Tribute to the composer Dimitris Papadimitriou

Dimitris Papadimitriou is of Alexandrian extraction and was born in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, in 1959. A musician and composer, he has also served Greek State Radio first as Director of the Cultural Program after 2003, and latterly as its Governor General since September 2010.

As a Law student at Athens University in the late Seventies, he composed music for various productions staged by the Theater Department including “Oedipus Rex”, Faust”, J.B. Priestley’s “Time and the Conways”, and Elias Kapetanakis’ “The Soiree”.

His first compositions as a professional musician included works for the piano, for the violin and for violin and piano, a symphonic ballet suite, his “Theatrical Trio” for piano, cello and violin, studies for classical guitar, an overture to mark the fortieth anniversary of the post-war BBC, and an electronic post-symphonic suite.

He has composed music for numerous films, including “Electric Angel” (dir. Thanasis Rentzis), “Revanche" and "Archangel of passion” (dir. Nikos Vergitsis), “The song of return” (dir. Yannis Smaragdis), “The Scarecrow” (dir. Manousos Manousakis), “The tree we hurt" and "Nike of Samothrace” (dir. Demos Avdeliodis), “In the shadow of fear” (dir. Giorgos Karypidis), “Xenia" and "A charmed life” (dir. Patrice Vivancos), “Trip to Australia” (dir. Lucia Rikaki), “Lovers beyond time” (dir. Dimitris Panayiotatos), “Life on sale” (dir. Foteini Siskopoulou) and “Fading light” (dir. Vasilis Douros).

In 1996, he composed the music for the ZDF production, “Duft des Sudens”. He has also written music for a number of plays, for the television—including the music for the news broadcasts on ET-2 (1986-94) and ET-1 (since 1994) along with various theme tunes for MEGA Channel—and for the radio.

He collaborated with Swedish television on the music for the TV series "Amforans Gata" which Lief Krantz directed for Canal Plus, and with MEGA Channel on a series of Artpon animations.

Works of his has been included in the official programme of the Musikverein’s Vienna Spring Festival, and have been performed in Rome, New York and the Ozawa Hall at the Tanglewood Music Center. He has won six music awards at the Thessaloniki International Film Festival, and four state music prizes awarded by the Hellenic Ministry of Culture.

In 1995, he was selected by the Boston Symphony Orchestra to participate in the Tanglewood Music Center Fellowship Program as a composer.