Since the 90s, he has confidently roamed the music scenes and large venues, played over a thousand concerts in Greece and around the world and released 15 personal records. But now KOTSYRAS Yiannis he worries about his new job and doesn’t hide it. “This is my first time in the theatre,” he explains with a laugh, rather reassuringly, about his theatrical experience, the musical-theatrical play “Catastrophe A” at the Acropolis Theater directed by Giorgos Kutlis and written by Odysseus Ioannou.

And yet, if you go back in time, even before he entered the field of professional singing, he was tested in small roles. Then he wanted to become an actor. He was 22 years old when he played in The General Secretary by Ilias Kapetanakis, directed by Diagoras Chronopoulos, and in The Court of Miracles, directed by Iakovos Campanellis, directed by Kostas Kleftoyannis. “Small roles in the municipality of Amarousiou, where I started with the choir of Terpsichoris Papastefanou, and at the same time I participated in these performances, in which the scenery was made by Giannis Tsarouchis. That’s where I fell in love with the theatre, which I got into music for a while.”

In 2020, he also appeared in The Beautiful City at the Concert Hall directed by G. Valaris, but now “in fact for the first time in the theater.” All of his important musical moments are included in the show, but it is not biographical. “Of course, anyone who knows me well will find clues from my life, elements from me like the fact that I come from a seafaring family.”

The story of a young woman who goes to Santorini and an old man who leaves his old life to go into the unknown is a story that will be presented from the 28th of the month and every Monday on the Acropolis Stage. According to him, two characters on the show could be his parents. That’s how they met, but not on a boat.

What need spawned this show? “For a long time I wanted to be able to play in theaters where the conditions and contact with the audience are different from what happens on the music stages and in nightclubs. I don’t judge them, but I need to play in a more introverted environment, share my music without interference, tables, reservations, etc.,” he tells “K”.

I have long wanted to be able to perform in theaters where conditions and contact with the audience are different from musical stages.

When he shared his idea with Odysseus to Ioannou, he meant something more autobiographical: “But he told me you weren’t young for something like that?” He came to my house with Giorgos Kutlis, we talked, he asked me questions about my life, which he more or less knew, and then the three of us started discussing a theatrical performance with music. I’m worried about how the audience will take it, but also about how I’ll do it, because I have a role to play in it. I perform as a singer and as a bartender, I play songs based on the feelings that a couple develops in a story played by Nancy Buklis, Giorgos Gallos, Aris Troupakis. I have a recurring role on the show.”

Some moments in the staging of the speech, to which the director attaches great importance, made it difficult for him. “This is a new landscape for me, but fortunately I have a good teacher. Yorgos Kutlis insists on pronunciation techniques, how we use commas, where I put pauses and other small details that fascinate me in rehearsals. I’m trying to understand the acting code, but I’m not going to be an actor.”

Paternity

In recent years, he has been talking more and more about his parents. Is it because he lost them or is he growing up? “That’s because I also became a parent. My father passed away six years ago when my first son Nikolai was born. Then Konstantinos was born, and a little later, in the spring of 2020, I also lost my mother. When I became a father myself, I began to look at life through their eyes. I often wonder how they managed. Also, I started to appreciate things that my mom told me, but I didn’t understand because I wasn’t a parent at the time. My mother made great sacrifices, she urged me to do mainly sports, because I had a lot of energy, I was an active child. I remember how she told me that such and such an object was expensive, and I ran to break it. Now I live like my own children. Everything I love is destroyed, so I stopped loving things too.”

He is very busy with his sons, six and four years old. For them, he also created Y4Kinds on Youtube during the lockdown period, trying to find ways for them to relax. He doesn’t have much time because he also writes lyrics for the TV show Sasmos with music by Nikos Terzis. He likes it because his inspiration comes from human stories that touch the traditions of Crete. Of course, since 2004, he first wrote the lyrics for the album “30+ Katya”, and then for the “Music Box”.

Parents, fairy tale

As a sailor, his father traveled widely. The time with him was short because he lost a lot. “I studied in his absence, however, as I got older, various problems began to arise. In a conversation about what I was going to do with my life, he suggested that I also become a sailor. “To be away from home all the time and not see your children?” I objected. She was a big miss, I wish I had a little more dad. Much later I realized that I was looking for the father part and found it first in Mitropanos and then more in Thanos Mikroutsikos. I don’t blame the parents, in those years the fathers were not emotional or at least open.”

Later, when they were able to talk to his father, dementia set in. “My mother has always been my source of inspiration. Separations, hardships, finances, political issues, we talked a lot about everything.” He admires her for a different reason. “He taught me not to have blinders in art. As much as I love, for example, Dimitris Bassis, I must have the same feelings for a colleague who has a different repertoire. I love, for example, Keitula Gharbi.” The absolute division that began somewhere in the 80s now seems so stupid to him. And he always remembers what Bitikotsis told him. That he took most of the flowers by singing “Sun of Justice, Understand”.

Since 2014, unconscious changes have taken place. “I think it started from the moment I met Katerina and started looking at life differently. I freed myself from the grip that gave all the weight only to my performing part. I stopped caring. Perhaps it was necessary, and given what the market had previously wanted. Maybe everything that happened with memorial Greece and that we acted as anti-memorialists, good or bad, as you like, played a role, and then we realized that these were all fairy tales. Hope that has come and gone… Everything plays a role.”