72 Facts About Vangelis

Vangelis was best known for his Academy Award-winning score to Chariots of Fire, as well as for composing scores to the films Blade Runner, Missing, Antarctica, The Bounty, 1492: Conquest of Paradise, and Alexander, and for the use of his music in the 1980 PBS documentary series Cosmos: A Personal Voyage by Carl Sagan.

Vangelis released his first solo albums during this time, and performed as a solo artist.

In 1975, Vangelis relocated to London where he built his home recording facility named Nemo Studios and released a series of successful and influential albums for RCA Records, including: Heaven and Hell, Albedo 0.39, Spiral, and China.

From 1979 to 1986, Vangelis performed in a duo with Yes vocalist Jon Anderson, releasing several albums as Jon and Vangelis.

Vangelis collaborated with Irene Papas on two albums of Greek traditional and religious songs.

Vangelis reached his commercial peak in the 1980s and 1990s.

Vangelis composed the official anthem of the 2002 FIFA World Cup held in Korea and Japan.

Vangelis used many electronic instruments in a fashion of a "one-man quasi-classical orchestra" composing and performing on the first take.

Vangelis's father Odysseus worked in property and was an amateur sprinter; Vangelis described him as "a great lover of music".

Vangelis developed an interest in music at age four, composing on the family piano and experimenting with sounds by placing nails and kitchen pans inside it and with radio interference.

When he was six his parents enrolled him for music lessons, but Vangelis later said that his attempts to study "failed" as he preferred to develop technique on his own.

Vangelis considered himself fortunate to have not attended music school, as he believed that it would have impeded his creativity.

Vangelis never learned to read or write music, instead played from memory.

Vangelis found traditional Greek music as particularly important in his childhood, but at 12 developed an interest in jazz and rock.

Vangelis scored music for three Greek films; My Brother, the Traffic Policeman directed by Filippos Fylaktos, 5,000 Lies by Giorgos Konstantinou, and To Prosopo tis Medousas by Nikos Koundouros.

In 1968, the 25-year-old Vangelis wished to further his career and, amidst the political turmoil surrounding the 1967 coup, left Greece for London.

Vangelis was denied entry into the UK and settled in Paris for the next six years.

Vangelis conceived the idea of their third, 666, a double concept album based on the Book of Revelation.

Vangelis would produce future albums and singles by their singer Demis Roussos.

From 1970 to 1974, Vangelis took part in various solo projects in film, television, and theatre.

Vangelis succeeded in taking legal action to have them withdrawn.

Vangelis provided music for the Henry Chapier film Amore.

In 1973, Vangelis released his second solo album Earth, a percussive-orientated album with various additional musicians, including Robert Fitoussi and Aphrodite's Child bandmate Silver Koulouris.

The line-up performed and released a single titled "Who" in 1974 under the name Odyssey, including a concert that Vangelis held at the Paris Olympia in February 1974.

Several months later Vangelis travelled to England to audition with the progressive rock band Yes, after singer Jon Anderson had become a fan of his music and invited Vangelis to replace departing keyboardist Rick Wakeman.

In 1974, Vangelis left Paris for London as he "outgrew France".

In 1976, Vangelis released his second soundtrack for a Rossif animal documentary, La Fete sauvage, which combined African rhythms with Western music.

Rossif and Vangelis again collaborated for Sauvage et Beau and De Nuremberg a Nuremberg.

In 1979, Vangelis returned to his Greek roots by recording new arrangements of Greek folk songs with actress and singer Irene Papas.

Vangelis had already begun a more extensive collaboration with Jon Anderson in 1979, as the duo Jon and Vangelis.

In 1986, Vangelis would be actively involved in the composition of new music for a special edition.

Vangelis recalled that Sagan had sent him recordings of some sounds collected by satellites, which were exactly what he heard as a child.

In March 1982, Vangelis won an Academy Award for Best Original Music Score, but refused to attend the awards ceremony, partly due to his fear of flying.

Vangelis turned down an offer to stay in a stateroom aboard the Queen Elizabeth 2 for a boat crossing.

Vangelis composed the score of Missing directed by Costa-Gavras, which was awarded the Palme d'Or and gained Vangelis a nomination for a BAFTA Award for Best Film Music.

Vangelis declined an offer to score 2010: The Year We Make Contact, the sequel to 2001: A Space Odyssey.

In 1981, Vangelis collaborated with director Ridley Scott to score his science fiction film, Blade Runner.

Critics have written that in capturing the isolation and melancholy of Harrison Ford's character, Rick Deckard, the Vangelis score is as much a part of the dystopian environment as the decaying buildings and ever-present rain.

This, in turn, was resolved in 2007 when a box set of the score was released to commemorate the film's 25th anniversary, containing the 1994 album, some previously unreleased music cues, and new original Vangelis material inspired by Blade Runner.

Vangelis wrote the score for the film Bitter Moon directed by Roman Polanski, and The Plague directed by Luis Puenzo.

In 1992, Vangelis wrote the music for a restaging of the Euripides play, Medea, that featured Irene Papas.

Vangelis collaborated in 1976 with Italian singer Patty Pravo with the album Tanto and with Italian singer Milva achieving success, especially in Germany, with the albums Ich hab' keine Angst translated in French as Moi, Je N'ai Pas Peur and Geheimnisse in 1986, translated in Italian as Tra due sogni.

Vangelis performed his only concert in the US on 7 November 1986 at Royce Hall on the campus of University of California, Los Angeles.

Vangelis conceived and staged the ceremony of the 1997 World Championships in Athletics which were held in Greece.

Vangelis composed the music, and designed and directed the artistic Olympic flag relay portion, of the closing ceremonies of the 2000 Summer Olympics in Sydney.

In 2002, Vangelis created the official Anthem for the 2002 FIFA World Cup.

In 2001, Vangelis performed live, and subsequently released, the choral symphony Mythodea, which was used by NASA as the theme for the Mars Odyssey mission.

In 2004, Vangelis released the score for Oliver Stone's Alexander, continuing his involvement with projects related to Greece.

Vangelis released two albums in 2007; the first was a 3-CD set for the 25th anniversary of Blade Runner, titled Blade Runner Trilogy and second was the soundtrack for the Greek movie, El Greco directed by Yannis Smaragdis, titled El Greco Original Motion Picture Soundtrack.

On 11 December 2011, Vangelis was invited by Katara Cultural Village in Qatar to conceive, design, direct, and compose music for the opening of its outdoor amphitheater.

In 2012, Vangelis re-tooled and added new pieces to his iconic Chariots of Fire soundtrack, for use in the same-titled stage adaptation.

Vangelis composed the soundtrack of the environmental documentary film Trashed directed by Candida Brady and starring Jeremy Irons.

Vangelis scored the music for the film Twilight of Shadows directed by Mohammed Lakhdar-Hamina.

In 2018, Vangelis composed an original score for Stephen Hawking's memorial.

However, Vangelis recalled he was kind-of pressured by the record company to release it and include old compositions.

On 24 September 2021, Vangelis released Juno to Jupiter, his last studio album.

Vangelis did own a house by the Acropolis of Athens which he did not renovate.

Vangelis died of heart failure on 17 May 2022, at the age of 79, at a hospital in Paris.

Vangelis was suffering from several health issues in the last couple of years and, according to some reports, died of COVID-19 complications.

Vangelis is sometimes categorized as a new-age composer, a classification others have disputed.

Vangelis himself called New-age music a style which "gave the opportunity for untalented people to make very boring music".

For films, Vangelis stated that he would begin composing a score for a feature as soon as he had seen a rough cut of the footage.

For example, in the Oliver Stone film Alexander, Vangelis conducted an orchestra that consisted of various classical instruments including sitars, percussion, finger cymbals, harps, and duduks.

Vangelis considered that contemporary civilization is living in a cultural "dark age" of "musical pollution".

Vangelis considered musical composing a science rather than an art, similar to Pythagoreanism.

Vangelis had a mystical viewpoint on music as "one of the greatest forces in the universe", that the "music exists before we exist".

Vangelis' first electric keyboard was a Hammond B3 organ, while his first synthesizer was a Korg 700 monophonic.

Vangelis disliked programming-oriented sampling devices like the Fairlight CMI and remained unimpressed by many of the later commercial 1980s polysynths such as the Yamaha DX7; however, he did use the E-mu Emulator sampler, in particular the Emulator II model.

Vangelis would continue to use the SP-12 and LinnDrum as drum machines, adding the Sequential Circuits TOM.

In 1988, Vangelis closed Nemo Studio and embarked on the more nomadic lifestyle he would continue for the rest of his life, moving between homes and hotels in different countries according to whim and circumstance.

In 1995, Vangelis had a minor planet named after him by the International Astronomical Union's Minor Planet Center at the Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory; the name was proposed by the MPC's co-director, Gareth V Williams, rather than by the object's original discoverer, Eugene Joseph Delporte, who died in 1955, long before the 1934 discovery could be confirmed by observations made in 1990.

In 1996 and 1997, Vangelis received awards at the World Music Awards.