“A New Authoritative Publication”

Abstract

Musicologist, PhD in Arts, Docent of YSC Anahit Hovhannes Baghdasaryan. - “A New Authoritative Publication”. By a decision of the Academic Council of Yerevan Komitas State Conservatory a new book by PhD in Arts History, Docent Nune Atanasyan has been published. The book is entitled Stepan Demurian. The Origins of Armenian Music Folkloristics (Yerevan, 2020, Amrots Group, 152 pages, annotations in Russian and English). Nune Atanasyan is one of the most active, broadly educated, and productive musicologists of this day. She presents papers at conferences, publishes articles in scientific periodicals on Armenian folk and spiritual music, on Armenian folklore classics, etc. She is the author of the Manual on Armenian Sacred Music (Yerevan, 2017), the first and only textbook on history and theory in this field, which has already been successfully included in the curricula of various departments of the Yerevan Conservatory. She is also the author of the Textbook for Armenian Sacred Music for music schools (Yerevan, 2020). Atanasyan has compiled and edited collections of recordings of Armenian traditional music (folk, and ashugh). She has also organized and directed annual festivals of national song and dance in Yerevan. She teaches various music theory disciplines at the Yerevan Conservatory. The presented monograph is dedicated to the life and versatile activities of Stepan Demuryan (1872-1934),the famous Armenian folklore musician, teacher, choirmaster, singer, composer, musical and social figure, who has been undeservedly neglected for a long time. The book is the result of the author's diligent and consistent work for many years. For the first time, Demuryan's voluminous and diverse personal archive (kept at the Charents Museum of Literature and Arts) was thoroughly studied. Demuryan's previously unpublished collection "Armenian Folk Songs and Melodies" (Yerevan, 2013) was published based on archival materials, thus enriching the classical collection. The monograph consists of a Foreword and four chapters, different in content while still inextricably linked. Thus, the chapters respectively, describe the following: Chapter I - The Beginnings and the First Steps of Armenian Music Folkloristics. The chapter describes the atmosphere of Armenian reality in the 19th and the early 20th centuries filled with ideas of national self- consciousness, and its rapid development, which greatly contributed to the creative growth of Demuryan the musician. Chapter II, Stepan Demuryan's Creative Profile, describes Demuryan's life and his manifold musical activities. Chapter III, The Ethnographic Heritage of Stepan Demuryan, is devoted to the main field of Demuryan's work. Chapter IV, Armenian Folk Songs and Melodies, resents an analysis of the recorded samples from Demurian's collection by region and chronology, structural characteristics of the recently discovered samples, etc. The scholarly apparatus of the monograph deserves special attention with its precise references to the sources, detailed additions and explanations to the main material provided in footnotes to the text, a voluminous list of used multi-genre literature (unpublished archival materials, musical literature, ethnographic records, monographs, articles, periodicals, dictionaries). The main text of the monograph is supplemented by Appendices, consisting of samples of Armenian folk songs (peasant and urban) notated by Demuryan, as well as photographs from the musician's personal archive. The high printing quality of the monograph, its attractive design (by V. Poghosyan) and the presentable, almost typo-free text (by L. Harutyunyan, editor) also deserve attention and praise. The monograph was published by the well-known Yerevan Amrots Group publishing house, awarded Gegharvest republican prize, along with other international prizes (the founder and long-time director of the publishing house V. Khachatryan).Nune Atanasyan's monograph is a significant contribution to Armenian musicology. At the same time, it is an expression of deep respect and appreciation for Stepan Demuryan - musician, personality, citizen, and patriot, for his activities and memory.