Aram Khachaturian
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Aram Khachaturian (Armenian: Արամ Խաչատրյան, Aram Xačaturyan; Russian: Арам Ильич Хачатурян, Aram Il'ič Hačaturjan) (June 6, 1903 – May 1, 1978) (born in Tiflis, Russian Empire) was a Soviet-Armenian composer whose works were often influenced by Armenian folk music.
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[edit] Life
Aram Ilyich Khachaturian was born in Tiflis, Imperial Russia (now Tbilisi, Georgia) to a poor Armenian family. In his youth, he was fascinated by the music he heard around him, but at first he did not study music or learn to read it. In 1921 he travelled to Moscow to join his brother, the stage director of the Second Moscow Art Theatre. Although he had almost no musical education, Khachaturian showed such great talent that he was admitted to the Gnessin Institute where he studied cello under Sergey Bychkov, and later Andrey Borysyak.[1][2] In 1925 Mikhail Gnessin started a composition class at the Gnessin Institute which Khachaturian joined.[3]
In 1929, he transferred to the Moscow Conservatory where he studied under Nikolai Myaskovsky (composition) and Sergei Vasilenko (orchestration), graduating in 1934. In the 1930s, he married the composer Nina Makarova, a fellow student from Myaskovsky’s class. In 1951, he became professor at the Gnessin State Musical and Pedagogical Institute (Moscow) and the Moscow Conservatory. He also held important posts at the Composers' Union, which would later severely denounce some of his works as being “formalist” music, along with those of Sergei Prokofiev and Dmitri Shostakovich. These three composers became the so called "titans" of Soviet music, enjoying worldwide reputation as some of the leading composers of the 20th century.
[edit] Music
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Khachaturian's works include concertos for violin, cello, and piano as well as concerto-rhapsodies for the same instruments. The piano concerto originally including an early part for the flexatone, and was his first work to gain him recognition in the West. Khachaturians's three symphonies are varied works, with the third containing parts for fifteen additional trumpets and organ. The composer's largest scaled works are the ballets Spartacus and Gayane, both of which contain Khachaturian's most well-known music, with Gayane featuring in its final act what is easily his most famous music, the "Sabre Dance".
He also wrote several solo piano works, including two albums of music for children (Opp. 62 and 100). Children's Album, Book 1, first published in 1947, contains a smooth and melodic Andantino originally composed in 1926; this piece is commonly known as Ivan Sings, which stems from eight of ten pieces originally being collected as Adventures of Ivan. Children's Album, Book 2, first published in 1964, includes a fugue composed in 1928, and a fast-paced programmatic piece entitled Two Funny Aunties Argued which is sometimes translated as Two Ladies Gossiping. He also composed some film music and incidental music for plays such as the 1941 production of Mikhail Lermontov’s Masquerade, the orchestal suite of which has become relatively popular.
The cinematic quality of his music for Spartacus was clearly seen when the Adagio of Spartacus and Phrygia was used as the theme for a popular BBC drama series, The Onedin Line, during the 1970s. Since then, it has become one of the most popular of all classical pieces for UK audiences. Joel Coen's The Hudsucker Proxy also prominently featured music from Spartacus and Gayane (the "Sabre Dance" included). Gayane's adagio was used in Stanley Kubrick's film 2001: A Space Odyssey among other films. He was also the composer for the state anthem of the Armenian Soviet Socialist Republic, whose tune is one of the five current choices to become the next state anthem of Armenia. The climax of Spartacus was also used in Ice Age: The Meltdown.
[edit] Khachaturian and communism
Aram Khachaturian was enthusiastic about communism. In 1920, when Armenia was declared a Soviet republic, Khachaturian joined a propaganda train touring Armenia, populated by Georgian-Armenian artists. The composer joined the Communist Party of the Soviet Union in 1943. His communist ideals, along with his Armenian nationalism, are apparent in his works, especially Gayane (which takes place on a collective farm) and the Second Symphony. It was the Symphonic Poem, later titled the Third Symphony, that earned Khachaturian the wrath of the Party. Ironically, Khachaturian wrote the work as a tribute to communism: “I wanted to write the kind of composition in which the public would feel my unwritten program without an announcement. I wanted this work to express the Soviet people’s joy and pride in their great and mighty country.” Perhaps because Khachaturian did not include a dedication or program notes, his intentions backfired. Andrei Zhdanov, secretary of the Communist Party’s Central Committee, delivered the so-called Zhdanov decree in 1948. The decree condemned Shostakovich, Prokofiev, Khachaturian, and other Soviet composers as “formalist” and “antipopular.” All three accused composers were forced to apologize publicly. The decree affected Khachaturian profoundly: “Those were tragic days for me... I was clouted on the head so unjustly. My repenting speech at the First Congress was insincere. I was crushed, destroyed. I seriously considered changing professions.”
He died in Moscow on May 1, 1978, just short of his 75th birthday. He was buried in Yerevan, Armenia, along with other distinguished Armenians who made Armenian art accessible for the whole world. In 1998, he was honored by appearing on Armenian paper money (50 dram).
[edit] Notable students
[edit] Works
[edit] Ballets
[edit] Orchestral
[edit] Vocal Orchestral
[edit] Concertante
[edit] Chamber
[edit] Instrumental
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[edit] Piano
[edit] Vocal[edit] Incidental music
[edit] Film scores
[edit] Brass Band
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[edit] See also
[edit] Further reading
- Robinson, Harlow (July 2007). "The Caucasian Connection: National Identity in the Ballets of Aram Khachaturian". Nationalities Papers 35 (3): 429–438. doi:.
[edit] References
- Ehrenburg, I., Khachaturian, A., and Pomerantsev, V. (1953). “Three Soviet artists on the present needs of Soviet art.” Soviet Studies, 5(4), 427–434.
- Shneerson, Grigory. (1959). Aram Khachaturyan (Xenia Danko, Trans.). Moscow: Foreign Languages Publishing House.
- Yuzefovich, V. (1985). Aram Khachaturyan (N. Kournokoff & V. Bobrov, Trans.). New York: Sphinx Press. ISBN 0823686582.
[edit] Notes
[edit] External links
- Virtual Museum of Aram Khachaturian - official site of the great Armenian composer
- NPR report including many audio examples of his Sabre Dance
- Aram Khachaturian 100th anniversary Web site
- Music composed by Khachaturian
- Aram Khachaturian's Gravesite
- Aram Khachaturian International Competition
