This album (also due for general digital release across all the usual platforms on 1st January, 2025), was inspired by my collaboration in the soundscape to the exhibitions of the new Jeff Koons sculpture, "Apollo Kithara" on the Greek island of Hydra in 2022 & Frankfurt during 2023.

Starting with my arrangement of an actual surviving ancient Greek melody by Mesomedes of Crete and ending with “Epitaph of Seikilos”, the most famous and only complete surviving piece of notated music from ancient Greece, these two incredible examples of the actual music of classical antiquity frame in between them, a complementary set of my own completely new melodies and a selection of some of my personal favourite older original compositions for lyre, the album hopefully demonstrates how the kithara was the only magnificent lyre worthy of Apollo himself!

The kithara was the highly advanced, large wooden lyre of the professional musicians of Classical Greece, which reached its pinnacle of perfection during the “Golden Age” of Classical Antiquity, circa 5th century BCE. In this album, I attempt to demonstrate through new compositions conjured forth in a selection of some of the original ancient Greek musical modes, how the magic of the kithara once cast some of its captivating spells.

The instrument featured in this recording was recreated in modern Greece, by Luthieros, whom I have had the pleasure of collaborating with since 2014:

https://www.luthieros.com