bio...

Stamatia Statherou is a Greek contemporary classical composer, solo pianist, lecturer, teacher, and researcher based in South East England (Canterbury, Kent). Her compositions range from contemporary classical new and experimental written for the concert hall, to ambient, neo-classical, new age and epic instrumental genres. Her musical language endeavours to be structurally challenging and experimental but also emotionally strong and imaginary and to bring contemporary classical music to a wider audience. In her Ph.D. thesis, with the title 'Voice interchangeability' and prolongation as structural devices and means of development', she has been composing music based on experimental concepts of structural extension and temporal protraction of material combined with emotive contrapuntal motivic fragments-themes within a certain group of vertical sonorities. 

She has written instrumental works for solo, chamber music, small and large orchestra as well as works for live electronics and for the ancient Greek theatre.  Her compositions have been performed in America, UK and in several European countries  such as Belgium,  Greece, Italy, Luxemburg and Poland  by internationally acclaimed soloists and ensembles such as Avi Avital-Grammy nominated mandolinist, Iwona Glinka, Renata Guzik, Sydney Howell, Bruno Ispiola, Allegri Quartet, Christopher Redgate, Arturo Rodriguez, Fabio Schinazi, Vicky Stylianou, Gdansk Reed Trio, Trio Arundos, Rebecca Turner, Sachiko Yoshida, Klimis Voskidis, Tomasz Zieba among others, in several festivals, conferences and symposiums such as the International First Athens Composer/Performer Conference, Osmose Festival, Soundscape Festival, Vox Novus Festival/15 Minutes of Fame and the Xenakis Symposium of Electroacoustic Music.  Her music has been broacasted on ERT 3 /Trito - Hellenic Public Radio, and has been released by the classical labels Sarton Records and Phasma-Music (Naxos Direct Label). The Cds of contemporary classical music 'One minute' and 'Two minutes' where her pieces 'fleeting moment' for solo flute and 'dancing in the dusk' for two flutes are featured won a double and a triple silver medal in Global Music Awards (San Diego, California) in the categories, contemporary classical and album in years 2017 and 2019 respectively. Additionally, the CD ‘Zayin I’ where her piece ‘Path’ for flute and piano is featured won the Clouzine International Music Award (London, UK) in the category, contemporary album.

Started playing the piano at the age of 6 at Palladio Conservatoire (for the first year) and then at the Hellenic Conservatoire in Athens, Stamatia developed a passion for the instrument almost instantly.  Over the years she has given several, with an enthusiastic audience, international piano recitals. Stamatia always combines both classical and contemporary classical works in her concerts (from Beethoven and Debussy to Toru Takemitsu and Philip Glass) with a special interest on female composers such as Rebecca Clarke, Sofia Gubaidulina and Frangis Ali-Sade. She has performed in venues such as the Ed Landreth Hall-former Van Cliburn's Piano Competition Hall, Piano Texas International Festival, Municipal Art Gallery of Peiraeus, Parnassos Concert Hall, Town Hall of Palaio Faliro, Theoharakis Foundation for the Fine Arts and Music and the Council Chamber-Deptford Town Hall in London among others. Along with her contemporary classical experimental compositions, from the period of 2008 to 2021, she has been working on a large collection of solo piano compositions that are mainly, emotive, positive and inspirational. Depicting certain personal life experiences and transforming them into music through the sound of piano was a therapeutic journey.  From 2026 onwards, she is going to start  both releasing and performing them in the UK. 

Stamatia holds a Ph.D. in Musical Composition from Goldsmiths, University of London, with Roger Redgate, a Master’s in Theory and Composition (received a (post)graduate departmental assistantship and stipend) with Gerald Gabel, and a second Master's in Piano Pedagogy (Thesis and Recital based) with Tamás Ungár, from Texas Christian University in America. She also holds a Bachelor's from The College of Southeastern Europe in Piano  Performance - cum laude distinction and music excellence award for exceptional performance in music (the award was given by Theodore Antoniou), a soloist  Conservatoire Piano Diploma with distinction, and several Advanced Conservatoire Theory Diplomas also with distinction from Protypo Peiramatiko Conservatoire (trans. Model-Experimental Conservatoire) in Athens, Greece.  Other inspirational composition teachers are Katharine Norman, Sadie Harrison, Dimitris Kamarotos as well as Ioannis Kastrinos in tonal harmony, counterpoint, fugue, Blaise Ferrandino in advanced (post) graduate theory analysis, and Lefteris Chalkiadakis in conducting. 

She has lectured in academia music theory/composition modules at the Hellenic Mediterranean University (former Technological Institute of Higher Education of Crete) and theory courses at Texas Christian University (teaching-departmental assistant). She has also taught classical piano at TCU -Texas Christian University Music Preparatory Division in Texas, advanced theory, tonal harmony, modal-tonal-modern counterpoint and piano diploma courses at Ignace Tiegermann Conservatoire in Athens, and ear-training classes at Conservatoire of Classical and Contemporary Music in Athens.

She currently teaches classical piano in the music departments of Junior and Senior King's School in Canterbury, Kent. She maintains a teaching-recording studio in Kent, where she works as a freelance composer, orchestrator, classical piano and composition teacher.