Andys Skordis (Cyprus, 1983) is a composer of contemporary music, with special emphasis on large scale works, music theatre and site-specific pieces. Skordis studied composition at Berklee College of Music and at the Conservatorium Van Amsterdam, with additional studies in Karnatic music with Dr Rafael Reina and in Balinese Gamelan at ISI Denpasar in Bali. His work list includes operas, orchestral and chamber pieces, Gamelan music, vocal works, as well as music for dance, theatre and short films. In addition, he has created various music theatre performances in site specific locations like quarries, temples, abandoned buildings, forests, floating stages, which he conducted and directed. His music has been performed worldwide by professional and amateur ensembles, and has received international recognition through prizes including the BUMA Toonzetters prize, one of the most important prizes in The Netherlands, as well as awards from ISCM, Fedora Platform, Third Coast Percussion group, Cyprus Symphony Orchestra, and more. Recently, he received the Berlin Opera Prize 2022 and the Black Pencil Prize 2020. Besides composing he is the founder of the contemporary music ensemble “PATSIAOURA”, he plays guitar with Monsieur Doumani, and he is an active performer in the field of free improvisation. At the moment he lives in Amsterdam where he is a lecturer at the Conservatory Van Amsterdam and composes.

He studied composition (class of Ilias Papadopoulos) and concert accordion (class of Konstantinos Raptis) and did his postgraduate studies in Rotterdam (Codarts) in the subject of contemporary composition with Robin de Raaff (acoustic) and René Uijlenhuit (electronic). In this context, he began his research on ways of approaching the Greek musical tradition through contemporary art and decoding common structural and functional elements of these two apparently “opposite” musical worlds, which ultimately co-exist in his works. In this context also belongs improvisation (acoustic and electronic), which is a key element for him both as a performer and as a composer.

Since 2018 he teaches composition at the Department of Music Science and Art of the University of Macedonia (Thessaloniki, Greece) in the major “Poetics” of the specialization “Greek Traditional (Community) Music”. From the academic year 2020-21 he is a PhD candidate in the above department, while from 2022 he is financially supported by the Foundation for Education and European Culture (IPEP) for the said thesis.

He is active as a composer and performer in the field of traditional and contemporary music. He is a member of the contemporary music ensemble TETTTIX, the free improvisation trio handful of windows and the organizing team of the Thessaloniki International Accordion Festival “REEDBLOCKS”. As a composer, he has collaborated with the Onassis Foundation’s Letters and Arts Center, the Greek National Opera and the Athens-Epidavros Festival.

He has received honors, most notably the 1st Prize in the G. A. Papaioannou International Composition Competition (2016), and 1st Prize in Panhellenic Accordion Competitions (2007, 2009, 2012).

Sorina Savii is a percussionist at the Romanian National Opera in Timișoara.
She graduated from the Faculty of Music in Timișoara in 2006, and obtained his Master’s degree in 2011. She collaborated with all the institutions in Timișoara (Banatul Philharmonic, German Theatre, National Theatre, Hungarian Theatre, Auăleu Theatre, Hoffner Big Band ), but also with Philharmonics and Operas from all over the country. Over the years he has supported many international tours (Serbia, Hungary, Austria, Germany, Italy, Spain, France, England, Iceland, Holland, Belgium, Greece, Qatar, Brazil, China). She taught percussion for 3 years at the Music School in Lugoj. For some time now, she has been organizing percussion workshops for children in Timișoara.

Nicolas Tzortzis is a composer. He was born in Athens in 1978 and has been living in Paris since 2002.
He studied composition and electronic music at the University of Paris 8, musical theater composition with G. Aperghis at the HEA of Bern and with P. Leroux at the University of Montreal.

He was selected for IRCAM’s CURSUS 1 and 2. He has been artist-in-residence at Herrenhaus Edenkoben, Villa Ruffieux, Schloss Solitude and Fulbright visiting scholar at UC Berkeley. His music has been performed in Asia, Australia, Europe and America. His works have been selected in 35 international competitions, for a total of 23 prizes. In 2019, the portrait CD “Les mystères” with Das Neue Ensemble was released by Toccata Classics, while the French Radio commissioned his work “Immobilités”. In the same year, the Musikfabrik ensemble dedicated a portrait concert to his music, playing his Trilogy on Man Ray’s silent films. His discography has a total of six CDs. In the academic year 2020-2021 he was a teaching fellow at the Aristotle University of Thessaloniki. He has taught compositional master-classess in Italy and Spain.

He participated in “A Greek Song Book” of the Greek national Opera with the work “Vents contraires”, based on letters of I. Kapodistrias.
In 2022 he wrote the music for the dance theatre performance “A User’s Manual” by Konstantinos Papanikolaou at the Onassis Cultural Centre. At the same time, he curated the tribute to George Aperghis, a co-production between the Onassis Cultural Centre and the Athens Conservatory.