Demis Roussos to visit Lithuanian towns

VILNIUS - Goodness, is he still singing and giving concerts?! Such is the first reaction of some surprised and happy fans of Greek-flavor music to the news that Demis Roussos, Europe’s superstar of the 1970s-1990s, will travel throughout Lithuania giving concerts. Yes, he is still singing, and released a new album titled Demis in 2009. This singer of very original versions of Greek music (as well as soul, blues, rock, and disco), accompanied by a symphony orchestra made up of Lithuanian musicians, will give his concerts in Siauliai (Siauliu Arena) on April 7, Panevezys (Cido Arena) on April 9, Kaunas (Sports Hall) on April 12, Vilnius (Pramogu Arena) on April 14 and in the Kaunas’ Sports Hall again on April 16. Tickets for his concert in Panevezys can be purchased via www.tiketa.lt while tickets for concerts in Siauliai, Kaunas and Vilnius can be purchased via www.bilietai.lt

Demis Roussos was born into an ethnic Greek family in Alexandria, Egypt, and spend his first 15 years there. Then Alexandria was still quite a cosmopolitan city, where decolletage and skirts barely reaching the knees were a more common women’s dress code than the burqa. During the political turmoil of the Suez crisis of 1961, his family was forced to leave Egypt for Greece where, in 1968, Roussos joined the progressive rock band Aphrodite’s Child. His bandmate was Vangelis, who now is considered to be a world-scale composer who is famous for his music for the Hollywood blockbuster 1492: Conquest of Paradise as well as of his anthem for the 2002 Football World Cup. After Aphrodite’s Child disbanded, Roussos still had some cooperation with Vangelis in 1970; together they issued their album Sex Power, and later Roussos participated in the vocal adaptation of the Vangelis-created themes for the movies Chariots of Fire and Blade Runner.

Regardless, Roussos became famous for his solo career, which started with his song We Shall Dance. His single Forever and Ever topped the charts of Europe in 1973. It was then that middle-aged Lithuanians, getting audio cassettes smuggled from Western Europe, fell in love with his Greek-style music. He sings mostly in English and French, or in English with some French inclusions, as is the case in his hit Goodbye, My Love, Goodbye where “au revoir” is rhymed with “too far.”
Roussos, during his concerts, used to wear big and posh clothes similar to the clothes of some Byzantine monarch or Russian Orthodox patriarch. These clothes hid his obesity. Interestingly enough, Roussos, being a superstar in Europe, never became popular in the USA, although he tried. He even started to sing country music for Americans and started to eat one chicken instead of two per day to become slimmer, but it did not help him to conquer America. Maybe some explanation of his failure in the USA could be as follows: his obesity was exotic in Europe, but not in America.

It is not the first time that Roussos comes to Lithuania. He has his nostalgic public always waiting for him here. Roussos got a reputation here of being a very simple and friendly man, enjoying the local food, although recently he, quite successfully, has fought against his weight problem. He likes to walk the streets of Vilnius (he knows the city quite well) and other Lithuanian towns, smiling to everybody. This time he will sing not only his Greek-style melodies but also the songs from his latest album Demis, where rock and blues dominate. He started his career as a rock musician. Now Roussos comes back to his musical roots.