Lukas Karytinos was awarded the title of doctor honoris causa of the NKUA’s Department of Music Studies

The eminent conductor and artistic director of the Athens State Orchestra, Lukas Karytinos, was awarded the title of doctor honoris causa of the Department of Music Studies of the NKUA’s School of Philosophy on Monday, 27 May 2024, at 19:00, at the Great Hall of the National and Kapodistrian University of Athens. 

The Rector of NKUA, Professor Gerasimos Siasos, addressed the ceremony, and Professor of Historical Musicology at the Department of Music Studies of the NKUA’s School of Philosophy, Nikolaos Maliaras, presented the work and personality of the honouree. Shortly after, Professor Anastasia Georgaki, Chair at the Department of Music Studies of the NKUA’s School of Philosophy, read the Department’s Resolution, the Award, and the Honorary Diploma. Then, the Dean of the School of Philosophy, Professor Dimitrios Drosos, invested the honouree with the gown of the School. The ceremony concluded with a speech by the honouree, Lukas Karytinos, entitled ‘Issues in Musical Performance’.

The musical programme of the ceremony featured Johannes Brahms: Piano Quintet in F minor, Op. 34 (1864), I. Allegro non troppo performed by Nektarios Lanaras, Ioanna-Omorfia Kotzioula (violin), Rafail Kontogouris (viola), Stergios Theodorou (cello), Myrto Kontogouri (piano). The programme was curated by Leontios Tsokas.

In his speech, the Rector of NKUA, Professor Gerasimos Siasos, said the following:

‘In keeping with a long-standing tradition of our Institution to celebrate those who have contributed the most to science and culture, it is with great joy that we confer today a high honour of our University, the title of doctor honoris causa, awarded by the Department of Music Studies of the NKUA’s School of Philosophy to Lukas Karytinos, a central figure in the art of music and the science of Musicology in Greece and the world.

Lukas Karytinos is widely known both as an eminent conductor and the artistic director of the Athens State Orchestra, the oldest orchestra in Greece.

Born in Athens, he studied at our University’s School of Law and at Athens Conservatory, where he currently teaches orchestral conducting.

Lukas Karytinos continued his music path in Germany, specializing in orchestral conducting at the University of the Arts in West Berlin and the Mozarteum University in Salzburg. From 1981 to 1984, he worked as a conductor in Germany and served as artistic director of the ‘Piccolo Teatro Berolino’.

His return to Greece in 1985 marked the beginning of a brilliant career at the Greek National Opera (GNO), where he worked as a regular conductor and then as music director and made a significant contribution to the expansion of the GNO’s repertoire and its co-productions with theatres abroad.

His tenure as artistic director of the GNO, from 1999 to 2005, was a period of great change and innovation. Under his leadership, the GNO saw the creation of new stages, including the New Stage and the Children’s Stage, the foundation of the GNO’s Higher Ballet School, and the introduction of operas for children at the Odeon of Herodes Atticus in Athens.

His foresight and dedication to opera contributed to the upgrade and expansion of the GNO, bringing attention to the necessity of constructing a state-of-the-art building complex for opera performances in Athens.

Lukas Karytinos’s international career includes collaborations with major symphony orchestras and concert halls worldwide (such as the London Philharmonia, RSO–Berlin, Suisse Romande, and many more).

He has conducted world premieres of operas by Mikis Theodorakis and pieces from the global operatic repertoire in conjunction with eminent directors and artists, while international critics count him among the finest interpreters of Italian opera.

The distinctions and awards he has received are numerous and testify to the recognition of his work. Among them, we find the Gold Medal of Honour of the City of Athens, the “Dimitris Mitropoulos” Prize of the Greek State Radio, and the title of “Commendatore dell’ Ordine della Solidarietà Italiana” of the Italian Republic. In 2016, the Academy of Athens awarded him the Spyros Motsenigos Prize for Music.

The esteemed Nikolaos Maliaras, a Professor of Historical Musicology at our University’s Department of Music Studies, will now approach the podium. He will provide us with a more thorough portrait of the leading Greek conductor and go into further depth about the genuinely significant work of the honouree.

Mr Karytinos,

With the utmost joy, the academic community of the largest University in the country, the National and Kapodistrian University of Athens, receives you to its fold.

Thank you for everything you have contributed to music, culture, and education of our country, for which the National and Kapodistrian University of Athens honours you.

We offer you our warmest wishes for the continuation of your work, which we know has international appeal and acclaim.

We welcome you to the “family” of the National and Kapodistrian University of Athens!

Big congratulations!’