Education
After taking classical guitar lessons and participating in the children"s choir of Yannis Nousias for some years, she studied singing with Gogo Georgilopoulou and Spiros Sakkas in Athens, and later attended postgraduate studies at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama in London.
Career
In 1979 she began working as a professional and two years later participated in the recording of the critically acclaimed album "Εδώ Λιλιπούπολη" ("Lilipoupolis here"). Following that, her career took off and has since released numerous albums, collaborating with many Greek composers. In the mid-1990s, she joined forces with select jazz / traditional musicians forming a band known as Primavera en Salonico, which started by interpreting Sephardic and Mediterranean songs, but later expanded to music from various areas of the world.
Gradually, she has extended her vocal techniques to include throat singing, glossolalia and ululations among others
Said explorations have led her to onand off-stage collaborations and sessions with international musicians such as Barry Guy, Peter Kowald, Floros Floridis, Günther Pitscheider, Gerald Preinfalk of the band BPM, Ken Vandermark, Sussan Deyhim, Damo Suzuki of the krautrock group Can, and Kiya Tabassian of the Ensemble Constantinople. Yannatou is also a songwriter ("Dreams of the mermaid Is king Alexander alive?", "Rosa das Rosas", "Musique Des Chambres"), as well as a composer for theater, dance theater and video art
She occasionally participates in select workshops, teaching vocal improvisations to actors and musicians. She is currently an ECM artist.
Dance theatre.
Membership
Besides that, her repertoire consists mainly of Greek music, although she has been a founding member of an Early music ensemble (Εργαστήρι Παλιάς Μουσικής), and has always displayed a keen interest in exploring free jazz and avant-garde music