Endless Vision
Any recording featuring elderly Armenianduduk(an ancient, nine-holed shawm-oboe made of apricot wood) virtuoso Djivan Gasparyan is worth treasuring. But this time out, he was heard in particularly august company and under extraordinary circumstances. In September, 2003, the maestro, along with Grammy-nominated Iranian plucked string virtuoso Hossein Alizedeh and a hand-picked group of collaborators, gathered at Teheran's Niavaran Palace. The personnel included Alizedeh's own Hamavayan Ensemble, with Armen Ghazarian and Vazgen Markaryan ondudukand bassduduk, plus vocalists Afsaneh Rasaei, Hourshid Biabani, and Ali Samadpour. Alizedeh is a renowned composer and a foremost living exponent of thetarand other members of the Persian lute family. However, for this recital, he is heard on the six-stringedshurangiz, a relatively recent and notably resonant descendent of that clan. Gasparyan’s mature grace ignites Alizadeh's impetuosity as the two men negotiate the highest peaks of passion and inspiration; both are captured at their best and that’s saying a lot. But aside from the musical brilliance on hand, the event also constituted a social breakthrough, in which a female singer performed live with an otherwise male roster and appeared before a mixed-sex audience. --Christina Roden