PRESS

Dimitris Tiliakos has interpreted in the past, with great success, songs that were written by the prementioned composers. Although he’s a very successful lyric artist with intense stage presence, he knows when to drop extravagance gestures, which opera favors, out of his expressive palette, and to adapt to the needs of the German classic song repertoire. It is not just a simple atmospheric change, but also a different use of means of expression. If in Opera, wide gestures are needed to make the characters and their feelings stand out, in the interpretation of a song, with the solely accompaniment of a piano, there is a need for much more detailed work with the shades of music that the text submits, as emotional transitions usually take place in a much shorter time.
The program included very famous works: The song cycle “An die ferne geliebte”, the song “Adelaide” by Beethoven, the songs “Der Wanderer”, “Wanderers Nachtlied” and “Der Doppelgänger” by Schubert, as well as the song cycle “Dichterliebe” by Schuman. With an excellent knowledge of the German language and by having total control of his voice and of his expressive means, Dimitris Tiliakos perfectly highlighted the poetic world of every miniature.

KATHIMERINI
Nikos Dontas 

Dimitris Tiliakos is not only perfectly credible as the noble father, but he also plays with a natural authority that goes very well with a strong and well-conducted voice.

FORUM OPERA
Jean-Marcel Humbert

Dimitris Tiliakos consumes his last fires with an infectious conviction. We know that the role of Macbeth crushes, especially with this extra arioso, which in the late opera comes to weight a partition already loaded. One can finally appreciate the nuances and the intentions with which he dresses a song that, given its length, could seem to lack seduction.

FORUM OPERA
Christophe Rizoud

Dimitris Tiliakos as Malatesta is superb in his hatred and suffering.

DIAPASON
Didier Van Moere

Dimitris Tiliakos has the vocal ability, stylistic balance and sense of legato to give Germont all the power and dramatic impact of the famous ‘Di Provenza il mar’ and even the dangerous cabaletta ‘No, non udrai rimproveri’.

CONCERTO NET
Emmanuel Andrieu

Dimitris Tiliakos’ Simon (a voice made for imprecations, curses, broad, powerful) will remain a highlight of the evening. The Greek baritone sings with taste, economy, without unnecessary effects, a kind of Dutchman flying backwards, no longer hoping for politics and power.

SORTIR
Christian Colombeau

Dimitris Tiliakos’ Macbeth is scenically beautiful. Elegant, profoundly human, bewitched, his singing teems with subtle and infinitesimal nuances of which we delight in abundance. His “Sangue a me”, in particular, is dark, velvety and terrified all at once.

FORUM OPERA
Catherine Jordy

Dimitris Tiliakos is a meticulous and elegant Macbeth, worthy heir to Renato Bruson and Leo Nucci, possessed by this role of terrorized, influential and self-destructive murderer.

FORUM OPERA

In the voice of Dimitris Tiliakos, Currentzis has also found a Don Giovanni with a young and late voice capable of expressing not only vitality but also the rare inwardness that sometimes characterises the role. A magnetising apostasy, similar to that of the flamenco, which can be heard in the duet “La ci darem la mano” with Zerlina, in which he seems to draw her into the dark depths of himself.

SCHWEDISCHE ZEITUNG DN
Martin Nyström

In Dimitris Tiliakos’ Don Giovanni, the air vibrates with subtle eroticism with Zerlina in “Là ci darem.”

OSNABRÜCKER ZEITUNG
Ralf Döring

Rarely has Don Giovanni been heard so lyrically and devotedly, so seductively and mellifluously sung by a baritone. This Giovanni is almost overwhelmed by his irresistible seduction in “Laci darem la mano”, and not a driven psychopath who does not shut out the evil in his soul, but lives it out.

KULTUR PORT
Hans – Juergen Fink

Acclaimed for his work in Verdi repertory, particularly the title rôle in Macbeth and Giorgio Germont, Greek baritone Dimitris Tiliakos is the ideal protagonist for Currentzis’s pragmatic Don Giovanni. Suave, sensual, and sonorously masculine, Tiliakos’s Giovanni dominates this performance despite the very strong work by his colleagues. Tussling with the Commendatore after being discovered in the act of assailing Donna Anna’s honor, Tiliakos sings like a man possessed, his voice flashing in the dark soundscape like lightning. The contrast with ‘Là ci darem la mano’ could not be greater. Here, the baritone’s vocalism is like the whisper of a summer breeze: Zerlina can hardly be blamed for following where it leads. Tiliakos voices ‘La povera ragazza è pazza, amici miei’ in the quartet with deceptive concern, and he follows this with a volatile reading of ‘Fin ch’han dal vino calda la testa,’ one which combines musical virtuosity with dramatic acuity. The pace of the Act One finale is set by Tiliakos’s animated singing of ‘Su, svegliatevi, da bravi!’ and ‘Ecco il birbo che t’ha offesa.’ Opening Act Two with the duet with Leporello, this Giovanni brandishes ‘Eh via, buffone, non mi seccar’ like a slap to Leporello’s face. Then, in the trio with Elvira and Leporello, he intones ‘Discendi, o gioia bella’ alluringly. Tiliakos sings one of the most beautiful and erotic accounts of the canzonetta ‘Deh, vieni alla finestra, o mio tesoro’ on disc, his hypnotic mezza voce and idiomatic diction captivating. The aria ‘Metà di voi qua vadano’ benefits from Tiliakos’s assertive swagger, and his insistent manner infuses ‘Finiscila, o nel petto ti metto questo acciar’ in the duet with Leporello with excitement. Defiant to the end, Tiliakos’s Giovanni mercilessly teases and torments Leporello at the banquet in the opera’s penultimate scene, and the baritone sings ‘Già la mensa è preparata’ with insouciance. The interpolated top A with which Tiliakos expresses his ultimate truculence aptly summarizes his interpretation of the rôle: his Giovanni is his own man, answering only to himself and recognizing no moral authority of this or any other world. There are more smoothly-sung Giovannis on disc, but Tiliakos blends Pinza’s vivacity, Siepi’s joviality, Gobbi’s urbanity, and Taddei’s panache in a brilliantly-executed, compellingly-vocalized depiction of one of opera’s most chameleonic characters.

VOIX DES ARTS
Joseph Newsome

The performance by Dimitris Tiliakos allows the listener to genuinely experience Winterreise. If the sonnets of Shakespeare, the canvases of El Greco, and the novels of Zora Neale Hurston could be condensed into seventy minutes of song, this Winterreise might be the result, but this Winterreise is a compelling work of art all on its own, a vision of humanity shared by three artists—Franz Schubert, Dimitris Tiliakos (baritone), and Vassilis Varvaresos (pianist)—courageous enough to look beyond the façades of pretty fusions of music and text.

VOIX DES ARTS
Joseph Newsome

In this latest release, the Greek baritone Dimitris Tiliakos, steps up to the mark admirably and doesn’t disappoint. Here is Schubert at his most tragic, and Tiliakos conveys the full spectrum of moods, from bitter resignation and deep felt regret to an unbearable sense of loss.

MUSIC WEB INTERNATIONAL
Stephen Greenbank

Dimitris Tiliakos, intimately feels the nature of Rigoletto. The character evokes empathy thanks to the relevance and rigor of the incarnation of his voice, who judiciously uses a high quality timbre, controls the cleanness of the emission, measures the power of his voice, adjusts the sentence.

CONCERTO NET
Sιbastien Foucart

Dimitris Tiliakos’ debut in the title role was a fitting tribute to his teacher, Kostas Paskalis. It takes a mature artist to portray this character, who has been referred to as Verdi’s alter ego in terms of elusive fatherhood, and Tiliakos has undoubtedly reached this point in his career. Although hard put to remain dignified in his Hell’s Angels to buffoon-like attire, his was an imposing rendition of one of the composer’s most in depth and nuanced character portraits – of a devoted father and peace-loving politician – conveyed by Tiliakos fluid baritone, complete with an exciting high register and a velvety low range.

MUSIC WEB INTERNATIONAL
Bettina Mara

Dimitris Tiliakos sings his Giovanni as a strong, smart aleck, untainted by self-doubt, who knows what he is, that nobody really loves him and that he therefore hates the whole of creation. Giovanni’s famous “Champagne aria” then becomes an ecstatic outcry, in which his chutzpah is combined with the wild orchestral outburst: frenzied sensuality bordering on brutality.

DER SPIEGEL
Werner Theurich

Dimitris Tiliakos is a singer with a remarkable capacity for characterization.

FORUM OPERA
Sylvain Fort

This is a bleak, stark existential journey, with Dimitris Tiliakos’ clean, slightly dry timbre complemented by the bare, sometimes aptly desiccated texture. The consistency and control of Tiliakos’ soft singing is particularly moving in ‘Wasserflut’ (sung in a bleached, traumatised tone), ‘Irrlicht’ with its haunting mezza voce ending, and an oppressive, rhythmically relentless ‘Rast’. His diction is always clear; and throughout he avoids the slightest hint of sentimentality.

GRAMOPHONE
Richard Wigmore

We have already applauded the baritone Dimitris Tiliakos in the title role of Macbeth in Paris. Here he shows himself to be the sensitive actor of his character, a hibernal traveller with death as his destination, who makes every nuance count, from the whispered note to the passionate ardour, from the combined expression to the immanent intensity, with an almost operatic presence. And with exemplary German diction.

CONCERT CLASSIC
Pierre-René Serna

His technique, able to encompass a soulfully shaded “Pietà, rispetto, amore” sung trouserless on tabletop in fetal position.

OPERA NEWS
Patrick Dillon

The protagonism of Dimitris Tiliakos is indeed formidable: if today’s baritones often use vile methods even in the parts of the Grand Seigneur, he instead realises an incisive Rigoletto, but never over the lines, protervo where necessary but forbidden in the song, with stamp and emission ennobled by a solid technique, he can modulate whenever this is possible, thus accamping rhetorical phrases and phrases of utopia.

IL CORRIERE DELLA MUSICA