Kostas Hatzis

Kostas Hatzis (Greek: Κώστας Χατζής) (born August 13, 1936) is a Greek Roma singer-songwriter and musician. Kostas Hatzis born in Livadeia, a city in central Greece. He is one of the most significant composers in the Greek social song. He is the one who has substantially imposed the "voice-guitar" style, and for the first time he made ballads with social messages heard.[1] His grand-father was a great popular clarinettist, and his father also played very well the dulcimer. Therefore, it didn't take Kostas Hatzis long to follow his family's steps. When he was sixteen years old, his father used to take him with him and he sang in weddings and christenings and in any other event, in which demotic, mainly, music was necessary. After a five year itinerancy in the country, he moved to Athens in 1957, and started recording in 1961, while he became popular until the mid-1960s with the Greek New Wave movement in Greek music.[1] His talent is quickly discovered by the great composers of that time (such as Mikis Theodorakis, Manos Hadjidakis, Mimis Plessas, Stavros Xarchakos, Yannis Markopoulos etc.), with whom he has cooperated, and he has performed their songs in his own particular way, adding strongly his personal style and particular sensibility, which add melody and meaning in the lyrics of the songs. At the end of that decade, Kostas Hatzis, in one of his tours, visits United States for concerts to the expatriate Greeks. It is worth noting that his fame as a singer for the peace has reached the White House and the then US President, Jimmy Carter invites him to meet him and congratulate him. He is one of the only Greek artists who have been invited and congratulated for their morality and their work by a US President.[2] Kostas Hatzis has sung about love as well as social issues in duets with well known singers, such as Marinella. Kostas Hatzis is the father of young singer Alexandros Hatzis.[1]