A universally lauded entertainer, he worked for many years in the cinema alongside stars such as Aliki Vougiouklaki. He both appeared in films and wrote music for them, with songs such as “Siko Horepse Syrtaki”. He claimed to have been influenced greatly by both Vamvakaris and Tsitsanis, but his music is unmistakably his own, and has its unique identity and place in Greek musical history. Many of his songs include references to nightingales and swallows. Zabetas himself said that he loved to go and sit in the forests to listen to the nightingales, whose birdsong gave him ideas for his melodies.