The Tegos Tapes is an interesting example of an obscure and heretofore unreleased Vangelis soundtrack unknown by many of even his most devoted fans.
The Tegos Tapes were produced originally by the Greek medical professional Dr. Stergios Tegos, and contain educational examples of his microneurosurgery work. This VHS set of tapes was not intended for general release to the Public as these training videos were mainly intended for student surgeons in training or offered to other microneurosurgeons via Dr. Tegos exclusively.
Dr. Tegos asked his close friend Vangelis to create a background soundtrack to accompany these videos and Vangelis agreed, composing nearly 8 hours of some of his more pleasing and ambient music. Dr. Tegos thought that a background musical score composed and performed by Vangelis himself would ease the monotony and dryness of the subject matter and help the viewer to focus more effectively.
The link below leads you to a Youtube recording of over 8 hours long, containing most materials from the tapes.
Originally available in 1998 as an expensive set of three 4 hour video tapes plus large book in a case and only available to practicing surgeons via Dr. Tegos. Vangelis was friends with the surgeon and had recorded music specifically for these tapes from special requests, as the subject matter could be ‘monotonous’.
This music was lost to obscurity for years because of the esoteric and hard to find nature of the videos. Now they have been ripped from the original content for all to enjoy. The voiceovers of Dr. Tegos have been removed and you will only hear pure Vangelis.
You can read more about the discovery of these tapes by Vangelis Collector. He also writes that the original set of tapes + book are still available through this bookshop for medical publications by Yiannis Parisiano.
Victor Habbick recently created a redesigned artwork for these recordings Bigger version are available through him, you can find Victor on facebook. Artwork © Victor Habbick Visions
