Eleanna Pitsikaki is a Qanun virtuoso, educator, composer, and researcher from Crete, Greece. She is one of the most multidimensional musicians of her generation, standing out for her innovative blend of ethno-jazz. Her music combines her deep-rooted musical heritage, which includes influences from Asia Minor, the Balkans, Greece, and the Ottoman tradition. She is one of the few female Qanun players skilled in blending Eastern and Western musical traditions.

Artistic Career

Eleanna’s artistic journey reflects her deep commitment to transcultural exchange, pioneering music pedagogy, and the scholarly exploration of music’s transformative power. In 2025, she will release her eagerly awaited debut album, Àroma.

As a professional musician, Eleanna has cultivated a versatile career, spanning a wide range of musical genres and continents. She has performed at prestigious venues across Europe and beyond, including the iconic Odeon of Herodes Atticus in Athens, the Elbphilharmonie in Hamburg, and concert halls at the Sharq Taronalari International Music Festival in Uzbekistan. Her performances have also taken her to venues in Turkey, Bulgaria, Luxembourg, and Belgium.

Since 2023, she has been a member of the “Trickster Orchester,” a groundbreaking ensemble that merges Western classical music with contemporary jazz influences. In 2024, Eleanna recorded with the ensemble for ECM Records. Her creative and collaborative spirit was notably displayed during her time as a core member of the “Bridges Kammerorchester” in Frankfurt from 2017 to 2024, where she performed on the Qanun and arranged music for the orchestra.

Eleanna’s ability to navigate and blend diverse musical traditions is evident in her collaborations with many renowned artists, such as Ross Daly, Kelly Thoma, Sokrates Sinopoulos, Pantelis Thalassinos, Yasmin Levy, Evanthia Reboutsika, Oumeima el Khalil, Nil Venditi, Bar Avni, Yurdal Tokcan, and László Fenyő. Through these partnerships, she continues to expand the boundaries of transcultural musical exploration, combining ancient traditions with contemporary sounds like jazz, Byzantine, Turkish, Greek, and Arabic music.

Academic Career

In her academic career, Eleanna has held various teaching positions at respected institutions. Since 2024, she has been a lecturer at the Hochschule für Musik Mainz (University of Music Mainz), where she leads seminars on intercultural music exchange. Additionally, she teaches Qanun and Ottoman makam at the Freies Musik Zentrum e.V. in Munich. In the summer semester of 2025, Eleanna will take up a teaching assignment in scenic research at the University of Mainz.

From 2023 to 2024, Eleanna was a lecturer at the Hochschule für Musik und Tanz Köln (University of Music and Dance Cologne), where she focused on music education that transcends traditional boundaries. She offered workshops on Oriental Music and intercultural music pedagogy for both students and professionals. Her approach to teaching emphasizes cultural literacy, inclusivity, and the role of music in fostering social cohesion. From 2023 to 2024, Eleanna also led the Transcultural Bridges music session.

Research Work

Currently, Eleanna is a co-researcher at the University of Cologne, working on the project Advancing Cultural Literacy for Social Inclusion through Dialogical Arts Education, as part of the dialoguing@rts program. Since September 2024, she has received a scholarship from the Deutsche Staatsphilharmonie (Rheinland-Pfalz) and is pursuing a PhD at the University of Mainz, focusing on the intersection of music, culture, and social inclusion.

Artistic Districtions

In 2020, Eleanna served as a staff member and principal performer in a ZDF documentary about Crete, where the Qanun featured prominently. She represented Greece at the 2nd Kanun Festival at the Ankara State Conservatory in 2015 and made her solo debut with the Plovdiv Music Academy Orchestra in Bulgaria in 2014. Eleanna is also the founder of EPI Music (2017) and the Balkan Fuego Trio (2022), which has gained significant recognition. The trio has performed at major festivals such as the Jazz & Joy Festival and the Schleswig-Holstein Festival, in addition to touring the Balkans.

Music Studies

Eleanna holds a Master’s degree in Jazz Improvisation from the Hochschule für Musik und Tanz (Cologne), where she specialized in blending the rich traditions of jazz with her cultural heritage. She also studied Systematic Psychology at ESYTHEPAS (Athens), which deepened her understanding of music psychology and the cognitive aspects of musical perception. Eleanna received a Bachelor’s degree in World Music from Pop Akademie (Mannheim) with a focus on the Qanun, as well as a Diploma in Byzantine Music from Agios Stefanos (2018). Her academic background also includes certifications in Early Music Education (2019-2020) and Elementary Music Pedagogy (2019), along with an Erasmus exchange at HKU Konservatorium (Utrecht), where she explored the interdisciplinary Musician 3.0 approach.

Eleanna began her Qanun studies at the Music School of Greece and later continued at Labyrinth in Houdetsi, Crete, under the guidance of Master Göksel Baktagir.
Coming from a musical family, she developed a love for music at an early age and started playing the Qanun in her mother’s choirs, where she gained her first stage experience. She was also a member of the Labyrinth Orchestra.