10 Facts About Vassilis Tsitsanis

Vassilis Tsitsanis was a Greek songwriter and bouzouki player.

Vassilis Tsitsanis became one of the leading Greek composers of his time and is widely regarded as one of the founders of modern Rebetiko and Laiko music.

Vassilis Tsitsanis has been described as having been an Aromanian, and his surname Tsitsanis could indicate some connection with the Aromanians of Metsovo.

Vassilis Tsitsanis was the only figure performing rebetiko at his time coming from the Greek mainland and not from the islands.

From a young age, Vassilis Tsitsanis was interested in music and learned to play violin, mandola and mandolin which were mainstays of so many of his songs.

In 1946, Vassilis Tsitsanis returned to Athens and began recording many of his own compositions that made famous many of the singers that worked with him, such as Sotiria Bellou, Marika Ninou, Ioanna Georgakopoulou and Prodromos Tsaousakis.

Vassilis Tsitsanis developed the "westernization" of the rebetiko and made it more known to large sections of the population, setting the bases for the future laiko.

Vassilis Tsitsanis was a close friend with Andreas Papandreou, Prime Minister of the country.

Vassilis Tsitsanis died at the Royal Brompton Hospital in London following a lung operation, on his sixty-ninth birthday.

Vassilis Tsitsanis was mourned across Greece, where his music is still enjoyed to this day and he is regarded as a legend of rebetiko music.