KOSTAS MERETAKIS - BIOGRAPHY

Kostas Meretakis was born in 1979 in Athens. Strongly influenced by the cultural heritage of his Thracian roots, as well as the folk music of the Balkans and the Eastern Mediterranean, he has shaped his own distinctive personal style. His inclination toward percussion was evident at the age of three. Initially self-taught, he began studying percussion, while simultaneously taking lessons in electric organ and Western music theory. As a teenager, he made his first professional appearances as a percussionist. He attended the Experimental Music School of Pallini, where he studied percussion under Vangelis Karipis, and later went on to study with Zohar Fresco, Stoyan Yankoulov, Hamdi Akatay, and Levent Yildirim.

He has collaborated as a virtuoso percussionist in recordings and live performances with many distinguished Greek and international artists in Greece and abroad, including: Nana Mouskouri, Maria Farantouri, Haris Alexiou, Eleni Vitali, Eleftheria Arvanitaki, George Dalaras, Alkistis Protopsalti, Dimitra Galani, Christos Nikolopoulos, Chronis Aidonidis, Domna Samiou, Omar Faruk Tekbilek, Simon Shaheen, Ross Daly, Badi Assad, Shantel, Calexico, Eric Burdon, and Joss Stone. He has also appeared on television and radio shows, as well as in musical documentaries.

Since 2001, he is the co-founder and a key member of the musical ensemble "TAKIM," with whom he has recorded two albums and performed in Greece and abroad.

In 2008, he was a member of the traditional folk orchestra that represented Greece in the cultural celebrations for the Beijing Olympic Games.

From 2017 to 2021, he taught in the Postgraduate Program of Music Studies at the Department of Ensembles of the National and Kapodistrian University of Athens. He has also taught percussion at M.E.L.M.O.K.E., the Experimental Music High School of Pallini, and the Municipal Conservatory of Patras.