Born in Toronto, Constantine was raised in a musical family in Pythagorion, a culturally vibrant township of Samos Island in the northeastern part of the Aegean Sea. Constantine’s playground as a young child was the ruins of the famed Polycrates Wall, Pythagoras’s ancient theatre, the local orthodox monastery of Spiliani and the Eupalinian aqueduct. 

At age six, a family friend presented Constantine with a gift: a baby violin and a first lesson. All playground activities have since then been abated. 

Hailed as “the most important Hellenic-descent composer of his generation” (Jazz & Tzaz), commanding a “beyond the ordinary sense of musicality”, Constantine Caravassilis’ music is “constantly charged with emotion and energy in a profoundly individual style” (RCM). Constantine is laureate of the 4th Volos International Composition Competition with 3 gold medals, the highest honour ever awarded to a composer by the competition’s blue-ribbon jury. His piece Apanthroposis for solo flute and tape received the first prize in the Canadian Composer Category, at the 2006 Syrinx Flute Festival in Canada. He has recently received the 2009 Karen Kieser Prize in Canadian Music as well as the 2010 Harry Freedman Recording Award. 

He has been resident composer with the Contemporary Opera Lab (Winnipeg), Open Strings (Denmark), and with the London Song Festival in Britain. He is currently composer-in-residence with Toronto‘s Cantabile Chamber Singers.

Constantine's compositions and arrangements appear on Marquis (EMI Canada) and have been recorded and broadcast by WGBH Radio in the U.S., CBC Radio in Canada, BBC-3 in the U.K, and TDK radio in Japan.

Commissions have come from soloists, ensembles and organizations the world around. Regarded as one of the most prolific young composers in Canada, Constantine‘s catalogue includes seven concerti, with a plethora of chamber, orchestral, vocal/choral and electroacoustic works. His music has been performed in Germany, France, Croatia, Denmark, Serbia, Romania, Austria, the U.K. and Wales, Sweden, Russia, Belarus, Greece, Cyprus, Israel, Turkey and Japan as well as throughout Canada and the United States. A graduate of the Marcel A. Desautels Facutly of Music (M.Mus), he received his formal training and education at Toronto’s Royal Conservatory of Music and the University of Toronto‘s Faculty of Music (B.Mus) where he is currently pursuing a Doctor of Musical Arts degree on full fellowship, specializing in the fields of composition and orchestral conducting.