Los Angeles Times
September 8, 2004 Wednesday
Home Edition

‘Komitas’ reawakened;
Anna Djanbazian brings back to life her ballet about the revered
Armenian, inspired by ‘the idea of survival … and not giving up.’

by Victoria Looseleaf, Special to The Times

Do a Google search for Komitas and more than 9,000 entries pop up.
The revered Armenian historical figure, who was born in Asia Minor in
1869 as Soghomon Soghomonian, assumed the name Komitas a quarter of a
century later, when he was ordained as a monk in the Armenian church.
But his work as a composer — more than 4,000 songs in Armenian,
Kurdish, Arabic and Persian, as well as numerous instrumental works
— is what made his reputation.

Add to this the facts that Komitas went insane after Turkey began
carrying out the Armenian genocide in 1915 and that he spent two
decades in mental hospitals before dying in Paris, and it’s easy to
see why a performing artist would be drawn to his story. Indeed,
Iranian-born dancer-choreographer Anna Djanbazian has been fascinated
with him for many years. In 1982, she created a two-act ballet,
“Komitas, Kroong Bnaver (Komitas, Banished but Not Forgotten),” in
Iran. The production featured 45 dancers, with Djanbazian as the
female lead opposite her husband in the title role.

Now, her locally based Djanbazian Dance Company is about to breathe
new life into this contemporary dance drama when it receives its U.S.
premiere this weekend at the Glendale Community College Theatre. But
its creator, 52, no longer performs, and she says her original vision
has been affected by time and by her own life struggles.

The new production was inspired by “the idea of survival and being
here and working, and not giving up,” explains Djanbazian, who
received a master’s in choreography from UCLA in 1990 and founded her
troupe in 1992. She also says that the more than 20 years she had to
think about the ballet nurtured its evolution. “The world has
changed, and the way people look at things. Also, my life and tastes
changed. The steps are not exactly the same, but Komitas’ story is,
which I wanted to introduce through his spiritual fragility and
struggle, through my eyes.”

Djanbazian’s eyes have taken in a lot. Her father, Sarkis Djanbazian,
was a renowned dancer-choreographer who in 1942 founded the first
classical ballet school in Iran. Born in Russia, he had studied dance
in St. Petersburg, but after the government arbitrarily expelled him
in 1937, he resettled his family in Tehran. Anna began dancing at 3;
her father died of a heart attack eight years later, in 1963. Her
mother, however, maintained the Djanbazian Dance Academy while
sending the teenage Anna to Russia for five years to continue her
training.

Djanbazian mounted “Komitas” in Tehran in 1982 in part to celebrate
the academy’s 40th anniversary.

“I loved Komitas’ ideology and his approach toward life. His music
was mesmerizing,” she says. But in her experience, that music “was
usually presented by scholars through lecture demonstrations and
recitals. Very rarely was dance set to it.”

She says Armenians have long considered Komitas’ music “a song of the
people,” and so she chose various tunes and instrumental works —
from religious and children’s songs to lively peasant and wedding
airs — as much for their emotional content as for their melodies.

There was one problem: Iran was in chaos under the reign of Ayatollah
Ruhollah Khomeini. “We were in the disaster of revolution,” she
recalls, “and I was working underground, with the fear of the
government interrupting. We had several incidents when they barged in
and were looking for things — going over my costumes, pictures,
books. It was terrible.”

The show did go on, but within two years Djanbazian had closed the
school and moved to Los Angeles with her mother. In 1988, she honored
her heritage by opening a Djanbazian Dance Academy in Glendale. Now
located in La Crescenta, the school has 100 students, 22 of whom are
in Djanbazian’s company and will perform in “Komitas.” She hopes
eventually to take the evening-length work to Armenia, where her
troupe toured for three weeks last year.

Her father’s dances continue to figure prominently in her life. Two
years ago, she earned a local Lester Horton Dance Award for restaging
his “Memento (An Uzbek Dance),” and last year she received a Horton
for costume design for “What Is Inside Every Woman.”

“God gave me a good memory,” says Djanbazian, whose own dance
creations, she says, number about 80. “Since I was watching his class
when I was very little, all the students came to me to know their
next steps. That became a habit — to learn everything.”
Unfortunately, routine of a sadder stripe has also followed
Djanbazian. In 1996, her husband died, and four years later she fell
ill with cancer, which was what forced her to stop dancing.

“It gave me a chance to look at life differently,” she says. “And if
I can get back my energy, I’m going to perform. Not like before, but
differently.” Until then, Djanbazian’s creativity infuses “Komitas,”
featuring 25-year-old Arsen Serobian in the title role. A guest
artist with Djanbazian’s troupe, he was born in Armenia and has
danced with companies including the Moscow Ballet Theatre and the
Moiseyev Dance Company.

“I knew about Komitas from school,” Serobian says. “I love his
music.” Portraying first a monk, then a musician and finally an exile
in the throes of a breakdown (in a haunting solo) is “like going back
to that time and experiencing his pain and his love.”

Iranian-born Ani Grigorian, 21, a student of Djanbazian’s since she
was 7, will dance the role the choreographer made for herself. “We go
through a lot of emotions when we dance our people’s history,”
Grigorian says. “We lived through hard times and tragedy, but we
survive with a sense of pride.”

“Komitas” depicts Turkish forces’ 1915 slaughter of Armenians from
eastern Turkey as a tableau of chest-pounding angst, with
backward-bending dancers ending as crumpled heaps. Like Djanbazian’s
own saga, though, the drama concludes on a hopeful note.

“I show how people get stronger because of Komitas,” says Djanbazian.
“The libretto ends with this resurrection, with all of the people on
their feet.”

*

Djanbazian Dance Company

Where: Glendale Community College Theatre, 1500 N. Verdugo Road,
Glendale

When: 8 p.m. Friday and Saturday (pre-show lecture by Arto
Tchakmakchian at 7:15 p.m.); 5 p.m. Sunday (pre-show lecture at 4:15
p.m.)

Price: $20 to $40

Contact: (818) 580-2170

GRAPHIC: PHOTO: PREPARATION: A reflection of Ani Grigorian, left,
Narinea Ghazarians, Arsineh Ananian and Arsen Serobian rehearsing.
PHOTO: IN SYNC: “Komitas,” at the Glendale Community College Theatre,
says Arsen Serobian, right, with Narinea Ghazarians, is “like going
back to that time and experiencing his pain and his love.”
PHOTOGRAPHER: Photographs by Genaro Molina Los Angeles Times