KHACHATUR AVETISYAN
Khachatur Avetisyan was born in 1926 in Gyumri. He studied composition with Edvard Mirzoyan at the Yerevan
Music Conservatory. At the age of 25, he became the first Armenian composer to win gold medals in
international composition competitions in Berlin and Moscow. In addition to his classical studies,
Avetisyan specialised in Armenian folk music and traditional instruments, especially the qanun. In 1954 he
composed his "Concerto for Qanun and Symphony Orchestra". Avetisyan has devoted his life to researching
and developing the performance practices of Armenian folk music.
Avetisyan founded the Folk Music Department at the Komitas National Conservatory in 1978. Under his
guidance, many valuable instrumentalists have been trained in this department. In addition to composing a
significant number of works for various folk music instruments, he also composed many famous songs,
ballets, oratorios, film and dance music. In 1958, he became the artistic director of the National Dance
Ensemble and later the Tatul Altunyan Song and Dance Ensemble.
The dominant repertoire of these ensembles consists of Avetisyan's instrumental and vocal music in the field of folk music. Looking at the works that Avetisyan wrote for the qanun, one can see that he composed his works in three different styles:
- Original qanun works/those in the form of transcriptions of folk music and traditional materials into qanun,
- Those in the form of transcriptions of the works of Armenian and Western composers for the qanun,
- In the repertoire of the Kanun and Piano Duo, there are works written by Avetisyan for qanun and piano, which can be examples of the three compositional techniques mentioned.
Dr. Mikael Avetisyan, son of Khachatur Avetisyan, who died in 1996, is conductor of the Glendale Philharmonic Orchestra and music director of the Los Angeles Armenian Community Choir. The Qanun Concerto no. 2, composed by Avetisyan in 1954 for qanun and large orchestra, was performed for the first time in its original form by qanun artist Tahir Aydoğdu, accompanied by the Presidential Symphony Orchestra (C.S.O.) conducted by Hakan Şensoy, in Ankara on 18 March 2016. Aydoğdu later performed this concerto with the Izmir State Symphony Orchestra and the Antalya State Symphony Orchestra.