Marinos Mitellas – Maestro – Director of the choir from 1962 to 2014
Biography
Marinos Mitellas was born in Limassol in 1938. He graduated the Greek Gymnasium of Limassol in 1956. As a pupil at school, he was taught music by the late Solon Michaelides, from whom he inherited his love and devotion to music.
He studied music in Athens and on his return to Cyprus, he was appointed as teacher of music in the Cyprus State Education. He taught with great enthusiasm, inspiring his pupils and forming students’ choirs with very good results. He retired from the post of Headmaster.
In 1961, he revived the ARIS choir , with which he managed to raise the standards of choral music, by taking up difficult projects and presenting them locally and abroad, earning general recognition.
For its contribution to choral music, he has been honoured by the Municipality of Limassol, the Political party of AKEL, the cultural organization of Nemesos, the Amathusia Rotary Club of Limassol and the Epilogi Cultural Organisation. His highest honour was the Award of the Merit of Excellence for Art and Literacy of the Republic of Cyprus presented to him by the late President Tassos Papadopoulos.
He has been a member of several musical committees of CyBC, of the Limassol Municipality and the Ministry of Education and Culture, as well as a member of the Council of the Symphony Orchestra of Cyprus.
He retired from the choir’s head in 2014.
Solon Kladas – Maestro – Director
Biography
Solon Kladas was born in Limassol. In 2005 he graduated the Pedagogical School of the Prague Charles University gaining a Master of Arts degree in Music, Choir conductorship, School Pedagogue and Psychology. In 2014 he was awarded a Ph. D in Musical Pedagogue, Theory and Choir Conductorship by the same Prague University. During his studies he taught choral singing at the State Conservatorium of South Czechia, and after his graduation he taught choral singing at the Prague Charles University. Between 2004 and 2007 he was artistic director and maestro of the Men’s Choirs of Prague and visiting maestro of the Prague Mixed Choir. In 2004 he founded the Mixed Ecclesiastical Choir of youths of the Orthodox church of Methodios and Kyrillos in Prague, while he was as well directing the Mixed Ecclesiastical Choir of the same church.
He has directed great works in Czechia with the Mixed Choirs of Smetana, Jakoubek and Adam Michna. He also directed the professional Orchestra of “Prague Posadkova hudba,” the Students’ Orchestra, the United Symphony Orchestra of Czech youths and the State Symphony Orchestra of Slovakia Zilina. Since 2005 he frequently direcred the JH Symphony Orchestra of Czechia , with which he participated in the International Cultural Festival “ Cypria 2010”. In 2012 he directed in Russia the Orchestra Samara performing works of Cypriot, German, Rumanian and Greek composers, earning excellent reviews. Since 2006 he has been the director of Yermasoyia mixed choir.
Besides his artistic activities as maestro, Solon taught at the Department of Music and Dance of the University of Nicosia ( 2006 – 2014 ) and since 2014 he has taught at the School of Fine Arts of the European University of Cyprus. Since 2006 he has been a teacher and Maestro of the choir of the Marios Tokas Music School of Limassol, performing in Czechia, Slovakia and Poland and participating successfully in European programmes and since 2010 and he has represented Cyprus and the Ministry of Education and Culture abroad. He has excelled with his choirs in International Competitive Festivals and he frequently delivers lectures in International Musicological Conferences abroad. Some of his musicological works have been published in The Czech republic.
Since 2014 he has succeeded Marinos Mitellas as Conductor and Artistic Director of ARIS choir of Limassol. Since then he has taught works of major composers such as Cesar Franck’s “ The Seven Words of Christ on the Cross”, W.A.Mozart’s “Missa Solemnis in C ( KV337),”Antonin Dvorak’s “ Mass in D Major” and C. Leontis’ “ Akathistos Ymnos”. In 2016 and 2017 he participated with the choir in the Internatinal festival “ Gaude Cantem” of Bielsko Biala, Poland and the festival of classical music of Jindrichuv Hradec of The Czech Republic.
