Progetto Martha Argerich

italiano

Works

Yannis Constantinidis

Huit Danses des Îles Grecques

 

Yannis Konstantinidis was born in 1903 in the Turkish city of Smyrna (modern-day Izmir), which at that time was inhabited mainly by people of Greek language and culture; he died in Athens in 1984. In 1922, following the Greco-Turkish conflict that forced the Greek community to abandon the city, Konstantinidis moved to Germany, and from 1922 to 1926 he studied in Dresden and Berlin with Kurt Weill and other teachers. After having returned to Greece, he settled in Athens, where he lived for the rest of his life, composing popular music under a pseudonym. The Eight Dances from the Greek Islands, written in 1954, are perhaps his best known composition. These short pieces are based on melodies collected in and around the Greek archipelago; they have been harmonised with impressionistic sensitivity, and the piano writing is highly refined and full of shadings.

1. Allegretto con grazia
2. Allegro moderato ma energico
3. Allegretto
4. Andantino mosso
5. Con moto
6. Allegretto vivo e con spirito
7. Moderato
8. Vivo e giocoso

Performers

Performance