Mikas Theodorakis 'Zorba The Greek' Composer, Greek WWII Resistance Fighter, Politician, Died Age 96

[appalachiablue]

- Theodorakis in 1971.
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'Greek Composer And Politician Mikis Theodorakis Has Died At The Age Of 96.' NPR, Sept. 2, 2021.

Greek composer and politician Mikis Theodorakis died Thursday at age 96. A notice on his website cited cardiopulmonary arrest as the cause of death. Theodorakis' music for the film Zorba the Greek became a worldwide shorthand for a seize-the-moment kind of joyfulness.

However, Theodorakis endured a lot of tragedy — and he was a much more complicated person than Zorba the Greek and its most famous song, a carefree dance, would suggest.

Theodorakis was imprisoned, tortured and exiled multiple times: the first time during World War II, as a resistance fighter; again during the brutal Greek civil war of the 1950s; and then again in the 1960s, when he was already internationally famous — by a military junta which banned his music.

His leftist politics and his music went hand-in-hand, as he told NPR's Morning Edition in 1994. "I wanted to unite the popular and the serious," he explained, "and to make a popular symphony, a popular oratorio. I put one, one question: for whom I compose. My answer is I wanted to address to all my people, and if I write music for the Greek people ... I compose for all the people. I write for all the peoples, for all the world."

Mikhail "Mikis" Theodorakis was born on July 29, 1925, on the Greek island of Chios. His father was a civil servant, and the family moved frequently across the country from post to post. Mikis wrote his first songs as a child, already enraptured by music. ~

https://www.npr.org/2021/09/02/702716101/greek-composer-and-politician-mikis-theodorakis-has-died-at-the-age-of-96

More, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mikis_Theodorakis

[Ocelot II]

1. He wrote a really neat cantata based on a set of poems by Pablo Neruda, "Canto General."

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[appalachiablue]

2. Composer of many music scores- a brilliant, versatile man.

A friend, Raphael turned me on to Neruda in college, wonderful.

[3Hotdogs]

3. That and "Third Man" theme are two of my favorites.