About

For more than three decades, Athens-born composer, conductor and university professor Konstantia Gourzi has shaped contemporary music with a distinctive musical language. Her works are characterized by a particular inner luminosity: emerging from silence and a sense of centeredness, they unfold a dramatic intensity that aims not at volume, but at depth.

For Gourzi, composition and conducting are two inseparably connected forms of expression. The interplay between the two has shaped and inspired her artistic work throughout her career. Her music opens spaces for reflection and emotional depth; even with reduced forces, she creates a compelling and resonant impact. Her compositions move between complexity and clarity, inner strength and poetic restraint.

Gourzi’s repertoire encompasses works for orchestra, chamber ensembles and solo instruments, as well as music theatre and film music. Her works often create soundscapes that seem like journeys through different levels of perception. Timeless themes such as social questions, spiritual impulses and the connection with nature play a central role in her work. She regards it as an inner calling to transform these themes into sound through the particular energy of music.

Her musical education began in Athens with piano, composition and conducting and continued at what is now the Berlin University of the Arts. Particularly formative was her close collaboration with György Kurtág between 1991 and 1996. She received further important impulses from composers including Isang Yun, Hans Werner Henze, Sofia Gubaidulina, Péter Eötvös, Aribert Reimann and Iannis Xenakis.

As a conductor, she was influenced by Claudio Abbado, whom she assisted at the Berliner Philharmoniker in 1995, as well as by Carlos Kleiber, Giuseppe Sinopoli, Günter Wand, Sylvia Caduff and Michael Gielen.

Since 1991, she has founded and directed various ensembles, including Ensemble attacca berlin, Echo Ensemble, ensemble oktopus and the opus21musikplus network and ensemble. From 1999 to 2007, she headed the Department of New Music at the Hochschule für Musik Hanns Eisler Berlin. Since 2002, she has been Professor of New Music Ensemble at the University of Music and Performing Arts in Munich.

Her works are performed and commissioned by numerous renowned institutions, festivals and orchestras worldwide. Among the commissioners, performers and presenting institutions are the ARD International Music Competition, Bamberg Symphony, Ultraschall Berlin, the BBC, the Bavarian State Opera, the Biennale di Venezia, the Lucerne Festival, the Grafenegg Festival, the Mecklenburg-Vorpommern Festival, the Staatsoper Berlin, the Athens State Orchestra, Camerata Salzburg, the Winnipeg Symphony Orchestra, the DSO Berlin, the Bremen Philharmonic and the RSO Wien.

Konstantia Gourzi regularly composes for renowned soloists including Nils Mönkemeyer, François Leleux, Cathy Krier, Dorothee Oberlinger, Julian Prégardien, Mikael Rudolfsson, Elisabeth Plank, Danae and Kiveli Dörken, Anastasia Kobekina and William Youn, as well as for ensembles such as the Minguet Quartet, Auner Quartet, Cuarteto Quiroga, Munich Opera Horns, OPERcussion and the Meitar Ensemble.

Her extensive discography comprises more than 30 releases, including recordings on ECM, GENUIN, NEOS and Sony Classical. Numerous albums have been nominated for the Preis der deutschen Schallplattenkritik and the International Classical Music Awards. Several new recordings of her works were released in 2023 and 2024. In 2023, she received the Opus Klassik award for her complete body of work in the category “Composer of the Year”. Her album Whispers has already reached more than 50 million streams on Spotify and Apple Music, with the number continuing to grow.

A central concern of her work is building bridges between cultures. Through the interplay of different musical traditions, she seeks to create pathways towards greater awareness and mutual respect. She also realizes this vision through interdisciplinary performance formats, collaborating with musicians from different regions of the world, visual artists and dancers, and bringing contemporary music to unconventional venues. Supporting young artists is another important part of her work.

In recent years, she has realized numerous projects as a composer, conductor and educator, often within the framework of Composer and Artist-in-Residence engagements. She has been invited as Composer or Artist in Residence at festivals including Grafenegg, Kreisau, Molyvos and the Romberg Festival, as well as by the Duisburg Philharmonic in connection with the Eigenzeit Festival and the Bremen Philharmonic. In 2026, the Philharmonisches Staatsorchester Mainz dedicated a composer portrait to her.

In the 2026/27 season, numerous performances and world premieres of her works are scheduled internationally, including commissioned works for institutions such as the Bavarian State Opera, the Philharmonie de Paris, the Munich Opera Horns and the Dresden Music Festival. In autumn, Logos, a new album bringing together her first three orchestral works, will be released.

Another focus of her work is the ongoing development of interdisciplinary concert formats with her Munich-based ensemble oktopus, which she has led for 24 years. These projects explore new forms of musical communication and experience, connecting different art forms and perspectives.

Dr. Susanna Schulz, September 2026