Ut Queant Laxis

Since 2016, Yiorgos Kaloudis has been collecting and selecting Early Music repertoire, transcribing and arranging scores for solo Classical Cretan Lyra.
”LA RÊVEUSE - Early Music on the Classical Cretan Lyra”, recorded at the Catholic Church of the Immaculate Conception, Santorini, Catholic Diocese of Thira, Santorini, on May of 2021.

Guido d’ Arezzo was an Italian music theorist and pedagogue of High medieval music.
A Benedictine monk, he is regarded as the inventor—or by some, developer—of the modern staff notation that had a massive influence on the development of Western musical notation and practice.
Perhaps the most significant European writer on music between Boethius and Johannes Tinctoris, after the former's De institutione musica, Guido's Micrologus was most widely distributed medieval treatise on music.

Guido d’Arezzo developed new techniques for teaching, such as staff notation and the use of the "ut–re–mi–fa–sol–la" (do–re–mi–fa–so–la) mnemonic (solmization).
The syllables ut-re-mi-fa-sol-la (do-re-mi-fa-sol-la-si) are taken from the six half-lines of the first stanza of the hymn Ut queant laxis, the notes of which are successively raised by one step, and the text of which is attributed to the Italian monk and scholar Paulus Deacon (although the musical line either shares a common ancestor with the earlier setting of Horace's Ode to Phyllis (Odes 4.11) recorded in Montpellier manuscript H425, or may have been taken from there) Giovanni Battista Doni is known for having changed the name of note "Ut" (C), renaming it "Do" (in the "Do Re Mi ..." sequence known as solfège).

A seventh note, "Si" (from the initials for "Sancte Iohannes," Latin for Saint John the Baptist) was added shortly after to complete the diatonic scale.
In anglophone countries, "Si" was changed to "Ti" by Sarah Glover in the nineteenth century so that every syllable might begin with a different letter (this also freed up Si for later use as Sol-sharp). "Ti" is used in tonic sol-fa and in the song "Do-Re-Mi".

"Ut queant laxis" or "Hymnus in Ioannem" is a Latin hymn in honor of John the Baptist, written in Horatian Sapphics with text traditionally attributed to Paulus Diaconus, the eighth-century Lombard historian.
It is famous for its part in the history of musical notation, in particular solmization. The hymn belongs to the tradition of Gregorian chant.

A variant of the melody appears in an eleventh-century musical setting of Horace's poem Ode to Phyllis recorded in a manuscript in France.

Kyrie Eleison
O Virtus Sapientiae
(a capella arrangement Cheryl Lynn Helm (1957), classical Cretan lyra arranged by Yiorgos Kaloudis (1973).

Composer Yiorgos Kaloudis arranged the compositions for classical Cretan lyra for the Diaghilev Festival 2023, in Perm.

Hildegard of Bingen (German: Hildegard von Bingen), also known as Saint Hildegard and the Sibyl of the Rhine, was a German Benedictine abbess and polymath active as a writer, composer, philosopher, mystic, visionary, and as a medical writer and practitioner during the High Middle Ages. She is one of the best-known composers of sacred monophony, as well as the most recorded in modern history. She has been considered by scholars to be the founder of scientific natural history in Germany.

Hildegard's convent elected her as magistra (mother superior) in 1136. She founded the monasteries of Rupertsberg in 1150 and Eibingen in 1165. Hildegard wrote theological, botanical, and medicinal works, as well as letters, hymns, and antiphons for the liturgy. She wrote poems, and supervised miniature illuminations in the Rupertsberg manuscript of her first work, Scivias. There are more surviving chants by Hildegard than by any other composer from the entire Middle Ages, and she is one of the few known composers to have written both the music and the words. One of her works, the Ordo Virtutum, is an early example of liturgical drama and arguably the oldest surviving morality play. She is noted for the invention of a constructed language known as Lingua Ignota.

Although the history of her formal canonization is complicated, regional calendars of the Roman Catholic church have listed her as a saint for centuries. On 10 May 2012, Pope Benedict XVI extended the liturgical cult of Hildegard to the entire Catholic Church in a process known as "equivalent canonization". On 7 October 2012, he named her a Doctor of the Church, in recognition of "her holiness of life and the originality of her teaching.

Mirie it is while sumer ilast

Since 2016, Yiorgos Kaloudis has been collecting and selecting Early Music repertoire, transcribing and arranging scores for solo Classical Cretan Lyra.
”LA RÊVEUSE - Early Music on the Classical Cretan Lyra” recorded at the Catholic Church of the Immaculate Conception, Santorini, Catholic Diocese of Thira, Santorini, on May of 2021.

Mirie it is while sumer ilast is a Middle English song of the first half of the 13th century. It is about the longing for summer in the face of the approaching cold weather.

It is one of the oldest songs in the English language, and one of the few examples of non-liturgical music from medieval England.

The manuscript was found together with two old French songs in a book of Psalms in the Bodleian Library.
It was rediscovered at the end of the 19th century and made accessible to experts in 1901. It was arranged and published in a modern form for the first time by Frank Llewellyn Harrison.

The text and melody are incomplete on a single, damaged manuscript page, which, together with the somewhat ambiguous notation, makes it difficult to reconstruct the song in whole.
It is unclear whether the song originally contained additional lines or stanzas, which Harrison considers probable, nor can the final word be conclusively determined.

The author of the song is also unknown, although by its inclusion with two other French love songs pasted in a Book of Psalms, Nicholson proposes that the manuscript was written by lay chorister.

The context of the piece also may suggest the surviving leaf was originally included in a French chansonnier, suggesting an origin in the French tradition.

1) Jugement du roy de Navarre: Tres douce dame que j’aour,

2) Je vivroie liement,

3) Douce Dame Jolie,

4) Le Reméde de Fortune

5) Je ne cuit pas

Since 2016, Yiorgos Kaloudis has been collecting and selecting Early Music repertoire, transcribing and arranging scores for solo Classical Cretan Lyra.
”LA RÊVEUSE - Early Music on the Classical Cretan Lyra” recorded at the Catholic Church of the Immaculate Conception, Santorini, Catholic Diocese of Thira, Santorini, on May of 2021.

Guillaume de Machaut was a French composer and poet who was the central figure of the ars nova style in late medieval music. His dominance of the genre is such that modern musicologists use his death to separate the ars nova from the subsequent ars subtilior movement. Regarded as the most significant French composer and poet of the 14th century, he is often seen as the century's leading European composer.

Machaut, one of the earliest European composers on whom considerable biographical information is available, has an unprecedented amount of surviving music, in part due to his own involvement in his manuscripts' creation and preservation. Machaut embodies the culmination of the poet-composer tradition stretching back to the traditions of troubadour and trouvère. His poetry was greatly admired and imitated by other poets, including Geoffrey Chaucer and Eustache Deschamps, well into the 15th century.

Machaut composed in a wide range of styles and forms and was crucial in developing the motet and secular song forms (particularly the lai and the formes fixes: rondeau, virelai and ballade). Among his only surviving sacred works, Messe de Nostre Dame, is the earliest known complete setting of the Ordinary of the Mass attributable to a single composer.

Other notable works include the rondeaux "Ma fin est mon commencement" and "Rose, liz, printemps, verdure" as well as the virelai "Douce Dame Jolie".

Tourdion

Composer Yiorgos Kaloudis arranged the composition for classical Cretan lyra and voices for the Diaghilev Festival 2023, in Perm.

The tourdion (or tordion) (from the French verb "tordre" / to twist) is a lively dance, similar in nature to the galliard, and popular from the mid-15th to the late-16th centuries, first in the Burgundian court and then all over the French Kingdom.
The dance was accompanied frequently by the basse danse, due to their contrasting tempi, and were danced alongside the pavane and galliard, and the allemande and courante, also in pairs.

Tant que vivray

Claudin de Sermisy was a French composer of the Renaissance.
Along with Clément Janequin he was one of the most renowned composers of French chansons in the early 16th century; in addition he was a significant composer of sacred music. His music was both influential on, and influenced by, contemporary Italian styles.

Composer Yiorgos Kaloudis arranged his composition for classical Cretan lyra and voices, for the Diaghilev Festival 2023 in Perm.

If Ye Love Me

"If ye love me" is a four-part motet or anthem by the English composer Thomas Tallis, a setting of a passage from the Gospel of John.
First published in 1565 during the reign of Elizabeth I, it is an example of Tudor music and is part of the repertoire of Anglican church music. An early English-language motet, it is frequently performed today, and has been sung at special occasions including a papal visit and a royal wedding.

Thomas Tallis, also Tallys or Talles) was an English composer of High Renaissance music. His compositions are primarily vocal, and he occupies a primary place in anthologies of English choral music. Tallis is considered one of England's greatest composers[according to whom?], and is honoured for his original voice in English musicianship.

Composer Yiorgos Kaloudis arranged the composition for classical Cretan lyra and voices for the Diaghilev Festival 2023, in Perm.

Pavane a quatre parties

Thoinot Arbeau is the anagrammatic pen name of French cleric Jehan Tabourot.
Tabourot is most famous for his Orchésographie, a study of late sixteenth-century French Renaissance social dance. He was born in Dijon and died in Langres.

Composer Yiorgos Kaloudis arranged his composition for classical Cretan lyra and voices for the Diaghilev Festival 2023, in Perm.

Célébrons sans cesse (Canon for unaccompanied voices)

Orlando di Lasso was a composer of the late Renaissance. The chief representative of the mature polyphonic style in the Franco-Flemish school, Lassus stands with Giovanni Pierluigi da Palestrina and Tomás Luis de Victoria as the leading composers of the later Renaissance. Immensely prolific, his music varies considerably in style and genres, which gave him unprecedented popularity throughout Europe.

Composer Yiorgos Kaloudis arranged the Canon for classical Cretan lyra and voices.

Une jeune fillette

Composer Yiorgos Kaloudis arranged the composition for voice and classical Cretan lyra.

Jehan Chardavoine (baptized on 2 February 1538 at Beaufort-en-Vallée, Anjou – died c. 1580) was a French Renaissance composer mostly active in Paris. He was one of the first known editors of popular chansons, and the author, according to musicologist Julien Tiersot, of "the only volume of monodic songs from the 16th century that has survived to our days.

Come again sweet love
Can she excuse my wrongs
Lacrimae Antiquae or Seven Tears

John Dowland was an English Renaissance composer, lutenist, and singer. He is best known today for his melancholy songs such as "Come, heavy sleep", "Come again", "Flow my tears", "I saw my Lady weepe", "Now o now I needs must part" and "In darkness let me dwell".
His instrumental music has undergone a major revival, and with the 20th century's early music revival, has been a continuing source of repertoire for lutenists and classical guitarists.

Composer Yiorgos Kaloudis arranged the composition for classical Cretan lyra and voices for the Diaghilev Festival 2023, in Perm.

Lamento della Ninfa (SV 163)

Composer Yiorgos Kaloudis arranged the composition for voice and classical Cretan lyra, specifically for the renowned mezzo-soprano Irini Tsirakidis, during the premiere concert of his album titled "La Rêveuse: Early Music on the Classical Cretan Lyra" in December 2021 at the Megaron Hall in Athens.

Claudio Giovanni Antonio Monteverdi (baptized 15 May 1567 – 29 November 1643) was an Italian composer, choirmaster and string player. A composer of both secular and sacred music, and a pioneer in the development of opera, he is considered a crucial transitional figure between the Renaissance and Baroque periods of music history.

Born in Cremona, where he undertook his first musical studies and compositions, Monteverdi developed his career first at the court of Mantua (c. 1590–1613) and then until his death in the Republic of Venice where he was maestro di cappella at the basilica of San Marco. His surviving letters give insight into the life of a professional musician in Italy of the period, including problems of income, patronage and politics.

Much of Monteverdi's output, including many stage works, has been lost. His surviving music includes nine books of madrigals, large-scale religious works, such as his Vespro della Beata Vergine (Vespers for the Blessed Virgin) of 1610, and three complete operas. His opera L'Orfeo (1607) is the earliest of the genre still widely performed; towards the end of his life he wrote works for Venice, including Il ritorno d'Ulisse in patria and L'incoronazione di Poppea.

While he worked extensively in the tradition of earlier Renaissance polyphony, as evidenced in his madrigals, he undertook great developments in form and melody, and began to employ the basso continuo technique, distinctive of the Baroque. No stranger to controversy, he defended his sometimes novel techniques as elements of a seconda pratica, contrasting with the more orthodox earlier style which he termed the prima pratica. Largely forgotten during the eighteenth and much of the nineteenth centuries, his works enjoyed a rediscovery around the beginning of the twentieth century. He is now established both as a significant influence in European musical history and as a composer whose works are regularly performed and recorded.

Che si puo fare

Composer Yiorgos Kaloudis arranged the composition for voice and classical Cretan lyra, specifically for the renowned mezzo-soprano Irini Tsirakidis, during the premiere concert of his album titled "La Rêveuse: Early Music on the Classical Cretan Lyra" in December 2021 at the Megaron Hall in Athens.

Barbara Strozzi (also called Barbara Valle; baptised 6 August 1619 – 11 November 1677) was an Italian composer and singer of the Baroque Period. During her lifetime, Strozzi published eight volumes of her own music, and had more secular music in print than any other composer of the era.[1] This was achieved without any support from the Church and with no consistent patronage from the nobility.

Les Pleurs (Tombeau les Regrets)

Jean de Sainte-Colombe was a French composer and violist. Sainte-Colombe was a celebrated master of the viola da gamba. He is credited (by Jean Rousseau in his Traité de la viole (1687)) with adding the seventh string, tuned to the note AA (A1 in scientific pitch notation), on the bass viol.

Sainte-Colombe's music was only rediscovered in 1966, when a manuscript of his 67 Concerts a deux violes esgales was discovered in the library of the famed pianist Alfred Cortot.
His music (and a fictionalized account of his relations with his more famous student Marin Marais) was brought to wide attention in Tous les matins du monde, a film that opened the ears of many to the glories of the viola da gamba. Sainte-Colombe's Tombeau les regrets is exemplary for its passionate and lyrical rhetoric.

Since 2016, Yiorgos Kaloudis has been collecting and selecting Early Music repertoire, transcribing and arranging scores for solo Classical Cretan Lyra.

LA RÊVEUSE - Early Music on the Classical Cretan Lyra
Recorded at the Catholic Church of the Immaculate Conception, Santorini, Catholic Diocese of Thira, Santorini, on May of 2021.

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Marche pour la ceremonie des Turcs

Composer Yiorgos Kaloudis arranged the composition for solo classical Cretan lyra.

Jean-Baptiste Lully was an Italian naturalized French composer, guitarist, violinist, and dancer who is considered a master of the French Baroque music style. Best known for his operas, he spent most of his life working in the court of Louis XIV of France and became a French subject in 1661. He was a close friend of the playwright Molière, with whom he collaborated on numerous comédie-ballets, including L'Amour médecin, George Dandin ou le Mari confondu, Monsieur de Pourceaugnac, Psyché and his best known work, Le Bourgeois gentilhomme.

Indian Queen (opera)

Yiorgos Kaloudis has been invited by Theodor Currentzis to arranged the classical Cretan lyra to the opera of Purcell, with selections from the basso continuo, themes and improvisations.
The opera presented at the Salzburg Festival 2023 with the Utopia orchestra and choir.
Conducted by Theodor Currentzis.
Directed by Peter Sellars.

It’s the very first time in the history of the Cretan Lyra for it to participate in the basso continuo of Purcell's opera with multiple improvisations of Yiorgos Kaloudis’s, as well as the prestigious Salzburg Festival.

The Indian Queen (Z. 630) is a largely unfinished semi-opera with music by Henry Purcell, first performed at the Theatre Royal, Drury Lane, London, in 1695. The exact date is unknown, but Peter Holman surmises it may have been in June.

It was created as a revised version of the 1664 play The Indian Queen, in a prologue and five acts, by John Dryden and his brother-in-law Sir Robert Howard. More specifically, in 1694, Thomas Betterton was given £50 to transform the play into an opera, and he commissioned Purcell to compose the music. Purcell, who died in November 1695, left music only for the Prologue and Acts II and III. His brother Daniel completed a masque for Act V.

The Indian Queen is one of Purcell's less often performed stage works. This is probably more a reflection of the incomplete state of the score than of its quality.

Sellars' and Currentzis 2013 realization

In the twenty-first century there was a major new production by Tchaikovsky Perm Opera and Ballet Theatre (Perm), Teatro Real (Madrid), and English National Opera (London). Peter Sellars completely rewrote the text to tell the story of the Spanish Conquista. He drew on a book by the Nicaraguan writer Rosario Aguilar. This version, with designs by Gronk, was premiered at Perm in 2013.
It was performed at the Teatro Real in 2014, by musicAeterna orchestra and choir, under the direction of Theodore Currentzis.

What can we poor females do (Z.518)
Composer Yiorgos Kaloudis arranged the composition for classical Cretan lyra and voices for the Diaghilev Festival 2023, in Perm.

Musette
L’ Arabesque
La Rêveuse
Le Badinage
(Pièces de violes, Book IV, 1717)

L' Agréable (Rondeau)
(Pièces de violes, Book V, 1725)

Les folies d’Espagne
(32 Variations for viola da gamba and basso continuo, 1701)

Composer Yiorgos Kaloudis arranged Marin Marais’s composition for solo classical Cretan lyra

Marin Marais was a French composer and viol player. He studied composition with Jean-Baptiste Lully, often conducting his operas, and with master of the bass viol Monsieur de Sainte-Colombe for six months. In 1676 he was hired as a musician to the royal court of Versailles and was moderately successful there, being appointed in 1679 as ordinaire de la chambre du roy pour la viole, a title he kept until 1725. He was the father of the composer Roland Marais (c. 1685 – c. 1750).

Since 2016, Yiorgos Kaloudis has been collecting and selecting Early Music repertoire, transcribing and arranging scores for solo Classical Cretan Lyra.

LA RÊVEUSE - Early Music on the Classical Cretan Lyra
Recorded at the Catholic Church of the Immaculate Conception, Santorini, Catholic Diocese of Thira, Santorini, on May of 2021.

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Sonata No. 12 in D minor "La Follia", (RV 63)

Six Cello Sonatas for solo cello and basso continuo (RV 38-47), (1720 - 1730)

Composer Yiorgos Kaloudis has arranged the compositions for classical Cretan lyra and basso continuo.

Antonio Vivaldi composed several sonatas for cello and continuo. A set of six cello sonatas, written between 1720 and 1730, was published in Paris in 1740. He wrote at least four other cello sonatas, with two manuscripts kept in Naples, another in Wiesentheid, and one known to be lost.

Antonio Lucio Vivaldi was an Italian composer, virtuoso violinist and impresario of Baroque music.
Along with Johann Sebastian Bach and George Frideric Handel, Vivaldi ranks amongst the greatest Baroque composers and his influence during his lifetime was widespread across Europe, giving origin to many imitators and admirers. He pioneered many developments in orchestration, violin technique and programmatic music.
He consolidated the emerging concerto form into a widely accepted and followed idiom.

Vivaldi composed many instrumental concertos, for the violin and a variety of other musical instruments, as well as sacred choral works and more than fifty operas. His best-known work is a series of violin concertos known as the Four Seasons. Many of his compositions were written for the all-female music ensemble of the Ospedale della Pietà, a home for abandoned children. Vivaldi began studying for the priesthood at the age of 15 and was ordained at 25, but was given dispensation to no longer say public Masses due to a health problem. Vivaldi also had some success with expensive stagings of his operas in Venice, Mantua and Vienna. After meeting the Emperor Charles VI, Vivaldi moved to Vienna, hoping for royal support. However, the Emperor died soon after Vivaldi's arrival, and Vivaldi himself died in poverty less than a year later.

After almost two centuries of decline, Vivaldi's musical reputation underwent a revival in the early 20th century, with much scholarly research devoted to his work. Many of Vivaldi's compositions, once thought lost, have been rediscovered – in one case as recently as 2006. His music remains widely popular in the present day and is regularly played all over the world.

Cello Suite No. 1
in G Major, BWV 1007

Cello Suite No. 2
in D Minor, BWV 1008

Cello Suite No. 3
in C Major, BWV 1009

Cello Suite No. 4
in E-flat Major, BWV 1010

Cello Suite No. 5
in C Minor, BWV 1011

Cellist, Cretan lyra player, improviser and composer, Yiorgos Kaloudis created a new interpretive approach, adding a fourth string (low C), on the traditional Cretan lyra, changing the technique of the interpretation on both hands and transcribing this work of Bach for the Classical Cretan Lyra, in the authentic tonalities of the composer.

The six Cello Suites, BWV 1007–1012, are suites for unaccompanied cello by Johann Sebastian Bach.
They are some of the most frequently performed solo compositions ever written for cello. Bach most likely composed them during the period 1717–1723, when he served as Kapellmeister in Köthen. The title given on the cover of the Anna Magdalena Bach manuscript was Suites à Violoncello Solo senza Basso (Suites for cello solo without bass).

As usual in a Baroque musical suite, after the prelude which begins each suite, all the other movements are based around baroque dance types.
The cello suites are structured in six movements each: prelude, allemande, courante, sarabande, two minuets or two bourrées or two gavottes, and a final gigue.

Due to the works' technical demands, étude-like nature, and difficulty in interpretation because of the non-annotated nature of the surviving copies and the many discrepancies between them, the cello suites were little known and rarely publicly performed in the modern era until they were recorded by Pablo Casals (1876–1973) in the early 20th century. They have since been performed and recorded by many renowned cellists and have been transcribed for numerous other instruments; they are considered some of Bach's greatest musical achievements.

Yiorgos Kaloudis interprets on the Classical Cretan Lyra, one of the most important works of Baroque Music, J.S.Bach’s Cello Suites on the Cretan Lyra.

The cycle of the solo suites, written by Bach in his Köthen period, is akin to the Bible for modern cellists where hidden polyphony saturates the dance basis of the suite parts, and the performing complexity is subordinated to the creation of a melodic current of enormous emotional power.

Der Leiermann (Winterreise)

Composer Yiorgos Kaloudis arranged the composition for voice and classical Cretan lyra.

Winterreise (Winter Journey) is a song cycle for voice and piano by Franz Schubert (D. 911, published as Op. 89 in 1828), a setting of 24 poems by German poet Wilhelm Müller. It is the second of Schubert's two song cycles on Müller's poems, the earlier being Die schöne Müllerin (D. 795, Op. 25, 1823).

Both were originally written for tenor voice but are frequently transposed to other vocal ranges, a precedent set by Schubert himself. The two works pose interpretative demands on listeners and performers due to their scale and structural coherence.
The autograph manuscript of the cycle is preserved in the Morgan Library & Museum.

Franz Peter Schubert was an Austrian composer of the late Classical and early Romantic eras. Despite his short life, Schubert left behind a vast oeuvre, including more than 600 secular vocal works (mainly lieder), seven complete symphonies, sacred music, operas, incidental music, and a large body of piano and chamber music. His major works include the art song "Erlkönig" , the Piano Trout Quintet in A major, the unfinished Symphony No. 8 in B minor, the "Great" Symphony No. 9 in C major, a String Quintet, the three last piano sonatas, the opera Fierrabras, the incidental music to the play Rosamunde, and the song cycles Die schöne Müllerin and Winterreise.

Cello Duets

Composer Yiorgos Kaloudis transcribed the compositions for classical Cretan lyra duets.

Jacques Offenbach was a German-born French composer, cellist and impresario of the Romantic period. He is remembered for his nearly 100 operettas of the 1850s to the 1870s, and his uncompleted opera The Tales of Hoffmann. He was a powerful influence on later composers of the operetta genre, particularly Johann Strauss Jr. and Arthur Sullivan. His best-known works were continually revived during the 20th century, and many of his operettas continue to be staged in the 21st. The Tales of Hoffmann remains part of the standard opera repertory.

Born in Cologne, the son of a synagogue cantor, Offenbach showed early musical talent. At the age of 14, he was accepted as a student at the Paris Conservatoire but found academic study unfulfilling and left after a year. From 1835 to 1855 he earned his living as a cellist, achieving international fame, and as a conductor. His ambition, however, was to compose comic pieces for the musical theatre. Finding the management of Paris' Opéra-Comique company uninterested in staging his works, in 1855 he leased a small theatre in the Champs-Élysées. There he presented a series of his own small-scale pieces, many of which became popular.

In 1858, Offenbach produced his first full-length operetta, Orphée aux enfers ("Orpheus in the Underworld"), which was exceptionally well received and has remained one of his most played works. During the 1860s, he produced at least 18 full-length operettas, as well as more one-act pieces. His works from this period included La belle Hélène (1864), La Vie parisienne (1866), La Grande-Duchesse de Gérolstein (1867) and La Périchole (1868). The risqué humour (often about sexual intrigue) and mostly gentle satiric barbs in these pieces, together with Offenbach's facility for melody, made them internationally known, and translated versions were successful in Vienna, London and elsewhere in Europe.

Offenbach became associated with the Second French Empire of Napoleon III; the emperor and his court were genially satirised in many of Offenbach's operettas. Napoleon III personally granted him French citizenship and the Légion d'Honneur. With the outbreak of the Franco-Prussian War in 1870, Offenbach found himself out of favour in Paris because of his imperial connections and his German birth. He remained successful in Vienna and London, however. He re-established himself in Paris during the 1870s, with revivals of some of his earlier favourites and a series of new works, and undertook a popular US tour. In his last years he strove to finish The Tales of Hoffmann, but died before the premiere of the opera, which has entered the standard repertory in versions completed or edited by other musicians.

The J.C. Bach/Casadesus Cello Concerto in C Minor

Composer Yiorgos Kaloudis arranged the composition for classical Cretan lyra.

Henri-Gustave Casadesus was a violist, viola d'amore player, composer, and music publisher.
Casadesus received his early musical instruction with Albert Lavignac and studied viola with Théophile Laforge at the Conservatoire de Paris, taking first prize in 1899. From 1910 to 1917, he was the violist of the Capet Quartet.
Along with Camille Saint-Saëns, Casadesus founded the "Société des instruments anciens" in 1901. The society, which operated between 1901 and 1939, was a quintet of performers who used obsolete instruments such as the viola da gamba, or Casadesus's own instrument, the viola d'amore.

The quintet was also notable in its day for premiering rediscovered works by long-dead composers. It was later discovered that Casadesus and his brothers, notably Marius Casadesus, wrote these works. The Adélaïde Concerto, allegedly by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, is sometimes mistakenly attributed to Henri but is actually by Marius.

However, Casadesus is believed to have been the author of a "Concerto in D Major for viola" ascribed to Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach, described by Rachel W. Wade in her survey The Keyboard Concertos of Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach. This concerto appeared in 1911 in a Russian edition, allegedly "transcribed...for small orchestra by Maximilian Steinberg," and was subsequently performed by conductors such as Darius Milhaud and Serge Koussevitsky, then recorded by both Felix Prohaska and Eugene Ormandy, all under the false attribution. "Thus," Wade wrote in 1981, "at the present time, the most frequently recorded concerto of C.P.E. Bach is a spurious one."

Casadesus is also credited with the "Handel Concerto" and the "J.C. Bach Concerto," which are both for viola as well. These are often referred to as "The Handel/Casadesus Concerto" and "The J.C. Bach/Casadesus Concerto". Scholarly criticism has confirmed that both these concerti were written by Henri Casadesus in the style of their purported composers. Casadesus is also the composer of a violin concerto in D major in the style of Boccherini.

Serenade from “Der Schneemann” for cello and piano

Composer Yiorgos Kaloudis arranged the composition for classical Cretan lyra and piano.

Erich Wolfgang Korngold was an Moravian-born American composer and conductor. A child prodigy, he became one of the most important and influential composers in Hollywood history. He was a noted pianist and composer of classical music, along with music for Hollywood films, and the first composer of international stature to write Hollywood scores.

When he was 11, his ballet Der Schneemann (The Snowman), became a sensation in Vienna, followed by his Second Piano Sonata, which he wrote at age 13, played throughout Europe by Artur Schnabel. His one-act operas Violanta and Der Ring des Polykrates were premiered in Munich in 1916, conducted by Bruno Walter. At 23, his opera Die tote Stadt (The Dead City) premiered in Hamburg and Cologne. In 1921 he conducted the Hamburg Opera.[3] During the 1920s he re-orchestrated, re-arranged and nearly re-composed several operettas by Johann Strauss II. By 1931 he was a professor of music at the Vienna State Academy.

At the request of motion picture director Max Reinhardt, and due to the rise of the Nazi regime, Korngold moved to Hollywood in 1934 to write music scores for films. His first was Reinhardt's A Midsummer Night's Dream (1935). He subsequently wrote scores for such films as Captain Blood (1935), which helped boost the career of its starring newcomer, Errol Flynn. His score for Anthony Adverse (1936) won an Oscar and was followed two years later with another Oscar for The Adventures of Robin Hood (1938).

Overall, he wrote the score for 16 Hollywood films, receiving two more nominations. Along with Max Steiner and Alfred Newman, he is one of the founders of film music. Although his late classical Romantic compositions were no longer as popular when he died in 1957, his music underwent a resurgence of interest in the 1970s beginning with the release of the RCA Red Seal album The Sea Hawk: The Classic Film Scores of Erich Wolfgang Korngold (1972). This album, produced by his son George Korngold, was hugely popular and ignited interest in other film music of his and of other composers like Steiner and in his concert music, which often incorporated popular themes from his film scores (an example being the Violin Concerto in D, Op. 35, which incorporated his themes from four different motion picture scores and is a part of the standard repertoire).

Twenty songs of the Greek people (1937 - 1947)
Traditional folk songs

Songs of longing (1924-1980)
Poetry by Rabindranath Tagore (1861-1941)

Composer Yiorgos Kaloudis arranged the compositions for voice, classical Cretan lyra, cello and piano, specifically for the renowned mezzo-soprano Irini Tsirakidis.
They presented the songs at the Kharkiv Philharmonic, Ukraine on April 2021.

Ioannis Constantinidis (Greek: Ιωάννης Κωνσταντινίδης), also known by the pen name Kostas Giannidis (Greek: Κώστας Γιαννίδης) was a Greek composer, pianist and conductor.
Constantinidis was born in Smyrna (today Izmir) in 1903. He came to Greece after the destruction of Smyrna and continued his studies in Berlin (1923–1931).
He returned to Athens and worked as a conductor and composer at the musical theater composing many operettas, musical comedies, and revues. He would sign and publish his popular works as Kostas Giannidis, and his classical compositions as his birth name. He died in Athens in 1984.

Five Etudes in Major and Minor for solo cello

1. Lied (Andante)
2. Marsch (Allegro molto)
3. Tanz (Allegro moderato)
4. Improvisiation (Andante espressivo)
5. Scherzo (Allegro)

Composer Yiorgos Kaloudis arranged the etudes for solo classical Cretan lyra.

Dmitry Borisovich Kabalevsky was a Soviet composer, conductor, pianist and pedagogue of Russian gentry descent, was born in Saint Petersburg in 1904, but moved to Moscow at a young age.

He helped set up the Union of Soviet Composers in Moscow and remained one of its leading figures during his lifetime. He was a prolific composer of piano music and chamber music; many of his piano works were performed by Vladimir Horowitz.
He is best known in Western Europe for his Second Symphony, the "Comedians' Galop" from The Comedians Suite, Op. 26 and his Third Piano Concerto.

Δέδυκε μεν α σελάννα (Dedyke me ἀ Selanna) (for voice, flute, classical Cretan lyra, percussion and piano)
Poetry of Sappho and Alexandros Pallis.
(March 2012, revised January 2020)

Dimitris Lionis was the first composer who orchestrated the classical Cretan lyra into his composition “Δέδυκε μεν α σελάννα” on Sappho and Alexandros Pallis poetry for chamber music ensemble, replacing the cello part with the classical Cretan lyra.

Sappho was an ancient Greek lyric poet from the island of Lesbos. She wrote around 10,000 lines of poetry, only a small fraction of which survives. Only one poem is known to be complete; in some cases as little as a single word survives.
Modern editions of Sappho's poetry are the product of centuries of scholarship, first compiling quotations from surviving ancient works, and from the late 19th century rediscovering her works preserved on fragments of ancient papyri and parchment.
Along with the poems which can be attributed with confidence to Sappho, a small number of surviving fragments in her Aeolic dialect may be by either her or her contemporary Alcaeus. Modern editions of Sappho also collect ancient "testimonia" which discuss Sappho's life and works.

Dimitris Lionis was an academic composer and educator.
He tudied piano with Alex F. Tournaisser, advanced music theory with Miltiadis Koutougkos, and composition with Yiannis Ioannidis and Charis Xanthoudakis.
Continued with postgraduate studies in Composition at the Belgrade Music Academy with Zoran Erić, Srdjan Hofman, and Rajko Maksimović.

Attended seminars on contemporary music (Th. Antoniou), electronic music (Goethe Institute, Hellenic Society for Electroacoustic Music, Vierzon Studio in France), as well as Byzantine music lessons (S. Karas, L. Angelopoulos). Took courses in music pedagogy - ORFF system at the Matteu School and taught children's groups at the Friendly Nest of Elefsina and the Camps "Happy Children - Happy Youth." Engaged with Medieval, Renaissance, and Baroque music and was a founding member of the "Old Music Workshop" ensemble. Collaborated with the third program of the Hellenic Broadcasting Corporation (ERT) as a producer of programs primarily focused on Medieval music.

His works have been performed in concerts in Greece and abroad and have been presented by ERT. He had a long and distinguished teaching career as a Professor of Advanced Music Theory at music schools such as Athenaeum, Panarmonion, and the Municipal Conservatory of Argos.

Works: for solo instruments, for Mixed Choir in the poetry of A. Empirikos, Chamber Music, Symphonic Music, cycles of Songs for Voice and Orchestra with lyrics by D.H. Lawrence and Paul Eluard, Electronic Music, as well as music for children's theater and puppet theater.

A me desde hace tiempo (poetry of Pablo Neruda)

Composer and arranger Yiorgos Kaloudis orchestrated the classical Cretan lyra and the cello for Stathis Gyftakis' composition, which was originally composed for voice and piano. He presented this orchestrated version at concerts with the exceptional ensemble Thesis Trio, featuring the renowned mezzo-soprano Irini Tsirakidis and pianist Dimitra Kokkinopoulou.

Stathis Giftakis was born in Kalamata in 1967. He studied piano with Dora Bakopoulos (Piano Diploma with Distinction) and composition with Theodore Antonio (Composition Diploma with Distinction and 1st Prize). Works of him have been successfully performed in Greece and abroad (Turkey, France, Germany, Italy, Canada, Russia, Belgium, U.S.A., Portugal, Austria and Holland) among others by the Athens State Orchestra, the Greek Ensemble of Contemporary Music, the National Opera Ensemble, the Orchestra of Colours, the Arcadian woodwind Quintet, the Duo Palmos, the ARTéfacts ensemble, the Danubia Winds Orchestra, the Kalamata Symphonic Orchestra and the Kalamata Municipal Youth Orchestra.

He is a member of the Greek Composers' Union Board. He was appointed as the Artistic Director of the Municipal Conservatory of Kalamata from 2003 to 2009 and then again since September 2015. Since 2017 he was appointed as the Local Artistic Director of the Kalamata International Choir Competition and Festival. Stathis Giftakis teaches piano and theory at the Municipal Conservatory of Kalamata and is one of the founding members of the International Kalamata Music Days.

Στάσιμον (in memory of Herman Vinogradov)

Yiorgos Kaloudis has been invited by Theodor Currentzis to arrange and improvise on the classical Cretan lyra to his new composition-introduction to the play "Persephone. Symphony of Psalms" of Stravinsky, based on the poem by Theodor Currentzis "In the month of Anthesterion" and a fragment from the tragedy of Aeschylus "Prometheus Chained".

Theodor Currentzis is the very first composer who has included the classical Cretan lyra in his composition and orchestration of music!

Performers:
Lada Raskolnikova: sounding constructions of Bikapo
Egor Ananko, Viktoria Kharkevich, Marko Nikodijevic, Luka Kozlovacki: friu
Vera Sazhina: voice, shamanic tambourine
Yiorgos Kaloudis: classical cretan lyra
Alexey Retinsky: cauldron
Sofia Hill: voice in memory of Herman Vinogradov

Orchestra and chorus of musicAeterna,
director: Theodor Currentzis
Diaghilev Festival 2023, Perm

Theodor Currentzis was born in Athens, and at the age of four began to take piano lessons. At age seven, he began violin lessons. He entered the National Conservatory, Athens at the age of twelve, in the violin department. In 1987, aged fifteen he began composition studies under Professor George Hadjinikos, and then in 1989 under Professor B. Shreck. From 1994 to 1999, Currentzis studied conducting supported by a scholarship from the Alexander S. Onassis Public Benefit Foundation in the St. Petersburg State Conservatory with Ilya Musin.

From 2004 to 2010, Currentzis served as principal conductor of the Novosibirsk Opera and Ballet Theatre, where in 2004 he founded the Orchestra MusicAeterna and later the Chorus MusicAeterna. In 2009, Currentzis acted in Ilya Khrzhanovsky's film Dau (Russian: Дау) based on the biography of the physicist Lev Landau.[citation needed] In February 2011, Currentzis became music director of the Perm Opera and Ballet Theatre, to which he brought both of his MusicAeterna groups.

In 2011, Currentzis became principal guest conductor of the Southwest German Radio Symphony Orchestra. Effective with the 2018–2019 season Currentzis became the first chief conductor of the SWR Symphonieorchester (created by the merger of the Southwest German Radio Symphony Orchestra with the Stuttgart Radio Symphony Orchestra). In September 2021, the SWR announced a 3-year extension to Currentzis' contract. In September 2022, the SWR announced that Currentzis was to stand down as chief conductor of the SWR Symphonieorchester at the close of the 2024-2025 season.
The contract was not renewed upon his own request, and not for political reasons "as some had speculated or hoped".

Compositions for solo Classical Cretan Lyra:

Album: APTERA
Aptera, Orthi Petra (Necropolis), Cosmos

Album: DRIOPI
Driopi, Aaatos, Theasis

Unreleased compositions:
Kochyli, Trikymia, Synchoresis

Yiorgos Kaloudis composes Contemplative music for the Classical Cretan Lyra, and experiments on the effect of sound on the subtle human emotions. Employing a delicate and poetic approach, the classical Cretan lyra unveil the sublime melodies within the repertoire while also illuminating the vast creative horizons offered by the Classical Cretan Lyra—a time-honored instrument tracing its lineage back to the Byzantine lyra of the 9th century, serving as the precursor to numerous European string bow instruments.

Kaloudis’ deep-rooted connection to his Cretan and Corfiot origins, he has consistently pushed the boundaries of music, unveiling a splendid assemblage of original compositions, showcasing the Classical Cretan Lyra. 
The poetic expression of the bow, in the tonal/tropic form of compositions, the experimentation on improvisation and the use of multiple vibrations, creates an emotional imprint of catharsis.


The Classical Cretan Lyra, not limited to its role as a bow, reveals its versatility as a plucked string instrument with pizzicato techniques, but also as a percussion instrument, allowing for introspective exploration of its faintly whistling timbre and melodious potentials that metamorphose into evocative and ethereal sonic landscapes. 


Yiorgos Kaloudis expertly blends his techniques and employs varied timbres of the cello and lyra (Aptera recital), intricately weaving them together with a masterful deployment of live looping, resulting in introspective compositions that draw inspiration from the realms of classical and ambient music into a magnificent music-poetry recital.

Through the skilful implementation of effects and the artistry of live loop recording, he crafts multi-dimensional sonic paintings, enriching the soundscape and further enhancing the tonal qualities of these two extraordinary instruments.

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