SPIRAL
Sofia Labropoulou – Solo Kanun and Prepared Kanun
“Sofia Labropoulou , began her set with a mesmerizing adaptation of a prayer by Hildegard von Bingen. The church’s acoustics turned Labropoulou’s kanun into a suspended, meditative force, highlighting her ability to balance experimentalism with traditional Eastern Mediterranean sounds.” Jazz & The City Festival, Kollegienkirche, Salzburg, 18.10.2025 (Jo Frost – UK – Jazznews.com)
“Sofia Labropoulou has translated the musical heritage of the European and Aegean musical tradition into a living practice.” Performance by Sofia Labropoulou and Sonar Quartett at Gare du Nord, Basel, 09.02.2023 (Cecile Olshausen – SRF 2 Kultur)
“Sofia Labropoulou with “Sisyphus” proves why she is considered as the most important kanun player of the younger generation” (Haris Symvoulidis – mic.gr)
“When one speaks about music from Greece, usually you will not expect a story about a woman artist playing kanun, also a composer, with both legs and her arms into contemporary and experimental music as well as into Greek traditional music. And that her first solo album is inspired by Sisyphus, but rather by the work of Albert Camus than by the Greek mythology. Yes, that is Sofia Labropoulou. Her composing and playing and selection of featured artists show that she masters her instrument, but does not put it in front. Her compositions give space for the story to develop and for others to shine.” (Bojan Djordjevic WMCE, Serbia)
SPIRAL is the solo performance project by Vienna-based kanun player, composer and improviser Sofia Labropoulou, exploring the instrument beyond its established musical and cultural boundaries.
Through original compositions, improvisation, prepared kanun techniques and radical reinterpretations of existing works, Labropoulou transforms the kanun into a space of sonic experimentation. Resonance, altered tunings, fragile textures and unexpected rhythmic structures unfold in a musical language where tradition is neither abandoned nor preserved unchanged, but continually reimagined and transformed.
Drawing on centuries of musical thought, from Hildegard von Bingen to György Kurtág, and informed by contemporary experimental practices, SPIRAL approaches music as a process of questioning, transformation and renewal.
The project is connected to Labropoulou’s second solo album, SPIRAL, due for release on 6 November 2026 by Odradek Records.
SPIRAL — Live Performance
In live performance, SPIRAL unfolds through an intimate exploration of the kanun and prepared kanun. Through the manipulation of strings, preparations, shifting tunings and unconventional playing techniques, Labropoulou transforms the instrument’s familiar resonance into unexpected textures, rhythmic structures and sonic landscapes.
Moving between composed material and improvisation, the performance challenges not only the sonic boundaries of the instrument but also its physical and performative possibilities. In Untuned Ears Hear Nothing But Discord, two kanuns are played simultaneously by a single performer, creating a complex dialogue of gestures, resonances and contrasting musical materials.
BIO
Sofia Labropoulou is a kanun player, composer, and improviser whose work moves between modal traditions and contemporary sonic exploration. Rooted in the musical languages of the Eastern Mediterranean and shaped by a constant search for new forms, she approaches the kanun as both memory and possibility, an instrument ancient in resonance, yet open to reinvention.
Her practice unfolds at the intersection of composition and improvisation, poetry and silence. Whether performing solo or in dialogue with other artists, she seeks spaces where sound becomes gesture and structure dissolves into presence.
Her first solo album, Sisyphus (Odradek Records, 2020), marked the beginning of this, a meditation on repetition, endurance, and inner ascent.
Based in Vienna, she is the founder and artistic director of the Unbounded Sounds music series, a platform dedicated to artistic encounters across traditions and disciplines.
With Spiral, she deepens her long-term exploration of expanding the kanun beyond its established techniques and vocabulary, opening it to new sonic territories and reimagining its place within contemporary music.
This exploration continues with Utopic Scales, her current research and composition project, a work in progress that investigates new approaches to modality, tuning and the kanun’s evolving pitch architecture. Conceived as the next stage of her artistic research, the project explores how the instrument itself can become a generative space for new modal and compositional possibilities.
Sofia’s Extended CV
Sofia’s Technical Rider
Sofia’s Photos and Press Material
Website
Youtube Channel
Spotify
E-mail Adress: sofia_labropoulou@yahoo.gr
References
Venues
Great Hall, Musikverein (Vienna), ORF RadioKulturhaus (Vienna), Οnassis Cultural Centre (Athens), Opera Hall – Stavros Niarchos Foundation (Athens), Palazzo Liviano – Sala dei Giganti (Padova), Michael Fowler Center (Wellington, New Zealand), MUPA Palace of Arts (Budapest), Opera d’ Algiers (Algeria), ”The Sonic Lab” at SARC – Queen’s University (Belfast), LACMA (Los Angeles County Museum of Art), Skirball Cultural Center (Los Angeles), Yoshi’s (San Fransisco – USA), DROM (New York), Santa Fe University of Art (New Mexico), Iş Sanat Merkezi (Istanbul), Ferenc Liszt Academy (Budapest), Kodaly Center (Pecs, Kecskemet), Institute du Monde Arabe (Paris), Opera de Lyon (France), Alexandria Library.
Festivals
Saalfelden Jazzfestival (short winter edition 2026), Carinthischen sommer – 2026 (Austria), Jazz & The City Festival (Salzburg – 2025), Internationale Jazzfestival Münster (Germany – 2024), Mongenland Festival 2024 (Germany), aNOther Festival (Vienna – 2023), Salam Orient Festival – 2022 (Vienna), Mittelfest – 2021 (Cividale del Friuli, Italy), Bohemia Jazz Fest (Prague – 2021), Tectonics Festival – Athens 2019, New Zealand Festival (2016), WOMAD Festival – 2016 (Taranaki, New Zealand), Early music Festival Vilnius (2015), Festival Culturel Européen Algerie – Salle Ibn Zeydoun (Algiers), Les Rencontres International de Thoronet (Provence, France – 2021), Festival del Sole (Napa Valley, California – 2013).
Artists and Composers
Robyn Schulkowsky, John Psathas, Xavier Charles, Michel Godard, Sonar Quartett, Savina Yannatou, Wiener Symphoniker, Tonkünstler Orchestra, Shabnam Parvaresh, Ross Daly, Marta Sebestyen, Efren Lopez, Sokratis Sinopoulos, Jordina Milla, Ole Mathisen, Ourania Lampropoulou, Matthias Loibner, Ilhan Ersahin, amongst others.