Greek composer Vangelis passed away last Tuesday night, his lawyers' office announced. The author of the moving electronic theme song and Oscar winner "Chariots of Fire" has died at the age of 79.
Born Evangelos Odysseas Papathanassiou in 1943, young Vangelis developed an early interest in music, experimenting with the sounds made by banging pots and pans or by placing nails, glasses, and other objects on the strings of his parents' piano.
Despite having no formal musical training, he absorbed the tones of Greek folk songs and Orthodox Christian choral music. Over time he was drawn to the then-new field of electronic synthesizers, which allowed him to create the lush melodic colors that became his signature sound.
Outstanding musician and composer, he excelled in both electronic and progressive music or jazz, although his name became very popular as a composer of numerous film soundtracks, especially Chariots of Fire and Blade Runner.
As a keyboardist and musician, apart from his extraordinary compositional ability, his greatest contribution to the music and culture of the 20th century was making avant-garde music accessible and enjoyable for the general public. A merit achieved through electronic music itself and the fairly pioneering use of the synthesizer as another instrument.
He began his career in the 1960s with various pop and pop-rock groups such as The Forminx and, most notably, Aphrodite's Child. In this last band, and with the complicity as vocalist of Demis Roussos, he began to be known internationally with some songs that became real hits. And the album of him 666 of him, released in 1972, was recognized as a classic of progressive psychedelic rock
In the 1970s, the Greek musician composed the scores for several animal documentaries, including L'Apocalypse des animaux, La Fête sauvage and Opèra sauvage, the success of which was one of the reasons that pushed him into the world of celluloid.
Before throwing himself fully into that realm, in the early 1980s, he formed something of a quirky duet with Jon Anderson, frontman of the progressive rock band Yes, and they released several albums together under the name Jon.
The evolution of Vangelis was unstoppable and also attractive and fascinating. He jumped from pop to psychedelic rock; from this to avant-garde music, and finally from this -not as open as a genre- to film music. Where he became a prolific teacher.
By the early 1970s he had retired to the recording studio he had set up in London, where he wrote the score for Chariots of Fire, the story of a group of British runners' triumph at the 1924 Olympics.
The success of Chariots of Fire -with which he won an Oscar- somewhat eclipsed his other works, which does not mean that he wrote the music for several very important films, such as Missing, directed by his compatriot Costa-Gavras, and the especially Ridley Scott's futuristic thriller Blade Runner.
Since that boom, Vangelis has not stood still or lived on rents, as he remained a generous composer for many decades. His scores and his unmistakable style could be seen from advertising music and numerous other movie scores to elaborate symphonic-style compositions.
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