Musicatlas
Music
Composer Minas Borboudakis writes contemporary classical music.
Life
Minas Borboudakis, born in Heraklion (Crete, Greece) in 1974, took his first lessons in playing the piano at the age of four. At the age of 11, he began his studies of piano, harmony and theory with Georgos Kaloutsis in his hometown. From 1992 on he studied piano with Olaf Dreßler and Urzula Mitrenga and composition with Wilfried Hiller and Peter Michael Hamel in Munich and Hamburg.
Borboudakis enriched his studies by attending numerous master classes with George Crumb, Luciano Berio, Wolfgang Rihm, Alexander Nasedkin and Rudolf Kehrer.
His compositions have been performed at numerous festivals such as Munich Biennale, the Musik im 20. Jahrhundert of the Saarländischer Rundfunk, the MDR Musiksommer, the world exhibition EXPO 2000 in Hannover, the Schwetzinger Festspiele, the Beethovenfest Bonn and during Gidon Kremers festival in Lockenhaus.
Various works have been commissioned and premiered with famous orchestras, ensembles and soloists, such as the Bavarian state opera, the Bavarian Radio Symphony (BR), the Saarbrücken Radio Symphony (SR), the Stuttgart Radio Symphony (SWR Stuttgart), the Münchener Kammerorchester, the Kremerata Baltica, the Camerata Athens, the Athens state orchestra (KOA), the Orchestra Sinfonica Nationale della RAI, the ensemble modern, the Festival young.euro.classic in Berlin, the percussionist Peter Sadlo, the cellist Johannes Moser.
As a pianist, Minas Borboudakis gave numerous concerts in Europe and Japan. He appeared with the the Bavarian chamber philharmonic, the Nürnberg symphony orchestra. Besides his own compositions is the repertoire of Minas Borboudakis concentrated on contemporary music.
He received the Richard Strauss scholarship (1995) the scholarship of the Summer Academy of the Salzburg University Mozarteum (2000). In June 2002 Borboudakis was awarded the 3rd Prize of the international Günter Bialas composition contest for his work Krámata. In 2003 he became the scholarship of the city of Munich and the composition scholarship of the city of Tübingen. 2004 he was awarded with the music Prize of the Bavarian State and with the Rodion Shchedrin Chamber music prize for his compositions Sigma- Cassiopeia and Chorochronos I. 2006 he received a scholarship for the Cité Internationale des Arts in Paris.
His music is basically inspired by the ancient Greek philosophy, literature and mythology and is reflected in a synthesis which combines the elements of the ancient Greek music with contemporary methods. His credo as composer is that the compositional procedure is not an escape from the reality, but the reality itself.
Highlights of the season 2006/07 are his invitation as composer in residence at the les muséiques festival in Basel, as well as the premiere of his music theater work „liebe.nur liebe“ (commisioned by the bavarian state opera) at the munich opera festival 2007 under Kent Nagano.
Minas Borboudakis is living and working as a composer and a pianist in Munich/Germany.