Renowned Armenian tenor Gegham Grigoryan passed away today aged 65.

World-famous tenor Gegham Grigoryan graduated from Yerevan Komitas State Conservatory, the class of People’s Artist of Armenia professor Sergei Danielyan. Grigorian made his first appearance on the big stage in 1971 at age 20, in 1972 he went to West Berlin to appear with solo concerts.

In 1975 he made his debut at the National Theater of Opera and Ballet of Armenia in the role of Edgar (opera “Lucia di Lammermoor” by Donizetti). This was followed by Saro (opera “Anush” by Tigranian), Tirith (“Arshak II” by Chukhajyan), Sayat Nova (“Sayat-Nova” by Harutyunyan), Count Almaviva (“The Barber of Seville” by Rossini), Faust (“Faust” by Gounod.)

In 1978 he took part in the competition of the School of Art in Milan at the theater La Scalaand was one of the four lucky winners who were invited to qualify for this school. During his traineeship in Italy, he participated in several concerts. In “La Scala” Gegham Grigoryan made his debut in the role of Pinkerton (Madama Butterfly by Puccini). After that performance, he signed a contract with the theater “La Scala” on the leading rols of the operas “Boris Godunov” and Tosca. The performances were conducted by Claudio Abbado, then he was principal conductor of La Scalla.

Unfortunately, the Soviet authorities, for unknown reasons, forbade him to act outside the territory of the Soviet Union for 10 years. In those years Grigoryan was in the list of so-called restricted artists to travel abroad.

In 1980, Virgilijus Noreika, artistic director of Lithuanian National Opera and Ballet Theatre invites Grigorian to work In Vilnius. There Grigorian worked with the famous conductor Jonas Alex. He sang in the operas “Eugene Onegin”, “Don Carlos”, “Boris Godunov,” “La Traviata,” “Madame Butterfly,” “Rigoletto” and many others.

Since 1989, at the invitation of Valery Gergiev he performed at the Mariinsky Theater as the lead singer.

Gegham Grigoryan was the art director of National Academic Theatre of Opera and Ballet after A. Spendiarian.