Yunus Emre Institute accommodated an exclusive event for Ottoman Music lovers with the Golden Horn, an Ottoman Music oriented band performing at the institute’s central London headquarters. The Golden Horn is a project of old Ottoman music based on manuscripts of the earliest collectors of Ottoman music: Dimitrie Cantemir (1673-1723) and Ali Ufki (1610-1675). This is a modern interpretation of the repertoire of that era, for Santouri and Yayli Tanbur It focuses on the meditative character of the music and searches for new aesthetic implications of the Maqam.
The project that met with London audiences on the last Monday, Golden Horn was created in December 2015 at St Etienne and is the second program presented by Ourania Lampropoulou and Evgenios Voulgaris duo. Beyond Greece, the duo appeared at various music venues and festivals in: Algiers (Algeria, Constantine), Lyon, Paris, Bourges, Marseille, Saint-Etienne (France), Brussels (Belgium) and London (England).
Evgenios Voulgaris – Tanbur
Evgenios Voulgaris’ interest in traditional music began in 1992. Around the same time he completed his studies in Byzantine music. A multi-instrumentalist himself, he has repeatedly teamed with master musicians and composers in concerts, recordings and television productions in Greece and abroad. Since 1995 he has been the first mandolin in the Orchestra of Colours.
Of particular interest to him is teaching. He teaches in the Municipal Conservatory of Patras, where he leads the Department of Traditional instruments. He also taught the oud, yayli tanbur, organology, and maqam theory in the Department of Traditional Music at the Technological Educational Institute of Epirus. Since 2006 he has taught at the “Labyrinth” Musical Workshop in Crete and the “Music Village”, and he is often invited to deliver seminars in Greece and abroad.
As a yayli tanbur soloist he has been involved in various international projects: with Nima ben David at the Conservatoire National de Boulogne-Billancourt in Paris; “Flyways”, a project led by Paul Winter in New York, and “The Kommeno Project” led by Guenter Baby Sommer in Germany and various countries around Europe.
Ourania Lampropoulou – Santur
Ourania Lampropoulou was born in Athens. She studied Byzantine music, piano, harmony, analysis, orchestration and orchestra conducting in Athens and Paris. Her santouri studies took the form of an apprenticeship next to the virtuoso player, Tasos Diakogiorgis. She has studied musicology and anthropology of music (BA, MA) at the University of Athens and is PhD candidate in the Department of Arts (Paris 8 University).
Ourania taught santouri, music ensembles and organology at the Department of Traditional Music (Technological Educational Institute of Epirus), the Department of Music Science and Art (University of Macedonia) and at the National Conservatory in Athens.