Athanasios "Thanos" Mikroutsikos (Greek: Αθανάσιος (Θάνος) Μικρούτσικος; 13 April 1947 – 28 December 2019) was a very important Greek composer and politician. Many people consider him one of the most significant composers in recent Greek music history.

About Thanos Mikroutsikos

His Early Life and Family

Thanos Mikroutsikos was born on April 13, 1947, in Patras, Greece. He had an older brother named Andreas Mikroutsikos. Andreas is also a musician, composer, and a well-known television host. Thanos married Maria Papagianni, who writes books for children, in 1996. Sadly, Thanos passed away on December 28, 2019, at the age of 72, after a long battle with cancer.

His Musical Journey

Thanos loved music from a young age. He studied piano and learned how to compose music at the Philharmonic Society of Patras. He also attended the Hellenic Conservatory and took private lessons with a famous teacher, Yiannis Papaioannou. Besides music, he was also very smart in math and studied Mathematics at the National and Kapodistrian University of Athens.

He started creating music in the late 1960s. However, his first official album, Politika Tragoudia (meaning 'Political Songs'), was released in 1975. He often took poems by famous writers like Giannis Ritsos, Vladimir Mayakovsky, and Bertolt Brecht and turned them into songs.

Some of his most famous early albums include Kantata gia ti Makroniso (Cantata for Makronisos), Fouente Ovehouna (Fuenteovejuna), and Troparia gia Foniades (Hymns for Murderers). These songs were very popular during a time of big political change in Greece, known as Metapolitefsi (Regime Change), from 1975 to 1978. His Cantata for Makronisos was special because he experimented with atonality. This means he used musical notes that don't always sound like they fit together in a traditional way, creating unique sounds. This piece was loved at music festivals around the world.

Later, his album Stavros tou Notou (Southern Cross), which used poems by Nikos Kavvadias, opened new doors for his music. He mixed elements of theatre, electronic music, and atonality. He continued to set poems by many other great writers to music, including François Villon and Constantine P. Cavafy. He even wrote an opera called Eleni (Helen) and created music for several children's fairytales.

Thanos worked with many well-known Greek singers. Some of them include Maria Dimitriadi, Haris Alexiou, Dimitris Mitropanos, and George Dalaras. His music was also very popular and recognized in other parts of Europe. He was known for making Greek songs more free and modern. He combined ideas from modern and classical Western music. He also liked to mix traditional and non-traditional sounds.

Beyond composing, he was the artistic director for the New Music Society and the Musical Analogion. He also helped organize and direct the Patras International Festival.

His Political Involvement

Thanos Mikroutsikos

Thanos Mikroutsikos was also very active in Greece's political world since the 1960s. During the difficult years of the Greek military junta of 1967–1974, he was targeted by the government. This was because he spoke out against the dictatorship. After the dictatorship ended and democracy returned, he continued to be involved in politics. He was a member of the EKKE, a political group.

After the elections in October 1993, he became the Deputy Minister of Culture. He worked with the famous actress and Minister of Culture, Melina Mercouri. When Melina Mercouri passed away in 1994, Thanos took over her position as Minister of Culture. He held this important role until 1996. He was also a supporter of the Communist Party of Greece.

Discography