Viktoras Vernikos was born in Marousi and grew up listening to all kinds of music, as he declares to be “a fan of it”. He started piano lessons when he was just 4, voice lessons when he was 8 and guitar lessons at 10. He started writing his own music around 11. He is currently studying music technology and is the youngest representative of Greece at Eurovision.

He wrote the song for her himself Eurovision 2023with Title “What They Say”. It’s a song he wrote after a difficult time in his life, and therefore means a lot to him. “My song is a song about a very real experience I had. An experience I’ve always wanted to write about,” says Viktoras speaking to the Athenian-Macedonian News Agency.

At the moment the young singer is rehearsing for his stage appearance at Eurovision, which has been undertaken by Konstantinos Rigos

The Greek participation will compete for the eighth place of the 2nd Semi-Final, which will take place on the stage of the Liverpool Arena, on Thursday, May 11, 2023.

The following is the interview of Victor Vernikos with the Athenian-Macedonian News Agency and Lambros Papathanasiou

Q: You are only 16 years old, tell us about Viktoras. How would you introduce yourself to the public?

A: I am just a man who knows nothing better than he knows music. I want through music to spread love, provide a medium for people to express themselves and inspire people as much as possible to follow what they love in whatever shape or form that is.

Q: How do you spend your time?

A: I write music and practice music, learn as much as possible about music and its production. When I’m not doing music I spend time with the people I love.

Q: What music do you like to listen to and who are your influences?

A: I listen to all kinds of music, I’m a music lover, not a particular kind of music lover. I grew up listening to a wide variety of music from my parents, including blues, jazz, pop, funk, even reggae, and found my way to what I liked to listen to step by step.

Q: Tell us about the song ‘What They Say’. Did you expect to be the winner to represent Greece at Eurovision?

Ans: My song is a song about a very real experience I had. An experience I always wanted to write about. So at one point, when I picked up my guitar, melodies and words came pouring out of me. From the first moment I created this song, I believed that those who listen to it will feel it and hold it in their hearts, just like I did the last two years before I released it.

Q: What experiences can a 16-year-old have to write an emotional ballad?

Ans: We all feel and have emotions, regardless of our age. Apart from the effects of the environment one lives in, what matters is one’s state of mind and mood, and any of us could fall into a negative state, even have difficult, painful thoughts. The only question that needs to be asked is whether the problem is internal (mental) or external.

Q: What are the anxieties that can lead a child your age to be inspired and express them through music.

A: At some point I started to realize that all the hard work I had done since I was 11 in music started to come true – people from the music industry in Greece and abroad were interested in me, and I felt that my dream was coming true . When I realized this, I experienced feelings of momentary anxiety, which sparked the creation of this song. I got over this experience I had, I understood it, I kept it in my heart, to express it at another time.

Q: You are the youngest representative of Greece in Eurovision. Are you nervous about representing your country in such a big competition?

A: I am so happy to represent Greece at such a young age, I hope to inspire people and one of the messages I want to send is that many things that people say are not possible are possible. And that in fact, most of them are.