After four decades of musical exploration, Nana Simopoulos continues to redefine the boundaries of artistic expression, weaving together cultures, traditions and sounds into a deeply personal musical language. An acclaimed composer, guitarist and visionary artist, she has collaborated with legendary musicians, explored diverse musical landscapes and embraced the expressive possibilities of orchestral composition and immersive art. Rooted in her Greek heritage yet inspired by the musical traditions of the world, her work reflects a lifelong search for connection, emotion and truth. Today, her artistic journey is guided not by technical virtuosity or recognition, but by the beauty of silence, the power of melody and music’s extraordinary ability to unite people across generations and cultures.

After four decades of composing and performing, how has your relationship with music changed? What do you hear, feel, or look for in music today that perhaps you didn’t when you began your career?

When I first started, I thought technique, speed, timing and proving what I could do were the most important things in music. I was focused on getting every note in its exact right place.

Today, four decades later, what is important to me has completely changed. What I look for now is the silence between the notes, the breathing space and pure honesty. Technical difficulty doesn’t matter to me anymore; what matters is how much truth and emotion a piece carries. Today, I hear music with my whole body, not just my ears. I look for the kind of sound that makes you stop thinking and simply feel.

Your music has always brought together different cultures, instruments, rhythms and traditions while maintaining a strong sense of melody. What continues to draw you toward musical dialogue across cultures and how has your understanding of that dialogue evolved over the years?

When I was younger, bringing together different instruments—like the sitar, the mandolin, or jazz guitar—felt like an adventure. I wanted to see how they sounded together.

Over the years, I realized this dialogue between cultures isn’t just an experiment; it’s the most effective way we have to understand one another. Melody is our common language. No matter what culture I encounter, when a strong melody is present, everyone feels the same underlying emotions: joy, sadness, nostalgia. Today, I’m not trying to ‘blend’ genres. I let each tradition keep its own distinct color and beauty, and I just invite them to sit at the same table and talk like old friends.

You are now focusing strongly on orchestral music and an upcoming album of original orchestral works. What is it about the orchestra that speaks to you at this stage of your life and career and what do you want this new body of work to express?

The orchestra is the largest canvas available to me as a composer. At this stage in my life, I feel I’ve accumulated so many experiences and memories that I need a big, rich sound to hold them all.

In an orchestra, dozens of musicians breathe together, play together, and form a single, powerful wave of sound. What I want this new body of work to express above all is unity. I want to show that even though we live in a world filled with noise, isolation and screens, the human spirit can still come together to create something beautiful, alive and deeply moving.

Your collaboration with the Nostos Youth Orchestra brings your music into conversation with a younger generation of musicians. What have these young performers taught you and what do you hope they take away from working with your music?

These young musicians from the Nostos Orchestra—from the Music School of Alimos—have given me so much energy! They remind me why I fell in love with music when I was their age. They’ve taught me to look at music once again with fresh eyes and pure excitement, free from the fatigue that sometimes comes with a long career.

What I hope they take away from working with me is a sense of freedom. I want them to know that music doesn’t have rigid boundaries and there’s nothing to be afraid of. You don’t have to put yourself in a box. You can play classical music while carrying rock energy, zeibekiko rhythms, or Eastern textures inside you. I want them to feel that music is an open door, and most importantly, I want to help them discover a deeper, more visceral way of listening—listening not just with their ears to hit the right notes, but with their whole body and heart.

You have recently expanded your work into immersive visual environments, including Perennial Land at the Morris Museum. How does composing for an installation or digital landscape change the way you think about melody, silence, space and emotion compared with writing for the concert stage?

When you write for the concert stage, the audience sits in rows and looks straight ahead. But when you write for an installation like Perennial Land, people walk through the space. The sound isn’t just in front of you—it surrounds you.

That completely shifted my approach. It taught me to give music much more space. Silence became even more crucial. The melody doesn’t need to push forward constantly; it can float in the air, allowing visitors to feel as though they are physically living inside the emotion. It’s like building a home out of sound that someone can walk into, experience and find stillness in.

You have collaborated with extraordinary artists from very different musical worlds, from Charlie Haden and Billy Higgins to Ustad Sultan Khan and Dave Liebman. Looking back, which collaborations changed you most deeply as an artist and what did you learn from those encounters that remains with you today?

Every one of these extraordinary artists reshaped a part of who I am. From Charlie Haden and Billy Higgins, I learned what true rhythm and ‘deep sound’ mean in jazz—they taught me to listen with my heart. From Ustad Sultan Khan in India, I learned about the spiritual side of music and how a single note can bring tears to your eyes.

What I learned from all of them—and what stays with me every day—is humility. The greater the artist, the more humble they are before the music. They didn’t play for their egos; they played to serve the sound. That is what I try to do every single day.

Your career has involved enormous creative commitments—composing, performing, conducting large multicultural ensembles, teaching and working across film, theatre, dance and visual art. What role has your family played in making that life possible and how have the people closest to you influenced your creative journey?

My family means everything to me. Without them, none of this would have been possible. A life in music involves constant travel, long hours of isolation and a lot of uncertainty. Having people by your side who truly understand you, love you and support you is the greatest gift.

My loved ones are my anchor. They keep me grounded when life gets overwhelming. And the memories of my family—like my grandfather playing the mandolin, or my parents and their deep roots in Greece—are the very foundation of my music. Every note I write carries a piece of the love I received from them.

You began your career in a very different musical and cultural landscape. If you could speak to the young composer and musician you were at the beginning of your journey, what would you tell her now—and what do you think she would find surprising about the artist you have become?

If I could talk to that young girl just starting, I would tell her: ‘Don’t be afraid. Trust your heart, be yourself and don’t try to be anyone else. Your journey is going to be beautiful—just keep working with love.’

I think she would be completely surprised to see where I am today! She’d probably be amazed that her guitar found its way to the Indian sitar, but most of all, she would be thrilled to see herself conducting a symphony orchestra in Greece, performing her own compositions. She would be proud that she never lost her passion.

At this point in your life, what are you still curious about? Are there musical territories, collaborators, instruments, forms, or artistic disciplines that you feel you have yet to explore?

I am still curious about everything! Curiosity is what keeps us young. And I learn new things every day.

I want to keep exploring large orchestral works. Still, I also want to experiment with artists from entirely different fields—perhaps collaborating more with architecture, theater, or new artistic mediums that connect sound with nature. There are still so many instruments and rhythms in the world that I haven’t touched yet! I feel like my journey is truly just beginning and I can’t wait to see what’s around the corner.

When you look toward the years ahead, what is the music you most want to make? Beyond projects and performances, what do you hope your work will leave with listeners—and what does “success” as an artist mean to you now?

When I look toward the years ahead, I want to make music that brings together the worlds that have shaped me—jazz, improvisation, African, Indian and Byzantine, contemporary and classical and the sounds and traditions of Greek folk music. I was never interested in fitting into a particular category, but more interested in creating a musical language that feels genuinely my own.

I want to keep making music with emotional depth, but also mystery—something the listener can discover. I’m especially drawn to the idea of music that can create a sense of place, memory, movement and connection between different cultures and traditions.

At this point in my life, success is less about recognition or the number of performances. Of course, I would love for the music to reach large audiences and to be performed by great orchestras. But ultimately, success would be knowing that I made the music I needed to make, without compromising who I am—and that somewhere, it moved someone, made them curious, or stayed with them after the music ended.

I think that is what I hope to leave behind: not simply recordings or scores, but a body of work that reflects a life lived across different worlds and continues to speak to people after I’m no longer there to explain it.