About

Tania Giannouli Solo (GR)
Harpa, Norðurljós
Friday August 30th
20:00

Classically trained Tania Giannouli is Greek pianist, composer, improviser and bandleader. She explores jazz as the most creative music form and regularly employs improvisation in her practice. She makes jazz of the kind where improvisation is just the starting point. Ιnspired by many different traditions and influences, embracing and transcending occidental and oriental spheres, her music and interdisciplinary projects span an impressive range of styles – a creative and borderless amalgamation of the global today’s reality.

Tania is one of the most exciting pianists of today’s jazz scene. She has been programmed in many of Europe’s prestige venues such as the Bimhuis, Bozar, Pierre Boulez Saal, Flagey, Handelsbeurs, and festivals such as Jazztopad, Enjoy Jazz, Ystad Piano Festival Trondheim Jazzfest, Brussels Jazz, Mai Jazz and more. Tania Giannouli’s latest release is SOLO (Rattle Records, June 2023) – a beautifully conceived set of piano improvisations – fearless, personal, and profoundly musical, it perfectly highlights her exceptional talents as an accomplished, highly intuitive pianist and composer. Her genre-defying “open sound language” is often described as lyrical, inspired, complex, eclectic, intoxicating and highly original. The album has been enthusiastically reviewed by the majority of the international media, has been placed in numerous Best of 2023 lists. In May 2021 Tania was nominated for the Deutscher Jazzpreis- German Jazz Prize- in the category “Piano/Keyboards International” together with Tigran Hamasyan and Shai Maestro.

In September 2023 she received the Art & Culture award by Greek International Women Awards. The annual critic’s poll Top Jazz, which is held by the Italian magazine Musica Jazz since 1982 (one of the most important polls in Europe) proclaimed her New International Talent for the year 2023.

Some reviews about SOLO : ‍
“A phenomenon is born…Everything that makes her so special comes together on her first solo piano album.’
Written in Music‍

“If you don’t know Tania Giannouli, you better get to hear her. Full, rich, sumptuous piano sounds, carefully recorded melodies, meditations, improvisations, and vibrations, all passionately sung on the piano. A magnificent set.”
— FRANCESCO MARTINELLI, jazz historian

“True, raw and mightier for it. Bravo.
-Jazzwise ”

…an essential artist to watch, Solo is a privileged window into a restlessly creative mind…” – London JazzNews

” Giannouli is a melodist of the highest calibre…She invites us into a sound world that is highly personal, that is exciting and that makes us want to come back to it again and again and…” Tor Hammero, Nettavisen