Yiannis Chryssomallis born November 14, 1954, known professionally as Yanni, is a Greek-American composer, keyboardist, pianist, and music producer who has spent his adult life in the United States.
Yanni continues to use the musical shorthand that he developed as a child,[8][9] blending jazz, classical, soft rock, and world music[4]to create predominantly instrumental works.[10] Although this genre of music was not well suited for commercial pop radio and music television,[3][11] Yanni received international recognition by producing concerts at historic monuments and by producing videos that were broadcast on public television.[11] His breakthrough concert, Live at the Acropolis, yielded the second best-selling music video of all time.[12] Additional historic sites for Yanni's concerts have included India's Taj Mahal, China's Forbidden City, the United Arab Emirates' Burj Khalifa,[13] Russia's Kremlin,[14] Puerto Rico's El Morro castle,[15] Lebanon's ancient city of Byblos,[16] Tunisia's Roman Theatre of Carthage,[17] India's Laxmi Vilas Palace,[18] and the Egyptian pyramids and Great Sphinx of Giza.[19][20]
At least fourteen of Yanni's albums have peaked at No. 1 in Billboard's "Top New Age Album" category,[21] and two albums (Dare to Dream and In My Time) received Grammy Award nominations.[22] Yanni has performed in more than 30 countries on five continents,[23] and through late 2015 Yanni had performed live in concert before more than 5 million people and had accumulated more than 40 platinum and gold albums globally, with sales totaling over 25 million copies.[24][25] A longtime fundraiser for public television,[2][26] Yanni's compositions have been used on commercial television programs, especially for sporting events.[22][27][28] He has written film scores and the music for an award-winning British Airways television commercial.[27]
Yanni popularized the combination of electronic music synthesizers with a full scale symphony orchestra.[29] He has employed musicians of various nationalities and has incorporated a variety of exotic instruments[4] to create music that has been called an eclectic fusion of ethnic sounds.[8] Influenced by his encounters with cultures around the world,[26][30] Yanni has been called a "True Global Artist"[29] and his music is said to reflect his “one world, one people” philosophy.
THROWBACKTHISDAY; makes it 61 years and TBT blog wishes him a happy birthday.
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