The Naghash Ensemble of Armenia

The Nagash Ensemble – a meeting of East with West and Ancient with Contemporary. The Nagash Ensemble combines the spirituality of Armenian traditional music with new classical music and post minimalism with the energy of jazz or rock. Three vocalists together with Armenian instrumentalists on duduk, dhol and piano present new music by composer John Hodian composed on the texts of a medieval Armenian mystic and priest from the fifteenth century. The result has a depth of classical music, but the sound colours push it to an uncharted level. The concert will take place on January 27, 2020 in Suk Hall of the Rudolfinum.“The idea for The Naghash Ensemble came when I first heard Hasmik Baghdasaryan singing in Garni temple outside of Yerevan, Armenia. She sang mostly medieval Armenian spiritual music and the acoustics at Garni are astounding. The sound remained in my mind for days after and I was determined to write something that would use this sound in a new way. It took years to discover the right text. I spent many months researching in the libraries of Yerevan, New York and Berlin. When I finally came across a small fragment of the Armenian medieval poet Mkrtich Naghash, the words leapt off the page and into my soul and I knew I had found my text. Being in Yerevan at the time I was able to track down the rest of the remaining 16 poems. After much contemplation as to which texts to use, I resolved that I would set all of them.”