Evangelos Odysseas Papathanassiou is a Greek composer of electronic jazz, progressive, ambient and orchestral music, under the artist name Vangelis. He was born 29/03/1943 in Volos and started to compose from 4 years old.
He is best known for his Academy Award winning score for the film Chariots of Fire and for the films Blade Runner and 1492: Conquest of Paradise. Vangelis began his professional musical career working with several popular bands of the 1960s such as “The Forminx and Aphrodite’s Child”, with the album 666 going on to be recognised as a psychedelic “classic”.
In the 1970s, formed a musical partnership with Jon Anderson the lead singer of progressive rock band Yes and the duo went on to release several albums together as Jon & Vangelis. Towards the end of the 1970s, composed music scores for several animal documentaries, including Opera sauvage. The success of these scores brought him into the film scoring mainstream.
In 1981, he composed the score for the Oscar-winning film Chariots of Fire. The soundtrack’s single, “Titles”, won Vangelis the Academy Award for Best Original Music Score and also reached the top of the American Billboard.
In a career spanning over 49 years, writing and composing more than 40 albums, Vangelis is regarded by some music critics as one of the greatest living composers of electronic music.
Explore Hellas 