Alexandros Spyrou

Alexandros Spyrou is a Greek composer, academic, and artistic director. In his compositional work, he questions the modernistic paradigm of dialectics and proposes a liquid identity of a-centred multiplicities, which are in a continuous morphallaxis, in a constant state of becoming. His music has been performed internationally across Europe, the Americas, and beyond, by renowned ensembles including Klangforum Wien, London Sinfonietta, JACK Quartet, Ensemble Recherche, Neue Vocalsolisten, MDI Ensemble, Ensemble SurPlus, Trio f : t, Reactive Ensemble, Longleash Trio, ensemble mise-en, Ensemble Airborne Extended, Contemporary Directions Ensemble, Musica Nova, Colere Quartet, Vijf Quintet, Ergon Ensemble, Ensemble DissonArt, and many accomplished soloists. His body of work encompasses chamber and orchestral music, music for electronic media and stage, sound art, and interdisciplinary projects, and is published by Universal Edition in Vienna. 

Alexandros completed his conservatoire and undergraduate studies in Greece, specializing in composition and music theory, and further honed his craft under the mentorship of distinguished composers, studying with Michael Finnissy in the United Kingdom, Beat Furrer in Austria, David Gompper and Josh Levine in the United States. He further attended masterclasses with leading composers such as Aperghis, Billone, Ferneyhough, Lachenmann, and Mahnkopf, enriching his artistic perspective. He has presented his music and research in several festivals and institutions such as the Internationale Ferienkurse für Neue Musik Darmstadt, the Schloss Solitude Akademie, and the Internationales Digitalkunst Festival in Germany, IRCAM Forum in France, Sounds of Matter at the University of Vienna in Austria, the Nordic Percussion Festival in Denmark, the Composit Festival, and the High Score Festival in Italy, the XVIII World Saxophone Congress in Croatia, the Ticino Musica Festival, and the Lugano Arte e Cultura Early Night Modern in Switzerland, the 2020 NASA Biennial Conference at Arizona State University, the Midwest Composers Symposium, the Exchange of Midwestern Collegiate Composers, the mise-en festival, and the Overdrive festival in the United States, the Bathurst Centre for Culture, Arts, Media and Education in Canada, the Festival Expresiones Contemporáneas in Mexico, the Atemporanea Festival in Argentina, the Extended Senses Symposium, and the MUSICON concert series in the United Kingdom, the Bilgi New  Music  Festival  in  Turkey,  the  Beyond Expo Thessaloniki International Fair, the Sacred Music Days, the Piano Festival at the Stavros Niarchos Foundation Cultural Center, the Stegi Onassis Cultural Center, the OutHear New Music Week, and the SKG Bridges Festival in Greece. Notable highlights include his 2019 portrait concert “Liquid Identities” presented at the ORF Kulturhaus in Vienna and the PROGR Zentrum für Kulturproduktion in Bern, and his pioneering Virtual Reality music project “Etude for Virtual Space”, showcased at the 2022 Thessaloniki International Fair. 

Alexandros’s academic and artistic work has been recognized with scholarships from institutions such as the Fulbright Foundation, the British Council, the Goethe Institut, the State Scholarship Foundation of Greece, the City Council of Ioannina, the University of Iowa, the Harry D. Triantafillu Foundation, the Stanley Foundation, the Austrian Agency for Education and Internationalisation (OeAD), the International Society for Contemporary Music Bern. He is the foudner and director of the Delian Academy (Greece), a member of BMI classical (USA), Society of Composers (USA), Greek Composers Union (Greece), GEMA (Germany), Royal Musical Association (UK), a fellow of the Higher Education Academy (UK), and the Royal Society of Arts (UK), and he has received awards such as the Startstipendium for Music Composition (Austrian Federal Chancellery), the Henry and Parker Pelzer Award for excellence in composition (USA), the Ernst Mach Award (Austria), and the Culture Moves Europe Award for emerging European artists (EU Council).

Website: https://www.alexandros-spyrou.com

Education

DipMus in Harmony, Counterpoint, and Fugue, Conservatory of Ioannina, Greece

BMus in Composition, Universtiy of Macedonia, Greece

MMus in Composition, Universtiy of Southampton, United Kingdom

MPhil in Music, University of Bristol, United Kingdom

PGCert in Composition, University of Music and Performing Arts Graz, Austria

PhD in Music Composition and Theory, University of Iowa, United States of America