The Days of Azerbaijani Music in Ukraine became an important cultural event in Kyiv. It was organized by the Ministry of Culture, the National Union of Composers of Ukraine, Embassy of Azerbaijan to Ukraine, the Union of Azerbaijan Composers, Muslim Magomayev Cultural Center, All-Ukrainian NGO “United Diaspora of Azerbaijanis in Ukraine.” It was a rather short-termed event, but it had powerful artistic content, unprecedented public interest, and high degree of emotions. The company of guests headed by the famous composer, head of the Union of Azerbaijan composers, People’s Artist, professor Franghiz Ali-Zadeh managed to create a real miracle: Kyiv music community ended up under the magic influence of the Azerbaijani mugam.
Mugam is a life philosophy, embodied in a special improvisational form of music. In fact, mugam is the basis of the Azerbaijani folk music. Today, Azerbaijani mugam and the art of Azerbaijani ashiks are on the UNESCO Intangible Cultural Heritage list. There are seven main frets of mugam. In his book The Basis of Folk Music in Azerbaijan, the classic of Azerbaijani music Uzeyir Hajibeyov described the variety of moods that are contained by mugams in a following way: rast invokes feelings of cheerfulness and courage, shur brings a listener into a happy, lyric state, segyakh evokes the feeling of love, shushter brings deep melancholy, chargyakh brings excitement and elation, sadness comes with bayati-shiraz, and deep bitterness and sorrow – with khumayun. One can only imagine what storm of wild emotions, fervent rhythms, unusual, sometimes exotic sounds of Azerbaijani folk instruments (guests brought both national instruments and brilliant tar, qanun, and kemenche players) awaited the audience in Kyiv. According to Ali-Zadeh, the exceptionally tuned program of the two concerts (chamber and symphony) was aimed at the “creation of the most panoramic vision of Azerbaijani music for Kyivites.” Works by composers of various generations were played: Asaf Zeynally, Kara Karayev, Fikret Amirov (founder of the symphonic mugam). Older generation was represented by Franghiz Ali-Zadeh, Javanshir Guliyev, and younger – by Vasif Allahverdiyev, Jeyhun Allahverdiyev, Aliya Mamedova, and others. And finally, mugam compositions during the chamber music concert, which took place in the Concert Hall of the National Sports Complex of Ukraine, aroused genuine interest and even excitement among the audience. True virtuosos, musicians who demonstrated phenomenal technique of playing kemenche (Aida Rafiyeva), tar (Sahib Pashazade), qanun (Chinara Mutallibova), and baglama (Firudin Allahverdiyev), created an absolutely miraculous acoustic space, which was very unusual for our hearing. The original mugam compositions, so different from the traditional European music, played during the fest, captured the attention and thoughts of professional Ukrainian composers and music experts so much, that they all were looking forward to the roundtable “Ukrainian-Azerbaijani music connections: modern dimension.” It became a sort of extended cadence in debates on mugam.
Head of the Azerbaijani delegation Ali-Zadeh is a charismatic figure. She is an outstanding contemporary composer, pianist, pedagogue, conductor, director. She was named the UNESCO Artist for Peace and she is a member of the GEVA Association for Copyright Protection, which only accepts composers, whose works are performed no less than 100 times per year during 3 years. Ali-Zadeh’s erudition won everyone’s favor, she revealed the panoramic essence of the musical and poetic phenomenon of mugam, secrets of the demand for it in the modern world. The artist shared some of the details of her vision of the contemporary musical processes with The Day.
Your knowledge of mugam history and detailed interpretation of all the frets and kinds of this unique genre is simply staggering. Perhaps, you were an exemplary student of a musical university…
“I have graduated from the Baku Conservatory (Composition Department) as a theorist as well. Of course, self-education means a lot. The continuum in which we act and communicate has great impact on the identity formation too. For example, I always try to find interesting people. When I created Dervish at the request of the outstanding contemporary cellist Yo-Yo Ma for his global art project The Silk Road, I started wondering if there still are dervishes in Azerbaijan. And I got to know such person. Then I thought: we live in a city and think that the whole Azerbaijan is limited to this one city. Extremely interesting people live side by side with us, they can be philosophers, wise men, and carriers of the vast amount of the world knowledge. And when you unexpectedly look into a soul of such person, you are awed by the internal radiance that comes from them, you find incredible depths and discover new truths.”
Oriental, national artistic values and European civilization cultural heritage organically intertwine in your music. Critics even call you a “mediator between East and West.” How do you manage to reach this state of equilibrium between the two cultural poles, and in what way do these contrasting lines get along in your art?
“My Zodiac sign is Gemini, which is initially characterized by a struggle of two principles: hot heart and cold mind, emotional intemperance and sober judgment. Perhaps, there is something truthful about it – I mean the birth date…”
Have you always been internally inclined to speak of yourself as of an Azerbaijani composer in the first place? Most of your works declare their nationality even by their names: Mugam Sayagi, opera Intizar, Absheron Quintet, etc.
“You know, it happened in different ways over the years. I think that nihilism is characteristic of all young people, they tend to deny the existing values, they differ by their explicit categoricalness, desire for something unusual and heterogeneous. It is like some internal antithesis lives inside of you all the time. By the way, this feature of denial played a very positive role in my biography: in the 1960s, I started actively studying dodecaphonic music, I played all of Schoenberg’s and Boulez’s works by myself, and as a result, I received a very strong European musical base.”
You position yourself as a woman of the sixties…
“Yes, it was a period of incredible desire to learn about new worlds and ways in the art, which was distinguished by the constant state of restlessness, staying in the search mode. However, as you grow up, it becomes obvious that becoming an average European composer without your own ‘face’ is not enough. I happen to be a part of a jury at world composer contests often. Sometimes you listen to one musician from Kosovo, another – from Germany, the third one – from Japan, and you see no difference between their music! And you want so much for something to get deep into your soul. Music is emotional art in the first place. Obviously, it is impossible to become a professional composer without intellect and the knowledge of modern techniques. But there are certain laws of physical perception that our hearing, vision, etc. are subject to. And they should not be ignored.”
There was a time when you remarked with bitterness that you were not spoiled with the attention of Azerbaijani performers…
“This year, I was awarded with two honorary prizes in Azerbaijan: ‘Patriot Woman of the Year’ and ‘Golden Feather.’ In 2007, I was chosen to be a chairman of the Union of Azerbaijan Composers, and when my colleagues saw how many important events I organized to bring the national music onto the international scene (in particular, I am the artistic director of two international festivals: ‘The World of Mugam’ and ‘The Silk Road’), their attitude shifted to more positive. However, I was still not invited to teach at the Baku Conservatory, despite the fact that I teach in Germany, the United States, arrange open lessons and master classes, which are attended by interested people from many countries, who are always grateful for what I can tell them.”
The music you brought to Kyiv this time was charged with solemn elation, colorful festivity for the most part, even though sometimes mugams can be sad and even tragic. The history of Azerbaijan has many dramatic pages, and art events are often dedicated to them. For example, the recent festival in Baku, which was dedicated to the anniversary of the Khojaly Genocide. Are such events noticed by the younger generation of Azerbaijani composers? Do they care about the events of their own history?
“Certainly, any tragic event has to be given a place inside one’s heart, it must be comprehended by an artist, and this, or course, requires maturity, both in spirit and age.”
