Yiorgos Batis


Yiorgos Batis was one of the first rebetes influential to rebetiko music. His real name was Yiorgos Tsoros although he was known as Yiorgos Ampatis. He had a great love for music and musical instruments.

Life and career

He was born in Methana in 1885 and moved to Piraeus when he was very young.
He served in the Greek army from 1912 to 1918. In the mid-1920s, he opened a music school called "Carmen". He opened a café named "Georges Baté" in 1931 and formed one of the most important scenes of rebetiko music. He continued to work as a quack-salesman, improvising drugs for painful teeth and other minor ailments. He kept a collection of many instruments and also used to name them. In 1933, Yiorgos Batis did his first sound-recording with bouzouki in Greece. In the 1930s, he dedicated himself solely to music and collaborated closely with, among others, Markos Vamvakaris in the rebetiko band called I Tetras i Xakousti tou Peiraios --the Famous Quartet of Pireos. However, it did not light up the charts. He appeared in Alekos Sakelariou's film "Oi papatzides ". He died in Piraeus on March 10, 1967.