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Manos Hadjidakis (1925 – 1994)  Manos Hadjidakis Manos Hadjidakis was born in the northern Greek city of Xanthi in 1925. At an early age he started to study music. When he was seven years old his family moved to Athens. His parents divorced and his father died soon after in an airplane accident. His father’s death and the outbreak of World War II forced him to work in different jobs to help support his family. At the same time though, he continued to study music. By the mid 1940s he started to work as a music composer and song writer in Greek theatre. He was very successful. In concerts in the early 1950s he presented music based on Rebetika but with a more folk song style. This helped make Rebetika more acceptable to the Greek upper class. His love for Rebetika led him to make two great LP's - 'Lilacs On The Dead Land', and 'Cruel April Of 45'. In the years that followed, Hadjidakis created an unforgettable personal music style. In 1959 and 1960, at the First Song Festival organised by the Greek National Broadcasting Institute, he won first prize for his two songs sung by Nana Mouskouri. In the early 1960s he wrote the music and staged "A Street Of Dreams"-Odos Oneiron, with Minos Argyrakis, which was considered a milestone in Greek Theatre. |