Interview, Eva Zaïcik and David Haroutunian on 'Mayrig: To Armenian Mothers'

Two pillars of the Armenian musical world form the tent-poles of this new album from mezzo-soprano Eva Zaïcik – the early twentieth-century priest-composer Soghomon Soghomonian (known to the world by his ordained name Komitas), perhaps the best-known and most influential composer to come out of Armenia, and the Paris-based Garbis Aprikian (b.1926) – a composer and musicologist whose work has been intimately intertwined with research into Komitas's output.

As Zaïcik and violinist David Haroutunian explain, the seed for the whole album was a planned birthday gift to Aprikian – and from there the idea grew and expanded until it was a full 69 minutes of evocative music from the Armenian classical tradition, weaving voice, violin and piano together. Eva and David were kind enough to share some of their thoughts on both the performance of the music and the history and legacy it explores.

Where did the idea for this album first come from?

Eva Zaïcik: The project began with Garbis Aprikian's Lullaby, which takes its place in the middle of the album. Aprikian's sons asked David Haroutunian, violinist and the leader of this project, to record this lullaby on the occasion of their father's 96th birthday. Indeed, he had composed this melody many years before, but had never heard it performed.

So David came to me after discovering my Russian repertoire. This new project was very exciting for me and after we recorded this melody, it sparked the desire to make it a bigger project, as this music spoke so naturally to me.

And in this I'm lucky enough to be supported by my record label Alpha Classics and its director Didier Martin, who has placed immense trust in me and given me a great deal of freedom in terms of the repertoire I wish to record. I would like to thank them warmly for this.

Different languages of course present different challenges and opportunities to the singer – how does Armenian compare?

Eva Zaïcik: Armenian presents both unique challenges and opportunities for a singer. I'll leave aside the unique writing system, since I sing these melodies phonetically and haven't had time to learn how to read it, and its lexical richness, largely due to its ancient history and cultural influence. Also its antiquity, since Armenian is one of the oldest living languages in the world, with a history dating back over 1,500 years. I'll concentrate on the phonetic aspect, which concerns pronunciation and how this affects singing.

First of all, Armenian has complex phonetics with specific sounds that may require some practice for non-native singers like myself. Armenian belongs to the Indo-European branch of languages and is an isolated branch within this linguistic family. It is not part of any of the major Indo-European language groups, such as Romanic, Germanic or Slavic. In this way, it's unlike any other language I've ever worked with. But it didn't feel as far removed from French as Russian, with its hard, wet consonants (velarized and palatal sounds), or Arabic, with its many guttural sounds.

However, the task was a complex one, given that there are as many Armenian pronunciations as there are regions. This is due to the fact that Armenian has been in contact with other languages over the centuries, notably Ancient Greek, Persian, Turkish and Russian. I set to work specifically on the pronunciation, which we call 'Western' for some pieces and 'Eastern' for others. All this was under the patronage of David Haroutunian, who guided me with great benevolence.

You describe Komitas as 'the voice of the land of Armenia', which I don’t think many people would argue with – but who was he as a person, and how did he forge his musical style?

David Haroutunian: Komitas was born in the Ottoman Empire and learned the Armenian language quite late. He studied in Echmiadzin, was a reverend father of the Armenian Apostolic Church and gave himself the following lifetime mission: 'I shall attain my main objective, bringing out of the ruins of our native land the treasures of our folk music.'

In 1915 he escaped from the Armenian Genocide – massacres committed by the Ottoman Empire. He lost his mind during the pogroms and spent 20 last years of his life at the Villejuif Psychiatric Hospital in France.

That story of Debussy effusively showing his admiration for Komitas at a concert shows how much of an impression he made at the time – is there any evidence for his music having influenced the composers of Debussy’s generation?

David Haroutunian: All Komitas's music was inspired by Armenian folk music; he confessed that peasants have a natural gift to create melodies and that he was only the transmitter. Mandelstam said that Dante was God’s copyist; in the same way Komitas would have been the transcriber of ancient Armenian music coming from thousands of years back, and passing via another genius who was Gregor of Narek.

Debussy was very much impressed by Antuni (Homeless), saying that even if Komitas had only written this one piece, that was enough to be considered a genius. Debussy’s style was already very established when he met Komitas for the first time, but we can imagine that the great admiration that he showed towards Komitas was also a source of inspiration for his inquiring spirit.

What’s the connection with Garbis Aprikian – how did the musical relationship with him come about?

Eva Zaïcik: In this album, Mayrig  ('little Mama' in Armenian), we decided to create a dialogue between the compositions of Garbis Aprikian and Komitas centring around the maternal figure - through songs of love, melancholy lullabies, exile, nostalgia for the country or songs of rejoicing. Two other pieces, the famous Berceuse by Parsegh Ganatchian and the Ode à la lune by Hakob Aghabab, complete the recording.

Aprikian was born in 1926. Composer, conductor and choirmaster, he directed the Sipan-Komitas choir [fr] for many years. A pupil of Messiaen and heir to Komitas, his vocal and instrumental work bears the dual influence of Eastern and Western music, and blossoms into an epic breath. In 2009, he received the Movsès Khorenatsi Medal (the highest distinction awarded by the Armenian state for outstanding achievements in the fields of Armenian art and culture) and was named Commandeur des Arts et des Lettres in 2021.

As for Father Komitas, David spoke very well of him above. He is constantly attuned to the song of the land of Armenia and the voice of his people, who have themselves become a symbol of their suffering. Both Father Komitas and Garbis Aprikian have devoted their lives to Armenian music; while the former helped to preserve and bring to light the treasures of popular and religious music, the latter has contributed to making it known and diffusing it to a wide audience. Both have contributed to this prestigious edifice with their own compositions rooted in a rich tradition and open to as yet unexplored territories.