ATHENS, Greece (AP) – Popular Greek singer-songwriter Dionysis Savvopoulos was buried at Athens First Cemetery in a state-run funeral Saturday, four days after he died at the age of 80.
Savopoulos died of a heart attack after battling cancer since 2020.
Thousands of people gathered Saturday morning to pay their respects to the artist, who lies peacefully in the chapel of the Athens Metropolitan Cathedral. Hundreds of people walked about 2 kilometers (1.2 miles) to the cemetery behind the hearse.
The presence of the Hellenic Navy Band playing music of sadness signaled a change in Subvopoulos’s status from a figure touted by the anarchist left in the 1960s and 1970s and rejected by the establishment as a long-haired eccentric to one who was accepted into the mainstream of the same establishment and culture.
Savopoulos never changed his musical style, which blended rock, folk rock, jazz, and Greek popular music, to suit mainstream tastes. Always a political animal, he never hesitated to criticize the left and its fantasies, especially on his 1989 album The Haircut, which showed him on the cover without a beard and with long hair tied back. Some of his songs have caused backlash from some longtime fans. His beard grew back, but his politics remained moderate.
Conservative Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis was the first prime minister to eulogize Mr. Savopoulos during his funeral, using lyrics from his 1972 song “Messenger Angel” to portray Mr. Savopoulos as someone who tells uncomfortable truths that many people don’t want to hear. “If you don’t have any good news to tell him / Better not say anything at all,” he quotes the song’s ending.
Others who joined in paying tribute to Savopoulos were former President Katerina Sakellaropoulos, fellow musicians, artists and literary figures, people from his hometown of Thessaloniki, and one of his two grandchildren.
