Calliope Tsoupaki (27/05/1963), a Greek female composer, born in Piraeus, Greece. She makes music that has a mood of timelessness. Her objective is expressing the essence as simply and clearly as possible. In her compositions she uses elements of early and contemporary music as well as the music of Greece and the Middle East.
Calliope Tsoupaki is a Greek-Dutch composer living in Amsterdam. Her compositions combine East and West into a contemplative and spiritual whole. Her works contain elements that refer to her Greek roots and her love of early as well as contemporary music. The result is a completely personal style and timelessness music. Her objective is expressing the essence as simply and clearly as possible.
Calliope Tsoupaki started her career at the Hellinicon Conservatory in Athens and continued her studies in the Netherlands with Louis Andriessen. Since 2007 she also teaches at The Royal Conservatoire in The Hague.
So far her oeuvre consists of more than 70 works for various instrumentations, from solo to orchestral works, dance, theatre, opera and multimedia projects. Her music is praised for its melodic character, warm sound and emotional quality. The New York Times once described her work as “dizzyingly beautiful” and the Dutch magazine TM called her “Monteverdi of the 20th century”, and her “St. Luke Passion” had a startling succes during the Holland festival 2008. From November 2018 to November 2021 she was Composer Laureate of the Netherlands. In July 2021 she was awarded the prestigious Matthijs Vermeulen Composition Price, for her composition Thin Air, a composition for variable instruments and instrumentation as an expression of solidarity and compassion in the troubled times of the pandemic. Thin Air is performed more than 50 times in various festivals and by musicians from all over the world.