Petros Bekiaridis was born in Thessaloniki in 1953.
He studied at the Macedonian Conservatory under Yannis Mantakas (earning diplomas in Vocal Music and Harmony) and at the State Conservatory of Thessaloniki under Kostas Nikitas (earning diplomas in Counterpoint and Fugue). From 1979 to 1981, he attended the Schola Cantorum in Paris (studying theory and clarinet) and participated in a series of choral training seminars with Stephane Callat at the Centre d’Études Polyphoniques et Chorales de Paris.
He worked as a professor of music theory, music history, and choir at the Macedonian Conservatory (1977–1979), the New Conservatory of Thessaloniki (1981–2010), the Municipal Conservatory of Stavroupoli (2001–2013), and the Municipal Conservatory of Polygyros (2002–2005). In 1997, he became the first director of the newly established Municipal Conservatory of Edessa.
His first contact with choral music came through the historic Children’s Choir of the Christian Youth Association (CYA), directed by Antonis Kontogeorgiou. From 1973, he was a member of the Choir of the Aristotle University of Thessaloniki (AUTH), conducted by Yannis Mantakas. From 1977, he occasionally served as musical assistant to the choir, and after Mantakas’s departure in 1992, he became director of the Music Department of the University Student Club of AUTH, a position he held until his retirement in 2016. In this role, he organized and conducted the “Yannis Mantakas” Choir of AUTH, its Chamber Choir, and Instrumental Ensemble, maintaining a continuous and active presence within the university, in Thessaloniki, Athens, many cities across Greece, and abroad. Through the choir, he gave thousands of young students and music learners in Thessaloniki the opportunity to discover and fall in love with choral singing, offering them a creative and enjoyable pursuit.
He has collaborated many times with the State Orchestra of Thessaloniki, the Athens State Orchestra, the Third Program of ERT (Greek National Radio), the AUTH Orchestra, the Orchestra of the New Conservatory of Thessaloniki, the Thessaloniki Youth Chamber Orchestra, and with conductors such as Karolos Trikolidis, Alkis Baltas, Myron Michailidis, Vladimiros Symeonidis, Dimitris Dimopoulos, Antonis Kontogeorgiou, Kostis Papazoglou, Angelos Filippou, Kostis Konstantaras, among others. He also collaborated with ET3 and TV100 in producing choral music programs and documentaries.
Since its founding in 1985, he collaborated for many years with the Department of Music Studies at AUTH, supporting the choral training of its students.
As a close associate of Yannis Mantakas since the 1980s, he participated in organizing seminars for educators and choral music workshops. He also contributed to the music publications produced by the Music Department of the University Student Club of AUTH.
He has organized a total of nine Meetings of Youth Choirs and Orchestras, giving musical ensembles from Thessaloniki and beyond the opportunity to work collaboratively and present their work.
Through the European Federation of Youth Choirs, Europa Cantat, he has regularly participated in international festivals since 1973, giving concerts of Greek choral music and taking part in workshops featuring major works of international choral literature. He has performed in Spain (1973, 1991, 2003), England (1976, 2002), France (1985, 1995, 2000, 2005, 2011), Austria (1997), Belgium (1982, 2001, 2004), Luxembourg (1982), and Hungary (1988, 2010). He also helped organize similar international choral gatherings in Thessaloniki (1980 and 1983) and Kavala (1986).
In the 1990s, he collaborated with the French choral organization À Cœur Joie, organizing workshops on Greek choral music for French choirs both in France and in Greece.
He also conducted the Choir of the Municipal Center for Letters and Arts of Veria (1976–1979) and the Choir of the “Alexander the Great” Association of Edessa (1982–1985).
His repertoire includes many hundreds of choral works of all types (for children’s, women’s, men’s, mixed choirs; a cappella; with piano accompaniment; with small or large orchestra) and from all periods (from the Middle Ages to the present), as well as Greek choral music. Many of these works were presented for the first time in Greece.
Erifyli Damianou was born in Thessaloniki. She holds a degree from the Department of Music Studies at the Aristotle University of Thessaloniki (AUTH), a diploma from the Thessaloniki School of Early Childhood Education, a Piano Diploma, a degree in Advanced Music Theory from the State Conservatory of Thessaloniki, and a diploma from the Zoltán Kodály Institute of Music Pedagogy in Hungary (Red Diploma).
She studied Choral Conducting in Hungary with P. Erdei, E. Rosgonyi, and K. Kiss. Additionally, she attended courses and seminars with A. Kontogeorgiou, G. Adamidis, E. Koletschka, and D. Rao. Since 1992, she has been teaching as a Specialist Scientist at the Department of Music Studies at AUTH.
She has been recognized as the conductor of the Girls’ Choir of the Church of Panagouda in Thessaloniki and served for many years as conductor of the Children’s and Mixed Choirs of the ‘Thessaloniki Music College’ Conservatory. From 2013 to 2017, she was a board member and President of the Hellenic Society for Music Education (E.E.M.E.), where she founded and conducted the Society’s choir. Since October 2016, she has been the conductor of the “Yannis Mantakas” Choir of AUTH and the conductor of the “Choral Workshop” group of the Department of Music Studies at AUTH.
As a music educator, beyond her specialization in the Z. Kodály methodology, she has attended seminars and training programs on the teaching approaches of C. Orff and J. Dalcroze. As a researcher, she actively participated in the Psychoacoustics Program (I.PS.A.) of AUTH, as well as in the interdisciplinary program Music and the Brain of the Department of Music Studies and the First Neurological Clinic of AUTH. She also attended specialized programs related to the connection between learning and brain function at the University of Sheffield in the UK and at the University of Macedonia (PAMAK).
She has presented academic papers at Greek and international conferences. As a musicologist, she collaborated with the organization “Thessaloniki – European Capital of Culture 1997,” the State Orchestra of Thessaloniki, and the Thessaloniki Concert Hall, contributing to the musicological curation of concert programs.