Biography:

Lefteris Hapsiadis (Greek: Λευτέρης Χαψιάδης, 23 October 1953 – 2 October 2023)[1] was a distinguished contemporary Greek lyrics author, a poet, and a writer of novels. His literary work included a plethora of poems, three novels, as well as lyrics for 525 songs (registered with AEPI[2]) in the contemporary Greek rebetika, laïka (pop music) and elafra (light music) genres. He had collaborated with various music composers and had occasionally worked as a record producer. Among those, he had often worked with Christos Nikolopoulos with whom he had had a number of popular records (including Μία είναι η ουσία – One matter counts, and Κάποια, κάπου, κάποτε – Some woman, somewhere, sometime). Together they also created and produced a CD with 12 songs (December 1986), for which they were able to assemble together 11 popular Greek performers, including Giorgos Dalaras, Haris Alexiou,[3] Stratos Dionysiou, Giannis Parios, and Manolis Mitsias. Nikolopoulos performed one of the songs in the CD as well, his first public singing performance ever. The CD was launched as “Τραγούδια για τους φίλους μου” – Songs for my friends. Other quite well known performers[4] of Hapsiadis pop songs were Stelios Kazantzidis, Glykeria[5] and Manolis Aggelopoulos.

Life

Lefteris Hapsiadis was born in 1953 in Feres, and lived during his early life in Koila,[6] both agglomerations located in the Greek Prefecture (Νομός) of Evros. This is the most north-eastern region of Greece, bordering on Turkey in the east, and Bulgaria in the north. Hapsiadis referred to Koila as his “Paradise on Earth”,[7] and he spent a major part of his life there. His family origin is from Pontos; this is the area in the north of present-day Turkey, along its Black Sea coast. Hapsiadis has been loyal to his Pontos origins and he has often collaborated in various artistic initiatives to preserve the cultural heritage of the land of his ancestors. An example includes the production of three CD records in the Pontos dialect, performed by Kazantzidis and Xrysanthos (an authentic Pontos singer), in the late eighties, early nineties. Hapsiadis was fairly knowledgeable of the Pontos Greek dialect that he learned from his parents and grandmother in Koila.

He attended high school in Alexandroupolis,[8] the administrative capital of Evros. For this purpose his entire family moved to town from Koila. During that period his father owned a kiosk, typical of Greek city landscapes, selling printed press items, like newspapers, magazines, pocket books, postcards, etc. Working at the kiosk as well gave him the opportunity to read a lot and grow his appetite for the Greek lyrics of rebetika, a.k.a. the songs of manges, members of a sort of inner city and urban slums gangs in the early 20th century. When most of his age peers enjoyed pop and rock, Hapsiadis was discovering little known events and details surrounding rebetika songs, their performers and lyrics. He developed a habit of collecting rebetika lyrics and writing them down in a notebook as his favorite pastime. That helped him a lot in being accepted in the circles of key rebetika industry players, in later years.

For six months, he attended college classes in Patras, in the department of Biology[9] before he dropped out and got entirely absorbed inside the professional world of rebetika in the Greek capital, Athens. He met Giorgos Dalaras, and through him he later came close to quite a few key actors in the Greek pop music industry. Names include Lefteris Papadopoulos, a widely known Greek lyrics writer, the composer Christos Nikolopoulos,[10] and various popular Greek pop singers like Stelios Kazantzidis, Stratos Dyonisiou and Manolis Aggelopoulos. He also became close friends with Vassilis Vassilikos, a prominent novels writer. Vassilikos became internationally known by his “Z” novel, a story about the assassination of Grigoris Lambrakis, a left-wing political activist in the mid-1960s. That novel was later made into a movie as part of a trilogy by Greek Director Costa Gavras, with Yves Montand in the leading role. In his first novel, Hapsiadis devoted a chapter to a dramatic period of Vassilikos’ life, right after the loss of his spouse Mimi, in Rome, Italy.

Songs

Per the generally accepted public opinion his most popular song lyrics were Mia einai i ousia (Μια ειναι η ουσία, “One matter counts”) that he wrote upon a Nikolopoulos[11] music score during the mid-80s. The song was originally performed by Haris Alexiou and later, following accrued popularity, by quite a few other performers, including Giorgos Dalaras.

Credits: