Vangelis

Born Evangelos Papathanassiou in Agria and raised in Athens, Vangelis cut his teeth in '60s rock bands, most notably Aphrodite's Child, whose 1972 album 666 became a progressive-psychedelic landmark. He settled in Paris, scoring Frédéric Rossif's animal documentaries, then moved to London in 1975 and built Nemo Studios, releasing a run of ambitious solo albums for RCA. The late '70s brought a side project with Yes singer Jon Anderson, but 1981 delivered the break: his Chariots of Fire score won the Academy Award, and its title theme hit number one in the U.S. A year later came Blade Runner, a second immortal soundtrack in a totally different key. Through the '90s he kept scoring (1492: Conquest of Paradise, Alexander) and in his final decades turned toward space, composing music for NASA and ESA missions, including Juno to Jupiter in 2021. He died of heart failure in Paris on 17 May 2022, at 79, having composed and performed more than 50 albums across five decades - a one-man electronic orchestra who worked in single takes and left two eras of film music unimaginable without him.