Yiannis Souroullas was born in the occupied village of Lysi, where he lived until the Turkish invasion of 1974. He now lives in Nicosia. He comes from a family of musicians and cantors. His long-term involvement in the traditional music of Cyprus has its roots in his family environment, as well as in his participation in SY.KA.LY. (Artists’ Group of Lysi) since 1973, and in the Yiangos Souroullas choir. 

He plays various string instruments, and also studied Byzantine music under his late uncle Yiangos Souroullas for five years. His close collaboration with Michalis Terlikkas and his participation, as a laouto player, in Mousa since 1991, have strengthened Souroullas’s involvement in Cypriot traditional music. 

He has taken part in many concerts and radio and TV programmes both in Cyprus and abroad. As a performer of the laouto and other string instruments he has appeared in several recordings, and taken part in theatre and musical theatre plays. In 1998 he played the laouto and was the music supervisor for Michalis Terlikkas’s CD Ton Gennon tzai tis Lambris (Christmas and Easter Songs). In 2008, he took part in Terlikkas’s CD Kypraia Foni – Kalos Irtan Oi Xenoi Mas (Cypriot Voice – A Welcome to Our Guests).