Perspectives Ensemble presents Dark Eyes/New Eyes: A Celebration of Armenian Music

Perspectives Ensemble, in cooperation with the Cathedral of St. John the Divine, presents Dark Eyes/New Eyes: A Celebration of Armenian Music on Sunday, March 22, 2020 at 7pm at the Cathedral of St. John the Divine, Chapel of St. James, 1047 Amsterdam Avenue at 112th Street. The performance will feature Zulal, a vocal trio composed of Teni Apelian, Anaïs Alexandra Tekerian, and Yeraz Markarian, and Perspectives Ensemble members, including flutist and Artistic Director Sato Moughalian, harpist Stacey Shames, and percussionist John Hadfield. Admission is free and running time is 70 minutes, no intermission.

Dark Eyes/New Eyes celebrates Armenian music in a program of village songs, as well as other traditional and composed pieces by historic and contemporary Armenian composers. The concert pays homage to the journeys of our families, ancestors, and departed ones. Six musicians offer lively and contemplative music, including sharagans (Armenian hymns), work songs and humorous songs, folk songs preserved by the great Armenian composer-musicologist Gomidas Vartabed in his own transcriptions as well as new arrangements, languidly beautiful melodies of 18th century troubadour/composer Sayat-Nova, music of Alan Hovhannes, and the beloved Lullaby from Aram Khatchaturian’s ballet Gayane–one of several new arrangements by Yerevan-based composer Artur Akshelyan. 
 
Featuring:
Zulal-Teni Apelian, Anaïs Alexandra Tekerian, Yeraz Markarian
Perspectives Ensemble members:
Stacey Shames, harp; Sato Moughalian, flute and Artistic Director;
John Hadfield, percussion

About the Artists
Flutist Sato Moughalian maintains a widely varied career as a chamber musician, solo and orchestral player, and is Artistic Director of Perspectives Ensemble, which she founded in 1993 at Columbia University. She serves as principal flute for American Modern Ensemble and Catapult Opera; was a twelve-year member of Quintet of the Americas; guest flutist with groups including the Imani Winds, American Ballet Theatre, Oratorio Society of NY, American Symphony Orchestra, and Orquestra Sinfonico do Estado São Paulo, Brazil, with whom she recorded Villa-Lobos’s Bachianas Brasileiras No. 6 and other major works of the composer.She has toured on five continents as a chamber musician, is an avid performer of new music, can be heard on more than 35 chamber music recordings, and was awarded the Catalan Ramon Llull Prize for Creative Arts in 2013. She has artistic directed 5 CDs with Perspectives Ensemble, most recently the critically-acclaimed Naxos recording, Manuel de Falla: El Amor Brujo (1915 version) and El Retablo de Maese Pedro. In 2019, after a decade of research and writing, Stanford University Press published Feast of Ashes: The Life and Art of David Ohannessian, her biography of her grandfather, who founded the art of Armenian Jerusalem ceramics in 1919 after surviving deportation from Ottoman Turkey during the WWI period of the Armenian Genocide. The book was longlisted for the PEN America Jacqueline Bograd Weld Biography Award and is a finalist for the Association of American Publishers’ PROSE Award in Biography & Autobiography. 

As soloist, chamber musician, and orchestral principal, harpist Stacey Shames has appeared throughout the United States, Europe, Canada, and the Far East. Recent concerto engagements include those with The Riverside Symphony at Lincoln Center, The Munich Chamber Orchestra, The New Jersey Symphony, The Saint Louis Symphony, and The National Chamber Orchestra. She won first prize in the American Harp Society National Competition, and a top prize in the International Harp Contest in Israel. Shames has held the solo chair with the Saint Louis Symphony, the Chamber Orchestra of Europe, The Mostly Mozart Festival Orchestra, and the Orpheus Chamber Orchestra, with whom she currently performs, tours, and records. She concertizes extensively with Aureole, her trio of flute, viola and harp, and the group has released ten recordings, championing new works written for the combination. Shames has performed on the soundtracks to over 100 films, and appears on-camera in many films, as well as on the acclaimed series The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel.

In Armenian, Zulal means “clear water.” Zulal, the a cappella performance and recording trio-composed of Teni Apelian, Yeraz Markarian, and Anaïs Tekerian-has brought the beauty of Armenian folk music to stages ranging from Carnegie Hall and the Kennedy Center to Yerevan’s Komitas Chamber Music House. The trio’s original arrangements pay tribute to Armenia’s folk melodies, while introducing a sophisticated lyricism and new energy. The group takes Armenia’s village folk melodies and weaves intricate arrangements that pay tribute to the rural roots of the music while introducing a sophisticated lyricism and energy. The trio has performed in such esteemed venues as the Getty Museum, Carnegie Hall’s Weill Recital Hall, New York’s Symphony Space and the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts along with performances for Cirque du Soleil, the Near East Foundation and the Silk Road Project. Visit zulal.org for music, videos, future performances, and more.
As a percussionist, drummer, and composer, John Hadfield’s dedication to music has taken him from his native Missouri to concert halls and clubs across the world. He has released two albums of his own compositions-The Eye of Gordon and Displaced-and composed for various ensembles, dance performers, as well as feature-length documentary After Spring, which was selected for the Tribeca Film Festival. John’s ability to cross genres has allowed him to appear with a broad range of artists such as Kinan Azmeh’s City Band, Nguyen Le’s STREAMS Quartet, the Saturday Night Live Band on NBC, the Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra and the Silk Road Ensemble. He has collaborated on more than 100 recordings as a guest artist, including the Grammy® award winner Yo-Yo Ma and Friends, Songs of Joy and Peace and the Grammy-nominated Fun Home. Most recently, he can be heard playing percussion on the movie soundtracks of Joker and Gemini Man. Hadfield’s work has received significant critical acclaim. Time Out New York noted, “John Hadfield’s percussion is so impeccable,” and in 2016, Modern Drummer stated, “Hadfield delivers a fluid groove, strong yet never intrusive, punctuated by adroitly chosen accents. His skillful sound-weaving choices create the illusion of a seamless multi-percussion section.” Hadfield currently serves on the Jazz faculty of New York University, where he teaches drum set and directs the World Percussion Ensemble.
About Perspectives Ensemble 
Perspectives Ensemble was founded by its Artistic Director Sato Moughalian in 1993 as the resident ensemble for the series Perspectives in Music and Art at Columbia University. The ensemble has presented thematic concerts as well as programs on subjects that bridge the visual, musical, and literary arts, consistently receiving the highest critical accolades, among them Familiar Strangers: Gypsy Musical Heritage; The 19th & 20th Century Melodrama (featuring the NY premiere of Aaron Kernis’ Goblin Market); Homage to Catalonia: Music of Xavier Montsalvatge, Roberto Gerhard, Benet Casablancas; Charles Tomlinson Griffes – An American Original; and Music of the Mountains–Aaron Copland’s Appalachian Spring and the Traditional Music that Inspired It. Praise from The New York Times includes “first-rate performances by accomplished musicians,” “a superb recital by the Perspectives Ensemble,” and “rhythms were remarkably precise, supple and subtle.” Under Moughalian’s leadership, the ensemble creates musical events and writings that explore and contextualize the works of composers and visual artists. Its presentations, recordings, and publications-which can be heard on all major music platforms, as well as in live performances captured on YouTube-offer interpretations and viewpoints informed by the cultural and historical influences prevailing upon artists, and often bridge and integrate the musical, visual, and literary arts. Perspectives Ensemble is a 501(c)3 tax-exempt organization. www.perspectivesensemble.com

Perspectives Ensemble collaborates with leading artists and musicians in concerts and recordings that feature the works of living composers and historic figures, shedding new light on their work through explorations of their music in the context of their time and place. The group holds an Artist-in-Residence position at the Foundation for Iberian Music at the CUNY Graduate Center, where they perform Spanish and Catalan music of the Modernist movement, world premieres of music by Casablancas, Vadillo, Artero, Sotelo, & Erkoreka, as well as thematic programs including Suriñach and the Creation of Modern Dance in New York and Homage to Catalonia. The New York Times called the ensemble’s performance of El Amor Brujo “stunning. Perspectives Ensemble worked [without a conductor], yet gave a performance that was remarkably polished, fastidiously balanced and full of electricity.”

Perspectives Ensemble has performed in Stern Auditorium of Carnegie Hall, the 92nd Street Y, Lincoln Center, Columbia and New York Universities, the Rubin Museum, Ethical Culture Society, the Morgan Library, and has recorded for Sony Classics, Newport Classics, Innova, American Modern Recordings, Naxos and New World Records, among others. It was a resident ensemble for the Young People’s Chorus of NY’s Transient Glory commissioning program, has served as a resident ensemble for the Miller Theatre’s groundbreaking Pocket Concerto Project, and has performed in the Composer Portraits and Bach series there.

Recordings include Sonnets to Orpheus by Richard Danielpour (Sony), Recollections by Karl Husa (New World), and Charles Tomlinson Griffes: Goddess of the Moon (Newport), of which The New York Times wrote: “The performances by the Perspectives Ensemble, an outstanding aggregation based in New York, are first-rate, with particularly fine playing by the flutist Sato Moughalian.” Perspectives Ensemble has released two recordings with Naxos: chamber ensemble works of Xavier Montsalvatge with soloists Timothy Fain, violin, Sasha Cooke, mezzo, Sato Moughalian, flute, and Blair McMillen, piano; and in 2019, music of Manuel de Falla, featuring flamenco cantaora, Esperanza Fernandez.

About The Cathedral
The Cathedral of St. John the Divine is the Cathedral of the Episcopal Diocese of New York. It is chartered as a house of prayer for all people and a unifying center of intellectual light and leadership.  People from many faiths and communities worship together in services held more than 30 times a week; the soup kitchen serves roughly 25,000 meals annually; social service outreach has an increasingly varied roster of programs; the distinguished Cathedral School prepares young students to be future leaders; Advancing the Community of Tomorrow (ACT), the renowned preschool, after-school and summer program, offers diverse educational and nurturing experiences; the outstanding Textile Conservation Lab preserves world treasures; concerts, exhibitions, performances and civic gatherings allow conversation, celebration, reflection and remembrance-such is the joyfully busy life of this beloved and venerated Cathedral.

This concert is generously supported by the Jarvis and Constance Doctorow Family Foundation in commemoration of the life of Danièle Doctorow. The Ensemble also honors the memories of our dear friends Hester Diamond, Winifred J Harris, and Si Newhouse. Additional support is provided by the Hegardt Foundation, the Si Newhouse Foundation, and many generous individual supporters.