Aram Khachaturian

From HitStory, the pop encyclopedia of School of Rock · Artist

Aram Khachaturian (6 June 1903 to 1 May 1978) was a Soviet-Armenian composer and conductor. He was born in Tiflis, present-day Tbilisi, into an Armenian family and grew up among Armenian, Azerbaijani and Georgian folk music. In 1921 he moved to Moscow. Without any earlier musical training he enrolled at the Gnessin Institute, and later he studied at the Moscow Conservatory with Nikolai Myaskovsky. His first major work, the piano concerto of 1936, made his name known inside and outside the Soviet Union. Among the works that followed were a violin concerto and ballets.

Music and breakthrough

Khachaturian wrote the first Armenian ballet music, symphony, concerto and film music. He followed the Russian tradition, but took broad influences into it from the folk music of Armenia, the Caucasus, the Middle East and Eastern Europe. From the late 1930s he held high posts in the Union of Soviet Composers, although in 1948 he was publicly denounced as a formalist together with Prokofiev and Shostakovich, a decision that was reversed that same year. After 1950 he taught at the Gnessin Institute and the conservatory.

Influence

In Armenia he is regarded as a national hero and as the best-known Armenian composer of the twentieth century. His rhythmic, colourful orchestral music was also used outside the concert hall and has influenced a great deal of contemporary music.

Listening