SPIROS SOUKIS Rockin’ Blues with Greek Soul Soukis Blues: The blues spiced with funky grooves, shuffle beats and rock elements, enlivened with European style and the freshness of Mediterranean breezes. Spiros Soukis, a native of Athens, Greece, began his love affair with the blues filtered through the British Invasion and guitar masters Peter Green, Eric Clapton, Robin Trower and Jeff Beck. In time he learned about American slingers like Jimi Hendrix, Johnny Winter, Duane Allman and Roy Buchanan. Reading liner notes and recording credits led him to discover the original men behind the music—B.B. King, Freddie King, Howlin' Wolf, Muddy Waters, etc. In the early '80s, Soukis started to perform and tour with Greek rock legend, Pavlos Sidiroupolos. He studied guitar, piano and harmonica and eventually earned a degree in Music Theory and Harmony from the Athens Conservatory. Soukis moved to Stockholm, in the mid '80s, where he performed live, taught guitar and earned a degree in Musicology from Stockholm University. Back in Athens in the early '90s, he formed the band, That's Why, which performed widely, recorded regularly and toured extensively. That's Why was the opener for a diverse group of musicians ranging from The Pixies to Peter Green, one of Soukis’s earliest influences. He self-produced “Fota Tou Iliggou” (Lights of Vertigo), and released it in Europe, July 1996, to overwhelmingly positive reviews. Voted ‘CD of the Month,’ “Fota” was reissued in September 2000, with many of its songs included in various compilations. The U.S. Congress declared 2003, ‘Year of the Blues,’ so Soukis arrived to live in New York City. One year later he released “Transblues,” his first CD recorded in English. Created in both Athens and his newly adopted city, the recording consists of eight original songs on which Soukis sings and plays guitar. Two smokin' blues covers, captured live in the heart of Manhattan, round out this auspicious American debut.  Soukis now performs throughout the tri-state area of New York, Connecticut and New Jersey, at clubs, concerts, music festivals and private events. He plays often at his favorite venue, B.B. King’s Lucille’s in Times Square, the premier place for blues in Manhattan, where top musicians throughout the region appear. His long-running “Rockin’ Blues”—a blog about the life and times of a working musician who lives in Times Square—is popular with his fans and followers throughout the world and is one of the highest-ranked in all search engines. A featured guest on radio shows devoted to the blues, Soukis performs regularly on “Antique Blues,” WPKN-FM, in Bridgeport, Connecticut and Montauk, New York; and “Something Inside Me,” WKCR-FM, at Columbia University. Soukis is very happy with the looks and sounds of his brand new release of six original compositions "Loveborne Blues". He creates soundtracks and scores music for a variety of commercial visual media--from documentary films to travel videos. A gifted musician/performer, Soukis is also a dedicated teacher with a large number of private students—from beginner to advanced—for whom he maintains a full teaching schedule at his Times Square studio. Official Website: Spiros Soukis <a href="https://www.last.fm/music/Spiros+Soukis">Read more on Last.fm</a>. User-contributed text is available under the Creative Commons By-SA License; additional terms may apply.