Rhapsody for Ancient Greek Lyre, Violin, and Orchestra Op.148 c.10’00” (2025)(2.2.2.2./4.2.0.0./Timp/Hp/Cel/Perc(2)/Violin solo/Lyre solo/Strings)

in one movement

Commissioned by the Thessaloniki State Symphony Orchestra

First performance on September 26th 2025 by Nikos Xanthoulis, lyre and Antonis Sousamoglou, violin, with the Thessaloniki State Symphony Orchestra conducted by Mihkel Kűtson at the Estonia Concert Hall, Pärnu, Estonia.

ABOUT

I was delighted when Maestro Simos Papanas asked me to compose a work for the Thessaloniki State Symphony Orchestra, featuring the foremost Ancient Greek lyre player Nikos Xanthoulis and the celebrated violinist Daniel Hope. It is rare occurrence at this point in my career for me to be asked to write a piece that includes an instrument that I have not written for before, and that is certainly the case here. Being an admirer of Greek culture, both modern and ancient, I accepted the project with enthusiasm. I must say that my work on this composition was very much facilitated by Nikos Xanthoulis’ generous gesture of shipping one of his instruments to me so that I would have a lyre at hand in order to familiarize myself with the instrument.

Writing for the Ancient Greek lyre presents interesting challenges to the composer: with just seven strings and a generally fixed tuning, its harmonic spectrum is pretty much limited to whichever tuning is chosen. In this case, I decided to stick with one of the traditional tunings of the instrument, the ancient Greek Dorian mode (corresponding to the medieval European Phrygian mode): A, B-flat, C, D, E, F, G.

In settling on the title Rhapsody I have continued in a personal preference for generic titles for my compositions, in order to emphasize that my music is “absolute” music, that is, its artistic concerns are with the notes themselves and the manipulation of the musical materials, rather than attempting to portray specific emotions or scenarios as “programmatic” music does. But in this case, the title also hints at the Greek roots of the  project: the word rhapsody in English is derived from the Greek rhapsōidos, a reciter of epic poetry.

Upon arriving in Estonia, the violinist for whom the work was written, Daniel Hope, was unfortunately stricken ill. The concertmaster of the orchestra, Antonis Sousamoglou, stepped in at one-day’s notice to perform the premiere of the work, to great acclaim.