Charis Ioannou was born in Nicosia, Cyprus in 1976. In 1997 he was enrolled at Berklee College of Music in Boston, where he studied saxophone performance and Jazz composition. Charis won the Woodwind Achievement Award in the last year of his studies in Boston. In 2001, he moved to New York where he earned a Master’s degree in performance from New York University. Charis has performed in various venues around the world including performances in Greece, Kuwait, Kazakhstan, Poland, Serbia, Spain, England, Luxembourg, Belgium, Holland and the U.S.A.
Charis has also collaborated with the American Embassy in Cyprus in a Bi-Communal Jazz program called Jazz Futures through which he has appeared all over Cyprus performing alongside the group of Ari Roland and Chris Byars for 6 years during the period 2007-2013.
Charis is currently teaching the saxophone and the jazz idiom at The University of Nicosia and continues to perform as a leader as well as a sideman in Cyprus and abroad.