Kissing Naná / Φιλώ τη Νανά (Single)

“Φιλώ τη Νανά” (Kissing Naná) is a Greek art song (έντεχνο) composed by myself, Pavlos Andronikos, featuring evocative lyrics by Sotiris Vaskos which came out of a songwriting workshop conducted by Akos Daskalopoulos.

Sotiris Vaskos had brought to the workshop a long poem—three or four pages long—which Daskalopoulos pruned drastically into a superb lyric. However, I think Vaskos was somewhat peeved that so much was left out, because when I met him he was very keen to show me the full extent of the original.

My composition was first presented to the public at the Antipodes Song Festival concert held at the Melbourne Concert Hall in 1990. It was sung by Christos Ioannides with backing vocals from Alexandra Kyriacopoulou, who was visiting from Greece. Unfortunately, Christos Ioannides must have had an attack of stage fright, because he began with the second verse, and then repeated it. Nevertheless his voice was perfect for the song, and Alexandra’s backing added a nice touch of colour.

In that same year I created a new version featuring a moving bitter-sweet performance on vocals by my immensely talented friend Christella. This enjoyed a limited circulation on cassette. The version of the recording being released now, in 2026, was given its final form by another immensely talented friend, Stephen Stelios Adam, who sound-engineered the final mix.

The single is distributed by LANDR, and is available on most platforms (e.g. Spotify, YouTube, Apple, Amazon).