"A dream of the years, the call of the blood, the duty of the soul, a priceless treasure for me, which encompasses the magnificent melodies of my beautiful and ancient country. The melodies without which my soul is empty, my existence is incomplete." (Hasmik Torosyan)

“The Armenian National Musical Treasury” project started with choosing highly qualified specialists in the field of Armenian traditional music, selecting soloists of Armenian folk songs, and forming the male chorus “Zark”, consisting of 10 singers. Vocal and instrumental compositions: folk, spiritual, ashug, were recorded. In parallel to recording, processes began directed to the creation of armenianmusic.am online music portal, in which all the recordings were placed.

A decade of Armenian disco, funk, and soul, compiled by Darone Sassounian who spent three years tracking down the records and artists; fulfilling a calling to lift his people’s voice, a people that have always faced the threat of erasure. The music was made a generation after the Armenian Genocide, a testament to perseverance. The seven tracks featured are incredibly inventive and unique in their interpretations of these Western seventies sounds.

Jazz was one of Lucy Yeghiazaryan’s first languages. When in 2001 her family moved to New York from Armenia, she sang American jazz, before she could master an English sentence. Eventually, she grew into The Big Apple’s most exciting jazz vocalist but always kept the Armenian melodies close to her heart. Her upcoming project, Beside the Golden Door, merges the two worlds, pairing Armenian folk songs with jazz standards that tell very similar stories, connecting the two beautiful but far-removed cultures.

In 1906, Komitas gave a concert and lecture in Paris. Debussy came on stage after the concert and knelt before the Armenian composer (who was also a priest, a singer and a pioneer of ethnomusicology), exclaiming: ‘I bow before your genius, Reverend Father.’

Anna Garano, classical and Flamenco guitarist from Trieste, Italy, has arranged a repertoire of Armenian songs for voice and guitar. Here in New York at Alwan she is joined by Anaïs Alexandra Tekerian, one third of the acclaimed Armenian a cappella trio Zulal, in this lyrical, poignant fusion of Flamenco and vocals of the Old World. In light of the upcoming 100th anniversary of the Armenian Genocide, Anna and Anaïs will present a selection of Armenian songs of love and idealization, of loss and despair, of questioning and hope.

“The Armenian National Musical Treasury” project started with choosing highly qualified specialists in the field of Armenian traditional music, selecting soloists of Armenian folk songs, and forming the male chorus “Zark”, consisting of 10 singers. Vocal and instrumental compositions: folk, spiritual, ashug, were recorded. In parallel to recording, processes began directed to the creation of armenianmusic.am online music portal, in which all the recordings were placed.

Savina Yannatou's fourth ECM album is a dazzling evocation of her band's hometown, plunging deep into its rich and complex history. Once known colloquially as the Jerusalem of the Balkans, Thessaloniki has been home to a host of cultures, religions and ethnic communities. Greeks, Jews, Turks, Bulgarians, Serbs, Armenians, Slav-Macedonians and Pontiac Greeks have shared the city's diverse life. Yannatou gives all of them a voice, even casting an Irish song about Salonika into this multi-lingual programme in which she shines as a unique interpreter and spokeswoman for the city's ghosts. As ever, Primavera en Salonico are a delight, one of the most resourceful bands of any idiom, as they negotiate the inspired - and very varied - arrangements of Kostas Vomvolos.

Soprano sorceress Isabel Bayrakdarian, acclaimed internationally for her glittering accomplishments on both stage and screen, presents – in this hypnotically alluring album of Armenian sacred music – a more spiritual aspect of her multifaceted musical persona…

Tigran Mansurians Requiem erinnert an die Opfer des Völkermordes, der von 1915 bis 1917 im damaligen Osmanischen Reich an den Armeniern verübt wurde. In zutiefst bewegender Weise führt Mansurian die musikalische Tradition seines Landes, ihre Klangfarben und Stimmungen, mit dem lateinischen Bibeltext zusammen und erfüllt seine Komposition mit dem »leuchtenden Glanz der armenischen modalen Musik«, wie Paul Griffiths es in seinem Essay formuliert. Für Mansurian, der als bedeutendster Komponist Armeniens gilt und in dessen Musik, so die Los Angeles Times, »ein tiefer kultureller Schmerz besänftigt wird durch wundersam stille, herzzerreißende Schönheit«, bedeutet das Requiem einen Meilenstein. Das Requiem entstand im Auftrag des Münchener Kammerorchesters und des RIAS Kammerchors und wurde im Januar 2016 in der Jesus-Christus-Kirche in Berlin-Dahlem mit Manfred Eicher als Produzent aufgenommen..

“This is a typical Alia Vox Hesperion release: sumptuously packaged, richly illustrated, and supported by edifying scholarly notes about the music and its historical context. It's recorded in clear yet atmospheric sound…In addition to the late Montserrat Figueras, there is wonderful singing by the Israeli Lior Elmaleh ad the Turk Gursoy Dincer.” ~BBC Music Magazine