User:Anistepanyan

David Yengibaryan

David Yengibaryan (March 9, 1976) is an Armenian composer and accordion player. He was the first to spread the popularity of that instrument in Hungary, where he started his flourishing career. His compositions incorporate elements from jazz, classical and avangarde music. A virtuoso accordionist, he frequently performs his own compositions as well as compositions of other outstanding composers and musicians.

Biography

David Yengibaryan was born in Yerevan, Armenia, in 1976, the third child of Armenian parents, Vazgen and Gayane Yengibaryan, his grandmother was one of the lucky survivors of the Great Armenian Genocide of the 1915, who migrated to Yerevan where she got married and formed her family. He inherited his love to music from his mother, who could not make her wish of becoming a pianist because of financial difficulties come true; she installed the love of music in him from early age. He was the youngest of the children and was brought up mostly with the help of his older siblings. His mother was a kindergarten tutor, furthermore she was the one responsible for the music class and since his childhood he grew up participating in many performances created by his mother.

Studies:

At a young age of 17 he went to Hungary for his studies. With the help and great support from his older brother (world famous sculptor Mamikon Yengibaryan) he got accepted in the University, but he dropped his studies because of the constant pressure from his lecturers to try and install in him the way of playing they themselves prefer. He refused to be controlled by others, so started his own way.

Early Career:

As a starter he traveled all over Europe and would perform outside in squares and elsewhere to collect money for living. He had tough days of scarcely collecting money, in order not to sleep under open sky. However, as they say a talent cannot go unnoticed for long, so one day his talent was also noticed and appreciated for what it is worth. His career grew with speed and grandness common only to those who possess the real virtue and talent. He set up his own band in 1999 called “Yengibaryan trio”. The band was made up of members from different countries from all over the world. He launched several disks, which were and still are being sold with great speed. Among them he also has one that was created and devoted to his mother. He put all his anguish and yearning to return to his hometown to his roots, where he has not been ever since his departure and his great longing to see his parents and his family, in his disk. The disk was called "Pandoukht" - the Armenian word for "exiled." He has also made film and theater music and played in several theater shows.

Travelling the World

He had performed in outstanding stages in front of thousands of people who would not stop clapping even when the concert was over, for the chance to listen to yet another composition. Yengibaryan has performed in Paris,London,Amsterdam, Vienna and Edinburgh. In January 2006 Yengiabryan toured Romania as a guest of Romanian jazz pianist of Armenian origin, Harry Tavitian. They performed for jazz lovers in Bucharest, Constanta and Cluj. Before that they have already had concerts together in Hungary. "I met David in 2005 in Hungary and I liked him very much. He is a very talented young man whose music is a mixture of Armenian folklore and Astor Piazzola. He is very good with improvisations and also has a talent for communication" Tavitian said.

Discography

=== 2012 - On Eastern way The sincerity of the playful moment ===

...Pannonian melancholy mixed with Armenian tradition, a deep utopia in Mediterranean joy, dwelling on Eastern European emigrants’ experience -journeys that are undertaken rather as a necessity then by free will, which have an uncertain duration and represent an ongoing search (maybe only latently) for what is left behind. The journey throughout ever different motives of music, undertaken by this energetic duo, represents a game which leads into the ambient of that what is inter-genre and above-possible, which moves outside of the stone gates of conventional, in the sphere of the trans-national and trans-traditional, without denying the difference between expressions and means of expressions. The collaboration of Kovač and Yengibarian is the point where jazz, contemporary chamber and classical music and the artistic derivatives of the music of the Balkans and Armenia meet. Improvisation is common to both these musicians: it is the language they share. Their freedom in playing music spontaneously is their way to overcome barriers set by music, geopolitics, tradition - their way to make these barriers soft, to provoke there passivity and to make them dance or play in the dynamics of variability, difference and in the form of freedom. The virtuoso dialog of the two musicians, the sincerity of the moment they create and which lasts, makes this music project different, nonconventional, innovative - makes it mirror still unexplored possibilities.

This spontaneous journey, which started as an unplanned meeting, visits the utopia of memories, memories of what was left behind, and brings them to life again, in the freshness of the present moment, with the richness that they acquired as time went by.

2010 - No compromise

I met Józsi Botos in Maria Street in the 8th discrict in 2003. He became a member of the band when the trio that I had founded sacked me. They kept drinking coffees, smoking, and blabbering during the rehearsals. This made me increasingly tense, and it showed. This was the point when I decided that there’s NO COMPROMISE.

I met Jancsi Egri in a jazz camp in Tatabánya in ‘97. We still keep in touch.

In 2003 I have founded the new trio with the two of them. Once I was sitting in a pub in Almássy Square and jotted down these names on a piece of paper: Karim Weemaels, Matt Darriau, Eddie Neumann, Tom Walsh, Komlan Agbekpenou, Adalberto el Bamba Dominguez.

This was when I envisaged the No Compromise band. I met and played with each of them on different occasions in different places. It was evidently different to play with them each.

E.g. I met Komlan in the L’archiduc Club in Brussels before I went on stage. Within 20 minutes we were playing together happily.

I met Eddie Neumann on the Orient Express tour in Italy. I can’t tell stories that would make one grasp and say „Wow, that’s fantastic!”, but they were each so impressive musical and human encounters that I have decided to bring these people together.

I have to tell that the bass guitarist is from Cuba. I met him in Brussels too. He only speaks Spanish, and I tried to communicate with him in French and English. But when we started playing music....

Most of the compositions on the album were performed in theatre. Later I have adapted them for this band. This is the result.

=== 2003 - David Yengibarian and Frank London - Pandoukht ===

=== 2002 - Balázs Elemér Group - Around the world ===

=== 2001 -  Trio Yengibarian -  Tango Passion ===