The Athens Conservatoire
We are the oldest educational institution for the performing arts in Greece, founded as a non-profit organization in 1871.
The Athens Conservatoire (greek: Odeion Athinon) is the oldest educational institution for the performing arts in modern Greece, founded as a non-profit organization in 1871, by the "Music and Drama Association "Athens Conservatoire - 1871"
The institution played a significant role in the advancement of music studies in Greece since day one. Some of the most renowned international musical personalities have graduated from or taught at the Athens Conservatoire, including conductor Dimitiris Mitropoulos (NY Philharmonic music director from 1951 to 1958), composers Nikos Skalkottas and Mikis Theodorakis, opera diva Maria Callas, pianists Gina Bachauer and Dimitris Sgouros and many others. Today, apart from continuing to offer to its c.700 music students the full range of classical music studies from the earliest stages to the concert diploma, the Athens Conservatoire is constantly expanding into new areas: thus, the Jazz Music Department includes leading Greek jazz musicians among its teaching staff and has already gained significant momentum, the Centre of Early Music offers new insights into historically informed performance to a growing number of students in collaboration with international institutions such as the Leeds University (UK), while a new program of studies leading to a BMus (Hons) degree in classical music performance is being developed in collaboration with Goldsmiths College, University of London (UK).
Meanwhile, the first Drama School in Greece, also founded in 1871, has had a pivotal role in the advancement of theatrical studies in the country. Today, the Drama School of the Athens Conservatoire, member of the World Theatre Education Alliance (WTEA) – Beijing, is included among the select few top professional drama schools in Greece, officially recognized by the Ministry of Culture. The school students and its staff regularly stage cutting edge performances and cooperate with leading drama institutions abroad.
The Athens Conservatoire School of Dance, although established in the ‘00s, has been constantly expanding ever since and today features one of the few state-accredited Higher Professional Dance Schools in the country, complementing perfectly the Athens Conservatoire's wide portfolio of performing arts disciplines.
The Athens Conservatoire Centre for Research and Documentation, initially founded in 2015 to rescue from oblivion and decay our institution's extensive historical archives, is currently developing a broad range of research and editorial initiatives such as the preparation and edition of the first ever extensive History of Music in Contemporary Greece. The AC Centre for Research and Documentation participates and regularly contributes to international fora like the IAML (International Association of Music Libraries, Archives and Documentation Centres), publishes scientific papers and a magazine, and organizes various exhibitions, such as a major exhibition on the composer Iannis Xenakis in collaboration with the Greek National Museum of Contemporary Art.
Many other major Greek arts organizations such as the Stavros Niarchos Foundation Cultural Centre, the Greek National Opera, the Athens & Epidaurus International Festival, the Onassis Cultural Centre, the Athens Concert Hall (Megaron) and many others regularly invite us to participate in leading cultural events.
The Athens Conservatoire iconic building, located in the heart of Athens near the Presidential Palace and the Aristotle Lyceum, is designed by the famous Greek architect Ioannis Despotopoulos (1903-1992) who holds a prominent position within the modernist architectural movement of the 1930s and the Bauhaus School in which he actively participated. His work for the Athens Conservatoire is the only completed part of an ambitious large-scale cultural complex commissioned in 1959 by the then government for Athens. For these reasons, the building is officially designated as a "Modern Architectural Monument" by the Greek Ministry of Culture. Today, this recently renovated building is functioning as a unique and enviable cultural hub for various contemporary artistic and cultural high profile events.
WHY DONATE TO US:
Since our establishment more than 150 years ago, we offer top-class education in the fields of Music, Drama and -more recently- Dance.
However, our main goal is to create a level-playing field for all children and young artists, offering equal opportunities for all interested in performing arts to join our programs, irrespective of their background, financial situation, class, ethnicity, religion or sex.
We strive to serve this goal via a series of endowments and donations which support many students for the realization of their musical and artistic dreams.
Therefore, your contributions are valuable since they will greatly help to ensure the seamless continuation of our efforts and programs from one year to the next and will also enhance our capacity to offer unique life-changing opportunities to even more aspiring young artists.
Fundraisers
Official fundraiser
The AC College of Music Scholarship Program
In 2022 we setup and launched a new and significant academic venture in the field of Music in Athens, Greece. The newly established "Athens Conservatoire College of Music" (ACCM) delivers a Bachelor of Music programme in collaboration with Goldsmiths, University of London, a university college founded in 1891, renowned for its influential research and creative practice, with courses spanning the arts, humanities, social sciences, cultural studies, computing, business and management. BMus (Hons) Music is a leading performance-oriented programme in the field of classical music. It enables successful graduates to receive an internationally-recognised UK degree award following a four-year comprehensive programme of study at our premises in the Athens Conservatoire, in Athens. It offers students numerous alternative pathways and specialisations individually adaptable to their specific talents and future career interests as performing musicians, researchers in music performance, or music educators. The program, now already in its second year, is naturally highly demanding in terms of resources needed to maintain the highest possible academic calibre. At the same time, we have strived to keep the necessary academic tuition fees at the lowest possible level, in order to enable young talented musicians to have an opportunity which otherwise would have been prohibitive. For this reason we have setup this scholarship fund, to reach even more young aspiring musicians and enable them to follow their dreams. Find out more about the music college in our dedicated website: https://collegeofmusic.athensconservatoire.gr WHY DONATE TO US: Since our establishment more than 150 years ago, we offer top-class education in the fields of Music, Drama and -more recently- Dance. However, our main goal is to create a level-playing field for all children and young artists, offering equal opportunities for all interested in performing arts to join our programs, irrespective of their background, financial situation, class, ethnicity, religion or sex.
We strive to serve this goal via a series of endowments and donations which support many students for the realization of their musical and artistic dreams. Therefore, your contributions are valuable since they will greatly help to ensure the seamless continuation of our efforts and programs from one year to the next and will also enhance our capacity to offer unique life-changing opportunities to even more aspiring young artists.
Official fundraiser
The "Little Musicians" Scholarship Program
The "Little Musicians" program of the Athens Conservatoire - the premier and non-profit educational institution of Greece founded in 1871 - aims to offer scholarships for musical studies to talented children, aged 6-12, whose families cannot afford the cost of tuition.
During the last eight years, thanks to this program, approximately thirty (30) talented children have been studying at the Athens Conservatoire every year, following a specially designed teaching program of increasing demands, which has already begun to bear good fruit. Thus today, two former scholarship holders of the program are already studying at prestigious Music Academies abroad (Haute Ecole de Musique de Geneve, Tel Aviv Music Academy), while several others are very close to their final diploma with excellent prospects. Also, every year the "Little Musicians" are performing in a public concert to demonstrate their progress and skills, but mainly to inspire and encourage other children to get closer to music. It is important to emphasize that these gifted children would probably never have been able to study music in a systematic way without the "Little Musicians" program which strengthened them, encouraged them and offered them solid and comprehensive musical foundations during their first artistic steps. The scholarships cover 50%-100% of each student's annual tuition fees. All junior scholars are selected after yearly auditions held by experienced musicians and teachers of the Athens Conservatoire. Your contribution is valuable since it will greatly help to ensure the seamless continuation of the program from one year to the next and will also enhance our capacity to offer this unique life-changing opportunity to even more aspiring "little musicians". In gratitude.
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