Biography
“Art is You Empowering Others”
Greek flutist and Trevor James Low Flutes Artist Dr. Eftihia Arkoudis leads a multi-faceted career as a performer, pedagogue, and arts entrepreneur serving as the founder of EVA Arts Collective. A Music Business & Entrepreneurship faculty at the University of Florida College of the Arts and Global Outreach Coordinator of the 2024-2026 Tampere Flute Festival, Eftihia is a visionary leader passionate for arts advocacy, community-building, and empowering the next generation of musicians. In 2024, she was honored with the "Outstanding Staff for Excellence" award by West Virginia University and the Community Engagement Center, recognizing her efforts in fortifying partnerships between higher education and the community during her tenure as Director of the WVU Community Music Program (2021-2024).
Eftihia has performed and recorded solo or with several ensembles and orchestras in Greece, Turkey, Austria, Germany, Finland, Luxembourg, and the United States, and is a founding active member of the award-winning and recording artist ensembles BETA Quartet (USA) and 3Pirouetten (Germany). An interdisciplinary artist at heart and “a natural performer who conveys her ideas and narrative very well” (Pittsburgh Concert Society Competition), Eftihia has a knack for adding a theatrical element to her interpretations of new works, and her collaborations with living composers, have led to benefit concerts, seven studio albums, and the delivery of over fifty world premieres. Further, her curiosity for contemporary notation resulted in her doctoral research “Contemporary Music Notation for the Flute: A Unified Guide to Notational Symbols for Composers and Performers” which has surpassed 15,000 downloads.
Among other distinctions, she is a winner of the International Grand Prize Virtuoso and WVU’s Young Artist Competition (2016), an alternate winner of Pittsburgh Concert Society Competition, a finalist for The American Prize Competition (2018-2019), and an alternate finalist of Byron Hester Competition (2015). With BETA Quartet she has won first place in the France Music Competition 2° (2020) and Flute Society of Kentucky Flute Quartet Competition (2017) and became the first flute quartet to be semifinalists in the renowned Fischoff National Chamber Music Competition (2017). Her academic and overseas musical endeavors have been funded by grants from the US Embassy (Finland), Ministry of Culture and Science (Nordrhein-Westfalen, Germany), Friends of Flutes Foundation, West Virginia University, and the Susan B. Hardesty (2015), Eleana T. Donley (2015), and Valerie Canady Charitable Trust Foundation (2015, 2017) scholarships.
A believer that our youth shapes our future, Dr. Arkoudis leads educational workshops and teaches K-12, high-school and college level students, and adults, including students with learning and physical disabilities, through her own private studio and in partnership with local arts organizations in West Virginia. While a flute instructor at Frostburg State University, and during the pandemic, Dr. Arkoudis launched the inaugural Frostburg Flutes Guest Artist Series (2020-2023), which hosted over 16 international guest artists and 50 auditors worldwide.
Dr. Arkoudis graduated with her DMA and MM from West Virginia University (Nina Assimakopoulos), while on an assistantship, and holds artistic diplomas with distinctions from Prayner Konservatorium Wien (Vienna, Reza Najfar) and Athens Conservatory (Athens, Urs Rüttimann) where she was awarded the first honorary Urs Rüttimann Award for Excellence in Performance (2012). She also studied with the late William Bennett and internationally acclaimed Jasmine Choi. Eftihia holds a Bachelor of Science in Food Technology & Nutrition.
DISCOGRAPHY
BETA Quartet
Eponymous Debut Album (2017), Nuraghi Warriors Dance (2020), Tesserae (2023)
3 Pirouetten
Wasser-Werk II (2022), Pirouetten I (2023)
Chamber Music
Dillinger: An American Oratorio (2023), Cavafy III – Theissis (2015)
SELECTED PUBLICATIONS
Tampere Flute Festival Magazine
“Navigating Success: Crafting Your Career Blueprint”
National Association of Music Education
Blog: “The Four Rs of Music Education: Committing to a Lifelong Learning Journey”
International Journal of Music Entrepreneurship and Leadership
Volume 1, Issue 1