Composer Mikis Theodorakis dies at 96: 'I have lost a great friend in life and arts'

Photos: Zülfü Livaneli personal archive

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Composer, songwriter, activist and politician Mikos Theodorakis has passed away at the age of 96.

Having composed more than 1,000 songs, he was most renowned for the soundtrack of the Oscar-winning movie "Zorba the Greek."

His musical activities were always accompanied by his political struggle, especially against the Colonels' Junta, which made him a symbol of the worldwide anti-fascist resistance.

Musician and writer Zülfü Livaneli, who first met Theodorakis in 1983 and founded the Turkish-Greek Friendship Association with him in 1986, talked about the death of his long-time friend.

"I have lost a great friend in life and arts," he said. "My sorrow is deep. We met Mikis Theodorakis in 1983. He had come to our concert with Maria Farantouri in Athens. After becoming friends there, our lives continued like older and younger brothers. There are too many memories to tell.

"He had given his last concert together with me. It was in Berlin in 1997. We were on tour. He got sick there and had to cut the tour short.

"We founded the Turkish-Greek Friendship Association in 1986. It was very important. Aziz Nesin, Ekrem Akurgal and Zeynep Oral were also there. There were many important people from Athens as well.

"We visited political leaders at the time. [Turgut] Özal was the prime minister. We asked Özal to lift visas for Greek citizens. Visas were lifted at the time. The opposite side had given the same promise but they didn't do it.

"Now I'm preparing to go to the funeral. He couldn't move over the last years, he was always in bed. He would say to me, 'You'll come to see me once a month.' I did. He was in bed, but he would have Greek appetizers prepared for me even if he couldn't eat, he would offer me ouzo. A kind person..."

Comrades and brothers

"When we were in prison in Ankara after March 12 [1971 military memorandum], we would find distant stations from transistor radios and listen to Theodorakis' music. We would have unbelievable enthusiasm. We would say, 'We are not in prison for nothing, there are all these brothers and comrades.' It would give us great power.

"He gave power to the world. He put up a great struggle against the Greek junta and the German occupation before that. He put up a great struggle for the Turkish-Greek friendship. At the time, they declared him the enemy of the Greeks because of our joint work.

"He gave a tremendous musicality to the world by molding the essence he took from Greek folk music. He had symphonies, concertos as well. But what made him world-famous was the 'Zorba' music.

"The Zorba music emerged in a very interesting way. In the novel of Kazancakis, Zorba sings 'Two partridges sing in a rock, I would say don't sing of partridge, this is enough for me' and dances with this. And Mikis works on this but the song emerges after the director says 'the character should dance by jumping like this.'

"Actually, it wasn't a piece that he cared about at all. But it exploded all across the world. It made its mark in the 20th century. He was a very important figure who made his mark with his music and personality."

Home of Theodorakis in Athens

"I won't shake hands with Bush"

"When Andreas Papandreou was the prime minister, he was angry that he treated Turkey as an enemy and became a minister from the New Democracy Party. But it didn't last long, he said, 'I was bored.'

"At one point, he was offered the presidency by all the parties. He said, 'I have one condition.' George Bush was the president of the USA at the time. He said, 'I won't shake his hand.' They thanked him and left.

"He was anti-imperialist, anti-capitalist. He lived as a communist until the end of his life. He was also patriotic. These are not contradictory things actually." (AÖ/VK)