A professor of composition at the Faculty of Music, University of Toronto, Christos Hatzis is the recipient of several national and international distinctions such as the Jean A. Chalmers National Music Award, the Prix Italia Special Prize, the Prix Bohemia Radio, the Jules Léger Prize for chamber music and the New Pioneer Award as well as three Juno Award nominations (2002, 2003 and 2005) in addition to his 2006 Juno Award in the “Classical Composition of the Year” category. Compact disc recordings of his works are available on EMI Classics (Awakening of his string quartets with the St. Lawrence String Quartet with international release and distribution), Sony Classical in Greece, Naxos, Marquis, CBC and Centrediscs labels in Canada, Cherry Red Records in the United Kingdom and Consipio in Japan with two upcoming All-Hatzis releases: Dancing in the Light with violist Rivka Golani, percussionist Beverly Johnston and oboist Suzanne Lemieux as soloists and Symphony Nova Scotia on CBC Records, and Constantinople with the Gryphon Trio and singers Patricia O’ Callaghan and Maryem Tollar on Analekta as well guest appearances on other artists’ recordings.

In the past few seasons, Hatzis’ compositions have been receiving international exposure through performances by touring ensembles committed to Hatzis' music, such as the St. Lawrence String Quartet, The Gryphon Trio, Pilobolus Dance Theater, the English Chamber Choir, the Elmer Iseler Singers and Cappella Romana, and soloists such as sopranos Isabel Bayrakdarian, Patricia Rosario and Patricia O’ Callaghan, Arabic vocalist Maryem Tollar, flutist Patrick Gallois, cellist Shauna Rolston, percussionists Evelyn Glennie, Beverley Johnston and NEXUS (Canada), Nanae Mimura (Japan), Peter Prommel (The Netherlands) and Gordon Stout (USA), to mention but a few. Premieres of his music from 2003 to 2007 include venues such as The Royal Opera House at Convent Garden, St. Paul's Cathedral, The Barbican Center and the Queen Elizabeth Hall in London, UK, The Lincoln Center and the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City, the Konzerthaus in Berlin, the Lively Arts Center in Palo Alto, CA, the Megaron in Athens, Greece, The Winspear Centre in Edmonton and Roy Thompson Hall in Toronto. Several new concerti for virtuosi such as percussionists Evelyn Glennie and Beverley Johnston, French horn player Jamie Sommerville, violist Steven Dann and oboists Suzanne Lemieux and Joseph Salvalaggio have been recently completed or are currently in the works. Premiers in 2006 include From the Book of Job by Valdine Anderson and the Winnipeg Symphony Orchestra, Wormwood, an hour-long cross-over cantata, at Toronto’s Roy Thompson Hall, the highlight of a concert dedicated to the 20th Anniversary of the Chernobyl nuclear disaster and Mystical Visitations for Arabic vocalist Maryem Tollar, a world music band and SurroundSound Audio. Hatzis’ next major project is Antigone, a cross-over multi-genre opera, currently in development by Tapestry New Opera Works (Iron Road) in Toronto and the Music Theater Group in New York City (Marko Polo), a collaboration with director Anne Bogart (SITI Company, New York City).

It is not unusual for a Hatzis work to become a signature piece for a soloist or an ensemble. His Old Photographs and Dance of the Dictators have been performed by the Gryphon Trio all over the world over 150 times in the past three years. There have also been an increasing number of all-Hatzis programs during the past few years, or programs that he shares with another composer (frequently with British composer John Tavener). Music presenters increasingly program larger events around Hatzis' music. The 2004 Byzantine Festival in London built its theme around Hatzis' The Troparion of Kassiani, while in 2005 Symphony Nova Scotia has programmed three Hatzis works, including a new commission. His recent large-scale work Sepulcher of Life, for soloists, choir and orchestra was commissioned by four different Canadian philharmonic choirs (the Vancouver Bach Choir, The Richard Eaton Singers of Edmonton, the Ottawa ChoralSociety and the St. Laurence Choir of Montreal) and already has had eight performances across North America by eight different presenters, including a remarkable performance at the Temple of Dendur, in the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City in May 2004. Hatzis' music is increasingly combined with visual media: His most important multimedia music theatre piece, Constantinople, performed at sold-out halls at Banff and Toronto during the summer and fall of 2004 and was described by the Toronto Star as “A multimedia feast of the imagination...a work unlike any other in the Canadian musical literature …Constantinople defies categories...it is in a class of its own” and by the Calgary Herald as “a stunning theatrical triumph”, while EYE magazine placed it on the number 3 spot of its top ten theatre picks for 2004. In June 2005 Constantinople opened the International Festival of Arts and Ideas in New Heaven, Connecticut, and it is now signed by IMG Artists Management for international touring. Constantinople will have several prestigious international performances in 2007 including the Royal Opera House,Covent Garden. Hatzis’ Juno nominated Everlasting Light, which had its US premiere in Portland and Seattle by Cappella Romana during the fall of 2004 to sold-out houses, was included in the top ten classical music picks of the season by the Seattle Post-Intelligencer and in the top seven by the Portland Monthly Magazine.

Hatzis' music is inspired by early Christian spirituality, his own Byzantine music heritage, world cultures and various non-classical music genres such as jazz, pop and world musics. He is an advocate of borderless culture and many of his most recent works bridge the gap between classical music and today’s popular music idioms, His compositions are structurally complex while sonically accessible. He has created several works inspired by the music of the Inuit, Canada's arctic inhabitants, and his Inuit-inspired works, particularly the award winning radio documentary Footprints in NewSnow, have promoted Inuit culture around the globe. His strongest inspiration is his own religious faith, and his religious works have been hailed by critics and audiences alike as contemporary masterpieces. In addition to composing and teaching, Hatzis has written extensively about composition and contemporary music. His writings have been published on Interface, Organized Sound and Harmony, and are increasingly translated into other languages.

Website: http://www.chass.utoronto.ca/~chatzis/