SONGS OF GREECE AND ASIA MINOR
October 18 to 22, 2025
AUBAGNE
OBJECTIVE
To train in Greek singing, modes, and modalities within the urban and rural music traditions of Greece and Asia Minor. The masterclass will cover:
- Improvisation techniques specific to the urban and rural music of Asia Minor
- Learning traditional songs
- Work on ornamentation
- Arrangement
- The historical and sociocultural context of the style
GENERAL CONTENT
– Vocal technique work: relaxation, breathing and breath control, vocal warm-up, voice placement
– Learning Greek songs (Epirus, Macedonia, Thrace, and Asia Minor): unison or polyphonic singing, drone work
– Work on interpretation, ornamentation, rhythms, and improvisation techniques
– Rhythm work for singing and dancing: experiencing rhythm through the body, ear, and speech
– Theory of Maqams and modal analysis
PARTICIPATION REQUIREMENTS
Good singing and instrumental skills (no theoretical knowledge required)
Open to amateurs and professionals
SCHEDULE:
10:00 AM – 1:00 PM & 2:00 PM – 4:00 PM
REGISTER NOW
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BIOGRAPHIES
MARIA SIMOGLOU // VOCALS
Maria Simoglou is a versatile singer and multi-instrumentalist, composer, and songwriter with over 20 years of experience on the international music and theater scene.
Born in Thessaloniki, Northern Greece, she benefits from a dual musical heritage- both scholarly and popular—rooted in her family’s rich tradition of music from Macedonia, Thrace, and Asia Minor, as well as from her formal studies. She trained first at the Thessaloniki College and Music High School, then at the Thessaloniki State Conservatory (oboe, oud, qanun, percussion), and finally at the Berlin Hanns Eisler Academy of Music, specializing in voice/music-theater under Marion Lukowsky and Professor Magdalena Hajossyova. She also attended masterclasses with renowned teachers such as Professor Barbara Schlich, Professor Norma Sharp, Thomas Quasthoff, René Jacobs, and Spyros Sakkas.
Early in her career, she collaborated with numerous groups and orchestras in Greece and abroad, working in traditional, classical, and contemporary music. She is regularly invited to concerts, festivals, and music seminars, notably in cinema and theater music.
Her performances include prestigious events such as the Avignon Festival, Babel Med Music, Villa Méditerranée, Forum Barcelona, Schwarz-Weiss Festival, Bayer Kultur, Berliner Märchentage (Berlin Storytelling Days), Deutsche Welle Concerts, Montalbane Internationale Tage der Mittelalterlichen Musik (International Medieval Music Days), Alte Musik Treff (Early Music Gathering), Rebecca Horn’s Moon Mirror installation, DIMITRIA Ethno-Jazz Festival, Cité de la Musique in Marseille, Mandopolis Festival, Les Suds in Arles, Vélo Theatre, the Abbey of Sylvanès, Centre Pompidou, among others.
Maria frequently appears on radio and television in Greece, Germany, Belgium, Switzerland, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Spain, England, France, the United States, Australia, and more.
She has collaborated and performed with internationally renowned singers and musicians such as Ross Daly, Spyros Sakkas, Stelios Petrakis, Efren Lopez, Maria Thoidou, Socratis Malamas, Bijan Chemirani, Patrick Vaillant, and Kevin Seddiki.
Since 2011, she has been performing with the theater company Mises en Scène, participating in two different productions: Bon Appétit and La parabole des papillons (directed by Michèle Addala / dramaturgy by Gilles Robic).
Maria has lived in Marseille, France, since 2008, where she leads and joins various ensembles. She collaborates as a singer, musician, or actress in traditional and contemporary music, dance, and theater productions.
Since 2008, she has regularly taught masterclasses (DROM, IIMM, FAMDT), focusing on vocal and body technique, repertoire, interpretation, ornamentation, rhythms, and improvisation techniques specific to Greek and Asia Minor singing.
ARTHUR RENDU // MODAL THEORY & MAQAM ANALYSIS
Arthur Rendu was born in Aix-en-Provence and discovered music in high school by watching Jimi Hendrix’s Woodstock live performance. After trying guitar, he began playing electric bass and double bass, which he studied at the Aix-en-Provence Conservatory.
When he discovered rebetiko and Greek blues, he set off on his bike during the harsh winter of 2016 in search of a bouzouki. He has played in various bands, including klezmer with Les Oreilles d’Aman, oriental surf rock with Karpouzi Mon Amour, as well as electrified Greek and Sephardic music with Tierras Ajenas.
Sylvain Peyriere, guitarist of Karpouzi Mon Amour and Samarabalouf, introduced him to François Petit, and he joined the project in July 2022.
Today, after exploring various Middle Eastern lutes—accumulating skills on the bouzouki, saz, lavta, baglamas, cümbüş, and oud—he increasingly electrifies and orientalizes his approach by incorporating electric bass, microtonal synthesizer, and a joyful, open study of modal music from around the world: from the Balkans to India, through Greece and Asia Minor, embracing the vibrancy of their traditions as played today, freshly reinterpreted with respect and energy by the new generations.
He regularly leads workshops introducing Greek and Asia Minor modal music and works at the International Institute of World Music as a modal analysis teacher alongside Maria Simoglou.