Savina Yannatou, Primavera en Salonico, Lamia Bedioui
Biography Savina Yannatou, Primavera en Salonico, Lamia Bedioui
Primavera en Salonico
was formed in 1993 to play Kostas Vomvolos’s arrangements of Sephardic folk songs with Savina Yannatou, and the core line-up has been stable since then, as a collective of players whose work has touched on idioms from classical and folk music to jazz, experimental music and improvisation. Accordionist and qanun (zither) player Vomvolos has written music for dozens of theatre productions, apt background for shaping instrumental scenarios for Yannatou to inhabit as she moves between songs of different traditions. Oud player Yannis Alexandris works also as a luthier, and like violinist Kyriakos Gouventas, has much experience in the worlds of rebetika and traditional music. Bassist Michalis Siganidis is active in contemporary creative music, and recently issued an album for bass and electronics. Harris Lambrakis has shaped a new role for the nay inside Primavera en Salonico, where this ancient flute is often a lead instrument, responding directly to Yannatou’s voice. Lambrakis is also a featured soloist on Eleni Karaindrou’s album Medea. Heard here as percussionist, Dine Doneff (also known as Kostas Theodorou) is a multi-instrumentalist equally at home on bass and guitar. Lamia Bedioui, born in Tunis, has lived in Greece since 1992. In addition to her own projects and collaborations with Yannatou, she has appeared in concert with Jon Balke’s Siwan ensemble.
Savina Yannatou
studied singing in Athens with Gogo Georgilopoulou and Spiros Sakkas, later attending postgraduate studies at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama in London. She became widely known in Greece through her radio collaborations with composer Lena Platonos. In the 1980s she was a founding member of the Athens Early Music Workshop. In the 1990s, in parallel with the beginnings of Primavera en Salonico, Yannatou intensified her investigations into free improvised music, working with Peter Kowald, Barry Guy, Floros Floridis and others. Her music today reflects all of these influences.
