CD of the MONTH - Merlin Virtuosi Komitas - String Quartet CD |
| 13 Beautiful songs by composer, pedagogue, pianist and priest Komitas. This Songs are pillars of Armenian culture and of great importance in the development of Armenian Classical music. Arranged for String Quartet.
Genre: Classical: Chamber Music. Release Date: 2008 Violin I Sami Merdinian Violin II Wayne Lin Viola Franklin Shaw Cello Jacob Braun About Komitas Vardapet [1869-1935] was the founding father of the Armenian national musical style. A composer, ethnomusicologist, scholar, educator, and a performer – Komitas was truly the first to emphasize the significant role of an independent Armenian music. He devoted his life to the collection and study of Armenian folk songs, and made it his mission to share them with the rest of the world through performances, lectures, as well as his writings. It was after one of such lecture-performances in Paris that the French composer Claude Debussy praised Komitas as one of the greatest composers in the world. Miraculously, his life was spared during the Armenian Genocide of 1915, but the devastation of this event resulted in a complete mental breakdown. He spent the remaining years of his life in a mental institution in Paris. After his death, his remains were brought to Yerevan, the capital of Armenia, the land that owed so much of its cultural identity to the work of this great man. As a sign of honor, the newly founded music conservatory in Yerevan was named after Komitas. The year 2009 marks 140th Anniversary of Komitas’s birth; hence, his work is being honored and celebrated in concerts and cultural events around the world. |