Sokratis Malamas was born on September 29, 1957 in Sykia in Chalkidiki, Greece. His family moved to Stuttgart, Germany for a few years, he later moved to Thessaloniki. There, he sang bouzouki songs and he learned from his father about his music. At age thirteen, he bought his first guitar and practiced for his presentations at schoolworks and when he was seventeen, he followed his guitar studies at the Macedonian Conservatory of Thessaloniki (Μακεδονικό Ωδείο Θεσσαλονίκης = Makedoniko Odeio Thessalonikis). He returned to Germany after he finished school and later went to the Stuttgart Odeon. In one difficult period of his life, he came back to Greece and attended studies at the National Conservatory of Athens (Εθνικό Ωδείο Αθηνών = Ethniko Odeio Athinon). He was taught by Vangelis Assimakopoulos and Notis Mavroudis. At 23, he began his professional career, worked as a guitar teacher and a singer in some public shops. Before he continued into his personal way, he was a guitarist at the orchestra of Nikos Papazoglou.