PRESS RELEASE
222 East Harvard Street
Glendale, CA 91205-1075
Phone (818) 548 - 3288
Fax (818) 548 - 7225
www.glendalepubliclibrary.org
Grammy Nominated Composer Tigran Mansurian At Glendale Central Library
Glendale, CA - Grammy nominated composer Tigran Mansurian will lecture
on the life and work of Armenian composer and musicologist, Komitas
Vardapet, on Saturday and Sunday, April 16 & 17, 2011, at 4 p.m., in the
Glendale Central Library Auditorium, 222 East Harvard Street, Glendale.
The event is organized by The Glendale Public Library. The program will
be presented in Armenian. Admission is free. Library visitors receive 3
hours FREE parking across the street at The Market Place parking
structure with validation at the loan desk.
Tigran Mansurian studied at the Yerevan Music Academy and completed his
PhD at the Komitas State Conservatory where he later taught contemporary
music analysis. In a short time he became one of Armenia's leading
composers, establishing strong creative relationships with international
performers and composers such as Valentin Silvestrov, Arvo Pärt,
Alfred Schnittke, as well as Jan Garbarek, and the Hilliard Ensemble.
Mansurian's musical style is characterized mainly by the organic
synthesis of ancient Armenian musical traditions and contemporary
European composition methods. His oeuvre comprises orchestral works,
seven concerti for strings and orchestra, sonatas for cello and piano,
three string quartets, madrigals, chamber music and works for solo
instruments and a numbers of film scores. Tigran Mansurian was nominated
for a Grammy award in 2006. He is the first Armenian composer to have
ever been nominated for this award.
Komitas Vardapet was born on 1869 in Kütahya, Ottoman Empire. He was
an Armenian priest, composer, and musicologist. He studied music at the
private conservatory of Prof. Richard Schmidt in Kaiser Friedrich
Wilhelm University, and acquired the title of Doctor of Musicology. He
traveled extensively around Armenia, listening and recording details
about folk songs and dances performed in various villages. He collected
and published some 3000 songs. In April 1915, Komitas was arrested
together with a number of outstanding Armenian writers, publicists,
physicians, and lawyers. After the arrest, accompanied by violence, he
was deported to Anatolia where he became a witness of the brutal
extermination of the nation's bright minds. Due to the intervention of
influential figures such as the U.S. ambassador Henry Morgenthau,
Komitas was returned to Constantinople. The nightmare and the amount of
violence he witnessed left a deep ineradicable impression on him.
Komitas remained in seclusion from the outer world, absorbed in his
gloomy and heavy thoughts - sad and broken. Komitas saved the cultural
heritage of Western Armenia that otherwise would have disappeared
because of the Armenian Genocide. Today the music academy in Yerevan is
named after Komitas. He died in 1935. His ashes were transferred to
Yerevan and buried in the Pantheon.
###
CONTACT: Elizabeth Grigorian, [email protected] or call
(818) 548-3288.
From: A. Papazian
222 East Harvard Street
Glendale, CA 91205-1075
Phone (818) 548 - 3288
Fax (818) 548 - 7225
www.glendalepubliclibrary.org
Grammy Nominated Composer Tigran Mansurian At Glendale Central Library
Glendale, CA - Grammy nominated composer Tigran Mansurian will lecture
on the life and work of Armenian composer and musicologist, Komitas
Vardapet, on Saturday and Sunday, April 16 & 17, 2011, at 4 p.m., in the
Glendale Central Library Auditorium, 222 East Harvard Street, Glendale.
The event is organized by The Glendale Public Library. The program will
be presented in Armenian. Admission is free. Library visitors receive 3
hours FREE parking across the street at The Market Place parking
structure with validation at the loan desk.
Tigran Mansurian studied at the Yerevan Music Academy and completed his
PhD at the Komitas State Conservatory where he later taught contemporary
music analysis. In a short time he became one of Armenia's leading
composers, establishing strong creative relationships with international
performers and composers such as Valentin Silvestrov, Arvo Pärt,
Alfred Schnittke, as well as Jan Garbarek, and the Hilliard Ensemble.
Mansurian's musical style is characterized mainly by the organic
synthesis of ancient Armenian musical traditions and contemporary
European composition methods. His oeuvre comprises orchestral works,
seven concerti for strings and orchestra, sonatas for cello and piano,
three string quartets, madrigals, chamber music and works for solo
instruments and a numbers of film scores. Tigran Mansurian was nominated
for a Grammy award in 2006. He is the first Armenian composer to have
ever been nominated for this award.
Komitas Vardapet was born on 1869 in Kütahya, Ottoman Empire. He was
an Armenian priest, composer, and musicologist. He studied music at the
private conservatory of Prof. Richard Schmidt in Kaiser Friedrich
Wilhelm University, and acquired the title of Doctor of Musicology. He
traveled extensively around Armenia, listening and recording details
about folk songs and dances performed in various villages. He collected
and published some 3000 songs. In April 1915, Komitas was arrested
together with a number of outstanding Armenian writers, publicists,
physicians, and lawyers. After the arrest, accompanied by violence, he
was deported to Anatolia where he became a witness of the brutal
extermination of the nation's bright minds. Due to the intervention of
influential figures such as the U.S. ambassador Henry Morgenthau,
Komitas was returned to Constantinople. The nightmare and the amount of
violence he witnessed left a deep ineradicable impression on him.
Komitas remained in seclusion from the outer world, absorbed in his
gloomy and heavy thoughts - sad and broken. Komitas saved the cultural
heritage of Western Armenia that otherwise would have disappeared
because of the Armenian Genocide. Today the music academy in Yerevan is
named after Komitas. He died in 1935. His ashes were transferred to
Yerevan and buried in the Pantheon.
###
CONTACT: Elizabeth Grigorian, [email protected] or call
(818) 548-3288.
From: A. Papazian