Argyrios Kokoris

About

One question, asked twice.

Argyrios Kokoris is a postdoctoral researcher in Modern Greek History at the Aristotle University of Thessaloniki, studying political song, soundscape, and public ritual during the Greek National Schism (1915–1922). He holds a PhD in Ethnomusicology (AUTh, 2024, awarded with distinction) and works where historical ethnomusicology, modern Greek history, and sound studies meet. His doctoral dissertation received the Hellenic Musicological Society’s 2026 Apostolos Kostios Award.

He is also a singer and multi-instrumentalist of Greek traditional music — on the oud and the mainland laouto — and the founder of the ensemble Romèiki Kompanía. The two halves of his work are the same question asked twice: what does a society sound like, and what does that sound do?

Based in

School of History & Archaeology,
Aristotle University of Thessaloniki

Fields

Auditory history · historical ethnomusicology · modern Greek history · sound studies · performance of Greek folk repertoires

Honours

Apostolos Kostios Award, 2026
Hellenic Musicological Society — for the best doctoral dissertation on Greek art music and musical life

Research

How a regime governs through sound — and where it fails.

Between 1917 and 1920 the Venizelist regime governed Athens and Thessaloniki by managing public sound: banning royalist songs, silencing royalist clergy, choreographing celebration for diplomatic ears. The work asks why that managed order collapsed the instant it most needed to seem sincere — when, within an hour of the prime minister’s departure after the catastrophic election of November 1920, a city “deserted for two days” filled with spontaneous counter-celebration.

The argument runs through a completed monograph, Auditory Regimes in Crisis: Sound, Power, and Political Conflict in Greece, 1917–1920, built from the French diplomatic archives at La Courneuve, Russian diplomatic material read in translation, the partisan press, and private diaries read as “ear-witness” testimony.

Current threads

The persecutor’s idiom: sound and political memory in Greece, 1920–1936next major project, in development
Sonic charisma: acclamation, recognition, and the audible communityarticle under review
“Buried like dogs”: exile, the list, and the making of the Antivenizelist martyrology, 1917–22article under consideration
From the street into the home: domestic music and the “New Greek Music”chapter proposal under review · Indiana University Press
Orchestral labour and the politics of anthem choicepresented at “Soundscapes of Entertainment” — Pula, September 2026

Publications

Selected writing.

bookAuditory Regimes in Crisis: Sound, Power, and Political Conflict in Greece, 1917–1920. Complete manuscript, under review with a university press.
2026Political Hymnography of the Greek National Schism (1915–22): The Personal Anthems of Eleftherios Venizelos and King Constantine I. Journal of Greek Media & Culture 12(1), 25–44. DOI
2026Acoustic Coercion: Music, Violence, and Nationalist Conflict. Nationalities Papers (research note), 1–10. Open access. DOI
2025Understanding Civil Conflict through Music: Popular Expressions and Political Soundscapes after the Greek Elections of 1920. Journal of Modern Greek Studies 43(1), 99–133. DOI
2025Soundscapes of National Unity and Division: Music, Power, and Resistance in Greece’s 1920 Venizelist Celebrations. Traditions of Music & Dance, First View, 1–25. DOI
2024Forging the Nation in the Greek “Nèes Chòres”: Popular Music and Nationalism in the Greek Press of Thessaloniki, 1912–1922. Journal of Modern Hellenism 36, 35–61.

Selected. The complete list is in the CV below; further work is under review.

Music & Performance

The repertoire, still sung.

Trained as a singer of Greek traditional song, Argyrios performs across Greece and abroad on voice, oud, and laouto, and has recorded on ten albums. He founded and leads the ensemble Romèiki Kompanía and has shared the stage with leading figures of the living tradition.

Next on stage: «Η λαϊκή μούσα τραγουδά τον Ελευθέριο Βενιζέλο» [The Popular Muse Sings of Eleftherios Venizelos] — a concert of the National Research and Study Foundation “Eleftherios K. Venizelos” at the Athens Concert Hall (Megaron, Alexandra Trianti Hall), 18 October 2026. Argyrios is the production’s lead singer and musicologist; research, texts, and artistic direction by Lambros Liavas.

Most recently he sang in Three Musical Acts of Humanity, a music-narrative production for the Hellenic Ministry of Culture’s programme All of Greece, One Culture, staged at the Osman Shah Mosque (Kursum Tzami) in Trikala in July 2026.

Voice · tenor / baritone Strings · oud · laouto · cümbüş · bouzouki Ensemble · Romèiki Kompanía (founder)

Listen

YouTube — performances & recordings

Selected recordings

Calanda (Polis Ensemble, 2023) · Gléntia Thrákon (2018) · Nuka (Matoula Zamani, 2018) · and others, 2008–2023.

Performing on the oud at an open-air concert — Open-air concert

Performing with the ensembles Romèiki Kompanía and Dilgeroúdi — With the ensembles Romèiki Kompanía and Dilgeroúdi

Recording voice and laouto in the studio — Voice and laouto — studio recording

Singing at the Gynaikokratía custom — Singing at the Gynaikokratía — a women’s-rule custom brought from Eastern Thrace to Greek Macedonia in 1923

Singing and playing the laouto — Voice and laouto

Speaking & Press

On stage, on the page, on air.

Recent & upcoming talks

One Composer, Both Camps: Spyros Kaisaris and the Limits of Authorial IntentionHUN-REN Institute for Musicology — Budapest, December 2026
Orchestral Labour and the Politics of Anthem Choice“Soundscapes of Entertainment” — Pula, September 2026
Hymns of Resurrection and Songs of RevengeICTMD Mediterranean Music Study Group — Izmir, June 2026
Sonic Statecraft in Athens, July 1920IMS Auditory History, inaugural conference — Paris 2026 · noted in The Senses and Society

Public history & media

Essays for the general press on music, heritage, and national memory — most recently «Ferto, αυθεντικότητα και η Ελλάδα που δεν ξέρει τι θέλει να ακούγεται» in Parallaxi (2026), and «Η μουσική μπορεί να ενώνει, μπορεί και να διχάζει» in Kathimerini. Appearances on Greek public television include ERT’s To Aláti tis Gís.

Available for lecture-performances bridging the archive and the stage — talks that are also sung.

On a conference panel in Paris — Paris · ‘The Historical Ear,’ 2026

Conference group photograph in Paris — Paris, 2026

Presenting at a lectern — At the lectern

Featured on Greek television — On Greek television

Broadcast

On television.

A performance for To Aláti tis Gís, the long-running folk-music programme of Greek public television (ERT) — Greek song carried to a national audience.

To Aláti tis Gís · ERT · 2021

Curriculum Vitae

The full record.

Education, appointments, the complete list of publications and conference papers, archival work, and artistic practice — in a single document.

Download CV (PDF)