Jani Christou

Jani Christou (Greek: Γιάννης Χρήστου, Giánnīs Chrī́stou; 8 or 9 January 1926 – 8 January 1970) was a Greek composer.

There is some disagreement about Christou's birth, the date of which is given by some authorities as 8 January (Lucciano 2000, xv; Leotsakos 2001), while others state 9 January (Slonimsky 1965, 227; Stewart 1999). Most sources agree that he was born in Heliopolis, Egypt, though one states he was born in Alexandria (Angermann 1994, 14), and it has recently been reported that a birth certificate has been found stating that the composer was born in Nicosia, Cyprus, though this certificate is suspected of being a forgery (Lucciano 2000, xv). His parents were Eleutherios Christou, a Greek industrialist and chocolate manufacturer, and Lilika Tavernari, of Cypriot origin (Lucciano 2000, xv). He was educated at the English School in Alexandria and he took his first piano lessons from various teachers and from the important Greek pianist Gina Bachauer. In 1939 his parents divorced and thirteen-year-old Jani and his brother remained with their father, something unusual at time. When he finished school, his father sent him to England to study economics, hoping to groom him to take over the family businesses, which did not happen. Although he finally got his degree in finance, Christou preferred to study philosophy with Ludwig Wittgenstein and Bertrand Russell in King's College, Cambridge, eventually earning an MA in 1948 (Leotsakos 2001). He also studied music with senior music theorists including Hans Rudlih, a student and biographer of Alban Berg. His musical studies continued in Italy (Siena, Gavi and Rome, 1949-1953) with Vito Franci and Bruno Lavanino, while at the same time he was deeply engaged in analytical psychology, influenced by his brother, who studied at that time at the Jung Institute in Zurich.

Returning to Egypt, he dedicated himself to composition, working several hours a day. In 1956 he married his childhood friend Theresia Horemi, a painter, with whom he had three children. That same year his brother was killed in a car crash, and this would mark him unimaginably for his entire life and strangely foreshadow the end of his own. In 1960, with Nasser's nationalizations, he was forced to leave Alexandria, as were most wealthy Egyptian Greeks. He settled with his family in Chios, where his family owned property. He spent most of his time mainly in Athens, where he composed and sought to promote pioneering Greek music. His financial comfort allowed him to avoid having to seek work in Conservatories (which he did not appreciate as an educational institution) or other musical bodies, or taking any responsibility for any musical institution or committee, except in 1962 when he was a member of the jury for a competition of contemporary music organized by Manos Hadjidakis.

Christou collaborated with the National Theater and the Art Theater, composing music for performances of ancient drama. He also wrote oratorios and opera. The main feature of his life and work was his intense philosophical and metaphysical concerns which he directly related to music, trying to show its universal religious, metaphysical and mystical dimension, distinct from historical periods, styles, cultures and specific religious dogmas. Having a deep knowledge of philosophy, psychology, religion, social anthropology, History of Art and the Occult, he developed his own philosophical system and his own terminology for a metaphysics of music, and he attempted, especially with his last works, to realize his ideas in a wider "post-musical" context where music was something beyond music, collaborating with many arts in a new, transcendent and redeeming way.

He died (along with his wife and Stephanos Vassiliadis' wife Anastasia Vassiliadi) at the age of 44 in a car accident on the night of January 8, 1970 when he returned home from his birthday celebrations.

Main works

• Phoenix Music (for orchestra) – 1949
• Symphony No. 1 – 1949–50
• Latin Liturgy – 1953
• Six T. S. Eliot Songs (for piano or orchestra and mezzo-soprano)1955(piano)/1957(orch.)
• Symphony No. 2 – 1957–58
• Toccata for piano and orchestra – 1962
• Tongues of Fire (a Pentecost oratorio) – 1964
• Persians (Incidental music for Aeschylus' drama) – 1965
• Agamemnon – 1965
• Enantiodromia – 1965–68
• The Frogs – 1966
• Mysterion (for orchestra, tape, choir and soloists) – 1965–66
• Praxis for 12 (for 11 string instruments and director-pianist) – 1966
• Anaparastasis I (The Baritone) – 1968
• Anaparastasis III (The Pianist) – 1968
• Oedipus Rex – 1969
• Oresteia (unfinished) – 1967–70

Text adapted from the Greek Wikipedia.