ZESSES SEGLIAS

Zesses Seglias’s compositional work focuses on sonic bodies and lingual structures.
A large part of his output explores the relationship between sound, voice, and its semiology, as defined by language. While much of this work is intended for the stage, his chamber music is also grounded in the same idea. In his most recent works, he attempts a fusion of music and speech into a hybrid between sound and its meaning, which he describes as spoken sound theatre.

His music as a whole is characterized by long-duration forms, an emphasis on sonic detail, narrative devices borrowed from other arts, vocal character, sharp contrasts with occasional grotesque elements, and slow, static structures with dense inserted episodes.

The highlight of Seglias’s international career so far is the opera To the Lighthouse (2017), commissioned by the Bregenz Opera Festival in Austria, with a libretto by Ernst Binder/Virginia Woolf. The premiere was celebrated by magazines and newspapers, such as Opernwelt, Suddeutsche Zeitung and Frankfurter Allgemeine. To the Lighthouse was followed by Not I in 2023, commissioned by the Greek National Opera and based on the monologue by Samuel Beckett, in collaboration with theatre group Zero Point and director Savvas Stroumpos.

These commissions followed years of intense international activity. In 2014, his mini-opera hystéra was presented at the Graz Opera under the direction of Beat Furrer, and in 2012, his piece [α-] won him the first prize in the Einojuhani Rautavaara composition competition at the Time of Music Festival in Viitasaari, Finland. He has participated in numerous prestigious closed-type composition workshops such as Voix Nouvelles Royaumont, Tzlil Meudcan, Centre Acanthes, Tschaikovsky Academy 2012, Darmstadt Summer Academy, Impuls Academy, Mixtur 2024, among others.

His collaborations include commissions, premieres, and performances by internationally acclaimed ensembles and soloists such as D. Michel-Dansac, Hannah Weirich, Krassimir Sterev, Dimitris Polyzoídis, Christie Finn, Sophie Burgos, Jana Luksts, Klangforum Wien, MusikFabrik, Schallfeld Ensemble, Diotima Quartet, Phace, DissonArt, Helsinki Chamber Choir, Exaudi, L’Instant Donné, Trio Amos, Vertixe Sonora, and many more.

His work madrigali alla luce e al sangue (2021) was performed by the ensemble Phace under the direction of Nacho de Paz at the Imago Dei Festival in Krems, Austria, and again in 2022 at the Aspekte Festival in Salzburg, under Lars Mlekush. In 2014, his piece her (commissioned by Impuls Academy) was featured in the celebration concert for Beat Furrer's 60th birthday, performed by Klangforum Wien under Peter Rundel. In 2024, Seglias took part in the 70th birthday concert of Furrer at Radialsystem in Berlin, conducting the KNM Berlin in the same work.

In 2018, Musikfabrik recorded his piece madrigali al vento e ai sospiri as part of the Composer Collider Europe program, funded by Creative Europe. Between 2020 and 2022, his trilogy Conversations was presented in New York, Toronto, and Vienna by Jana Luksts, the Longleash Trio, and the Schallfeld Ensemble.

He has worked regularly with the Schallfeld Ensemble and its principal conductor Leonhard Garms since 2015. A peak of this collaboration was the hour-long multimedia performance Namphaise (2018) at Dom im Berg in Graz, Austria. In November 2025, the ensemble will perform madrigali alla luce e al sangue again, this time for the recording of a monographic CD funded by the Kostopoulos Foundation.

In April 2026, Seglias has been commissioned by the Konzertaus Wien in Austria to compose a major new music theatre piece titled Qu4d, based on Beckett’s television play Quad, in collaboration with the ensembles ExVoCo (Stuttgart) and Crossing Lines (Barcelona), with funding from the Ernst von Siemens Foundation. In May of the same year, KNM Berlin will premiere his work …a drop on my fingers, two lips as a fuzz, a sun on our heads (is the pattern) for ensemble and lights, both at the Greek National Opera and in Berlin.

In the academic year 2025–2026, he will curate and teach the program Composing Sound Paintings, aimed at children aged 5–10 at the Museum of Modern Art, funded by the Ernst von Siemens Foundation.

Seglias (Edessa, 1984) studied composition and music theatre at the Aristotle University of Thessaloniki with Michalis Lapidakis and at the University of Music and Performing Arts in Graz, Austria, with Beat Furrer. He pursued further education with Georges Aperghis, Brian Ferneyhough, Pierluigi Billone, Mark Andre,  Chaya Czernowin, and others.

He completed his doctoral dissertation and postdoctoral research at the Aristotle University of Thessaloniki under the supervision of Dimitris Papageorgiou. His academic and artistic work has been supported by institutions such as the State Scholarships Foundation (IKY), the Onassis Foundation, and the Greek Composers’ Union.

He has taught music and composition at the Aristotle University of Thessaloniki, the University of Macedonia, the University of Thessaly, and the University of Western Macedonia. He has also given lectures and taught in seminars in Greece and abroad.

His works are published by BabelScores.