WORLD PREMIERE OF 9 SONGS BY KOMITAS TODAY
Hasmik Papian and Vartan Mamikonian to Perform in Yerevan
Azg/arm
20 July 05
At 8:00 pm on July 20, famous soprano Hasmik Papian and pianist Vartan
Mamikonian will play a two-part concert at Aram Khachatrian Concert
Hall dedicated to the 90th anniversary of Armenian Genocide and 70th
anniversary of Komitas’ death.
Along with known melodies by Komitas, they will perform compositions
that have never been presented. While a student in Berlin, Komitas
was inspired by the works of Goethe, Lenau, Uhland and created songs
that long rested at Culture and Literature Museum after Charents.
Hasmik Papian took up the task of reviving the aforesaid songs in
Vienna, representing them in different concert halls of the world
and writing them on CDs. Those 9 songs of early Komitas, bearing
the influence of Schuman, Hugo and Wolf, are valuable for being the
predecessors of well-known and beloved “Antuni” and “Kroonk”.
After the premiere of Komitas’ German songs in Yerevan, Bayerischer
Rundfunk will record them in Munich. Afterwards, the songs will be
preformed in New York, Paris and Munich.
“It’s difficult to come out with such a program after 11 months of
tough concert tour and amid summer heat but those two anniversaries
are obliging”, Hasmik Papian said adding, “This is a devotion, an
incense to great Komitas”.
“It’s a great responsibility for us to perform unknown songs of Komitas
in Armenia first”, Vartan Mamikonian says, “Komitas’ melodies passing
beyond national boundaries do not leave foreigners indifferent. I am
sure the Yerevan concert will draw people’s attention”.
By Anahit Hovsepian