Singer, choir conductor, flautist, and teacher...
Komitas is the founder of Armenian national school of musical composition. He freed Armenian music from foreign influences and was the first to prove the Armenian nation have its own music. Being a profound expert of national music, Komitas created an original synthesis of Armenian monodic (one-voice) thinking and European polyphony that has endured to the present. He collected and wrote down thousands of folksongs, studied church and folk music considering them to be “siblings”. Komitas also made a research of Armenian khazes (symbols used in the old Armenian system of musical notation), and authored Patarag (Liturgy) of the Armenian Church.
Unfortunately, the prolific way of consciousness and creativity of the brilliant composer was short. Komitas shared the fate of his compatriots during the Genocide of 1915. He was appallingly shocked by the tragic events, which subsequently fatally affected his mental condition.
Today, in the year of the great classicist’s 135th anniversary, we can boldly say, “Komitas arrived from the depths of the centuries-old history of life and spiritual culture of the Armenian nation and soared up, his face towards its new developments.”