A dramatic idyll in three acts, with Greek songs and dances
The dramatic idyll The Enchanted Shepherd by Spyridon Peresiadis is brought to life through a modern, lyrical interpretation that draws inspiration from memory and oral tradition.
The work serves as a vehicle for returning to rituals, in a long-gone world where nature has a voice and magic tests love. Through musical motifs, grotesque transformations, and folk sounds, this performance becomes a hymn to memory. The past evolves into a place of nostalgia and a tool for reinventing the present, all while remaining an ever-changing part of ourselves.
The Castle of Mytilene: Building on the Past is a diverse show that combines music and theatre, highlighting the events that have shaped the castle’s current form. The audience is virtually taken through seven milestone stops, each featuring a different performance. Each mudbrick of the Castle of Mytilene has been based on an earlier one. Different nations have built upon one another, in a continuous blend of civilizations, using many and diverse materials. How have people shaped the castle over the centuries, and how has the castle influenced those who have lived within its walls? Each different era, connected to the previous one, takes the baton, offering its own stone and contribution for the following era to consider. Yesterday, today, and tomorrow; the past as a guide; the East and the West; the evolution of the structure; always centered on the fusion of the new with the old, as manifested in the castle itself, the people, and art.
A cantata for soprano, wind instruments, and accordion
The cantata for soprano, wind instruments, and accordion Vrykolax in Kabeirio is a musical fairy tale for both the defeated and invincible vampires of our era, seen through the eyes of composer Apostolis Koutsogiannis in collaboration with poets Marlene Nika and Seme Selami.
It is a lyrical performance beneath the August moonlight at the archaeological site of Kabeirio on Lemnos, featuring the international soprano Afroditi Patoulidou and the distinguished instrumental ensemble Ventus Ensemble. The sculptures created by visual artist Filippos Vasileiou draw inspiration from Gregorio Dati’s Renaissance pictures, unveiling the myth’s diverse textures. Iakovos Polylas’ Forgiveness and Achilleas Paraschos’ The Vampire’s Son, two dark vampire novellas from the 19th century, serve as a reminder of an irrational universe, engaging with the original libretto of the creators and delivering a powerful message against the disenchantment of the world.
Between 1898 and 1899, French wanderer and linguist Hubert Pernot met the self-taught intellectual N. Kanellakis and recorded 114 traditional melodies from the island of Chios. A fortunate encounter! This was not the first time that composers explored this rich musical and cultural material: a prominent position among them is held by Maurice Ravel with his Cinq mélodies populaires grecques [Five Greek Folk Melodies, 1904-1906] and Michalis Adamis with his Folk Songs from Chios (1989).
Lefteris Veniadis selects twelve of these recorded folk songs from Chios to recreate and reintroduce them to the public. In this performance, he proposes an alternative, unified narrative of the local collective experience on stage, serving as a contrasting foil to a contemporary chorus. This dramaturgical venture aims to bring the past into the present while also looking to the future.
Based on oral history and experiential-biographical material, The Memory of Water foregrounds the value of memory and the importance of its preservation for reasons of historical and cultural cohesion and continuity, bringing out traces of the refugee identity of the island of Lesvos through the eyes of the young generation.
The project consists of two creative parts. The first part is the planning and implementation of an experiential documentary-theatre workshop with the participation of adolescent students of Lesvos, in collaboration with the Model General High School of Mytilene of the University of the Aegean.
The second part includes the creation of a documentary-theatre performance, with the participation of the same teenagers as “experiential performers”, handing over the baton to them so that they can explore, own, and bring to life the stories of their ancestors through experiential research and performance art.
As Above So Below: an experiential performance designed for the Kabeirion of Lemnos, the oldest known Greek Sanctuary connecting the spiritual heritage of the Asia Minor refugees with ritual memories of antiquity and the worship of Cabeiri. Sacred Fire, the element of destruction and regeneration, becomes the thread connecting Greeks with the Light and the greatness of the Universe.
The creator of the first underwater performance in Sounio and the vigil night in Fygaleia, director and choreographer Apostolia Papadamaki, connects cultural heritage with performing arts in a performance-ritual by renowned artists Savina Yannatou, Thanasis Efthymiadis, Maria Papageorgiou, professional dancers, and local volunteers under the full moon.
The music is composed by Trifon Koutsourelis.
A performance based on the novel of Giannis Makridakis and the journey of uprooting and moving to a new homeland accompanied by its sounds and images.
A shipwreck between Chios and Cesme sets in motion the unfolding of a multifaceted story inspired by family narrations. The story attempts a deep introspection to memory and perishability.
Anestis, the castaway, struggles to put his past in order and take decisions about his present. His homing pigeons, are trained to return to their “homeland” ignoring the borders and linking the past to the present. Images and sounds from the route Smyrna to Chios alternate and illuminate a multifaceted memory journey.
Generations of pigeons together with generations of people are moving in parallel. Their direction is constantly changing as it is determined by the History and many coincidences.
Singer Eleni Tsaligopoulou, actress Eleni Kokkidou and six virtuoso musicians invite us to join them on a journey through notes and words in the beginning of the 20th century, a journey full of the cosmopolitan atmosphere of the city that will always be a reference point in modern Greek history.
Smyrna, in all its legendary beauty and with its tragic ending, will always be the most loved “lost motherland” of the Greeks.
One hundred years later, on the occasion of the sad anniversary of the Asia Minor Catastrophe, Eleni Tsaligopoulou performs timeless songs from Smyrna and of composers of the time, while Eleni Kokkidou narrates testimonies of the uprooting and excerpts from relevant works of Greek literature. A concert full of history, dedicated to the memory that calls these songs its motherland, by two leading artists.
Continuing its research on intergenerational participatory story-telling, the APARAMILLON creative team focuses on the Asia Minor Catastrophe and the story of two places directly linked to the ’22 refugees. Nikaia and the island of Chios, one of the main first stations of the uprooted.
The basic dramaturgical stepping-off point is the concept of the house, both as the material manifestation of relationships grounded in a specific space and as a mental construction. A house is placed on the stage as a scenic indicator of every lost house of the refugees and at the same time of their effort to acquire a new roof over their heads.
The dramaturgy draws upon testimonies and archival material from refugee associations, engaging in a conversation with melodies performed by the students of the Musical Schools of Chios, in a scenic fusion of theatre with music, which bridges two places and two eras.
The musical ensemble Oros Ensemble joins forces with the Environmental Protection and Architectural Heritage Club of Lemnos “Anemoessa”, as part of a special initiative. Using art, environmental protection and primary production as goals and as a creative core, a site-specific lyrical performance is created. At its centre lies Lemnos, the “Volcanic Island”, the “granary of the Aegean”, the flattest island of Greece, with its unending wheatfields that has brought forth unique native varieties.
For the project Seeds in Danger or The Sound of the White-Eyed Beans, Afkos and Barley Oros Ensemble and Anemoessa collaborate with baritone Tassis Christoyannis and the local Kournos Music Festival, which aims at organising site-specific music-centered events both in the island’s natural environment and in selected buildings of historical or architectural importance. The production will be supported by Danai Sfakianou, an agronomist whose goal is to support traditional practices of the primary sector, so as to help preserve biodiversity and the special landscape of Lemnos.