Eftichia Papagianopoulos

Who was Eftichia Papagianopoulos?

Eftichia Papagianopoulos, also spelled as Eftihia Papagianopoulou, was a Greek lyricist.

She was born in Aydın near Smyrna in Asia Minor in 1893. She left Smyrna in 1919 prior to the Greco-Turkish War and just three years before the Great Fire of Smyrna and Smyrna's 1922 conquest by the Turks. She emigrated to Greece and settled permanently in Athens.

She wrote the lyrics to many popular Greek songs, co-operating with composers like Vassilis Tsitsanis, Apostolos Kaldaras and Manos Hadjidakis; however, she never became very famous among the public until her 1972 death. Her great contribution to Greek music through her exceptional ability in writing lyrics wasn't broadly known and recognized, although many of the successful songs of the 1950s and 1960s had been composed by her.

A recent book written by lyricist and journalist Lefteris Papadopoulos, who was a friend of Eftichia during the last years of her life, helped a lot to increase recognition for her work.