Stelios Manousakis (Crete, Greece) is a composer, performer, researcher, and sound artist. In these capacities he strives to develop a new musical language that is both visceral and cerebral; that communicates in a purely cognitive and experiential level while at the same time being complex and multilayered. At the same time, he finds most intriguing and pertinent to operate in the convergence zone between different areas: Art and science. Composition and performance. The rich tradition of Western art music and folk or ‘digital folk’ idioms. Blending algorithmic finesse with the expressivity of improvisation. As a composer, he aims to unify his methods of art creation from the most abstract to the most practical levels in ways that are meaningful: conceptually, as a process, and as a result.
Stelios composes mostly electronic, electroacoustic and electro-instrumental music using software that he designs and is currently interested in applying complexity science, cybernetic and biology-inspired Artificial Life models for musical structure generation and novel non-standard sound synthesis method. Most of his work is deeply concerned with the unearthing of rich, complex and organic worlds that can emerge through iterative processes. In the core of his artistic philosophy lies the notion that music compositions and time-based art pieces in general can be successfully designed as growing organisms, and that they can be algorithmically or systematically modeled as complex dynamical systems with dynamic structure that develops over time. This approach extends to fixed medium pieces as well as Open Compositions - live pieces composed as frameworks for exploring complex dynamics that arise through iterative processes, guided by defined modes of action and interaction between players and their instruments, and by real-time listening. It also extends into sound art pieces and interactive multimedia installations, an area that Stelios has begun exploring in the last years.
Besides his solo work, Stelios is co-founder of the electro-instrumental ensembles Computer Aided Breathing, SelectInput and the multimedia groups Hecate and the - defunct - Breakcore Tapdance Collective. He also collaborates frequently with vocalist and performance artist Stephanie Pan in a variety of projects. His music has been performed in Europe and the United States.
Stelios grew up in Chania, Crete, where he studied accordion, piano and music theory; he later moved to Athens to study at the National University of Athens. After receiving a BA in Linguistics and graduating with honors from the conservatory in Advanced Music Theory as a student of Giorgos Fitsioris, he moved to the Netherlands, joining the Institute of Sonology at The Royal Conservatory, The Hague. There he studied with Paul Berg, Konrad Boehmer, Joel Ryan and Kees Tazelaar, among others, graduating with a Master's Degree in Sonology (thesis subject: Musical L-systems). He is currently a PhD candidate at the Center for Digital Arts and Experimental Media (DXARTS) in the University of Washington, where he studies with Richard Karpen, Juan Pampin and James Coupe.