Dimitris Kokotas

Dimitris Kokotas was a Greek singer, composer and businessman whose voice helped define contemporary laiko and Greek pop in the 1990s. Born Dimitrios Kokotas in Athens on 14 December 1968, he grew up inside one of the country's best-known musical households as the son of laiko star Stamatis Kokotas and Rozina Kokota. He was known familiarly as Dimis. Rather than remaining only a famous son, he built a platinum-selling recording career of his own, especially through a formative run of albums with songwriter-producer Phoebus (Foivos).

His earliest credits included backing vocals for Marinella in 1990 and a 1992 appearance at the Thessaloniki Greek Song Festival. In 1993 he recorded a duet with his father. His first solo album, Diadoseis (Rumors), arrived in February 1994 on Eros Music with music and lyrics by Phoebus and sold about 30,000 copies in Greece and Cyprus, going gold. Songs such as Diadoseis and Afta ta Cheilia introduced him to a national radio audience.

The 1995 follow-up Syneidisi (Conscience / Sineidisi) went platinum on reported sales around 60,000 and remains closely identified with his early peak. Phoebus wrote and produced the album; standouts included Giati me tyrannas, Poli kali gia na sai alithini, Ki ase na lene, Syneidisi and Anemona. In May 1997 Acharistia became his strongest commercial statement, reportedly selling at least 80,000 copies and going platinum in Greece and Cyprus. In 1998 he shifted collaborators to Nikos Karvelas for Gia mena, which went gold on day one and platinum within roughly two weeks on about 50,000 sales, yielding hits including Sto' cho Pei and Gia mena. Se revmata antitheta (1999), with music by Giorgos Theofanous, added further radio successes before the new decade.

From 2000 he recorded for Minos EMI and later Virus Music and Alpha Records (Echo figei, Olopsycha dikos sou, Ena, Aprosmeni agapi, Ama de se do apopse, and a live set). He shared stages and discs with Marinella, Kaiti Garbi, Angela Dimitriou, Antypas, Vassilis Karras, Konstantina, Litsa Giagkousi and others. In 2013 he joined Haris Varthakouris, Grigoris Bithikotsis and Stelios Dionysiou on the international A Tribute to the Legends tour, performing their fathers' repertoire for Greek diaspora communities across Europe, the Americas, Australia and Israel. In later years he also appeared with Giorgos Lembesis and kept a lower public profile while running a cafe in Neo Irakleio, stepping back into television via J2US preparations in 2024.

On 28 March 2024, during rehearsals for J2US, Kokotas suffered an acute myocardial infarction and cardiac arrest. He was taken to Athens' G. Gennimatas General Hospital and remained hospitalized for more than two years. Public updates described a prolonged, closely watched medical struggle. He died at the hospital on 25 August 2026, aged 57. The Municipality of Agia Varvara, where he lived and had been an elected council member since 2024, voted to establish an annual municipal conservatory scholarship and to name a conservatory room in his honour, and helped with funeral costs. He was buried at the Third Cemetery of Athens on 28 August 2026.

Kokotas married Katerina Petraki, whom he met while working in a nightclub; their daughter Riana was born in 2011. He was predeceased by his father Stamatis (2022). Survivors named in obituaries and Wikipedia include his wife, daughter, mother Rozina, and sisters Elli and Marianna. Colleagues including Kaiti Garbi, Haris Varthakouris, Mando, Christos Dantis, Traiana Anania, Nikos Koklonis and others published farewell messages after his death. His catalogue of 1990s gold and platinum albums, and the songs still sung on Greek radio and stages, remain the core of his public legacy.

This memorial is for Dimitris Kokotas (Greek: Dimitris Kokotas / Dimitrios Kokotas; nickname Dimis; Wikidata Q100691236), the 1990s Greek laiko-pop singer. It is not for his father Stamatis Kokotas (died 2022), not for Giorgos Mazonakis, and not for unrelated social accounts that share a similar name.