"Il Purgatorio" di T. Mansuryan, con il contributo linguistico di G. Ghazaryan, sarà eseguito a Yerevan e al Ravenna Festival a settembre

The Chamber Choir of the Republic of Armenia has been invited to perform at the Ravenna Festival, where it will appear together with the “Luigi Cherubini” Youth Orchestra on the occasion of the 700th anniversary of the death of Dante Alighieri — an anniversary which, due to the regrettable ignorance of some Armenian media, is still mistakenly placed within the Italian Renaissance, rather than in the late Middle Ages.

Two major events will mark the collaboration between Armenia and the Ravenna Festival.
The first, in chronological order, will take place on 1 July 2021, when the Armenian Choir will perform at the Ravenna Festival under the direction of Maestro Riccardo Muti, with a programme devoted to great European composers such as Haydn, Mozart and Schubert.

On 4 July at the Yerevan Opera Theatre, and later in September in Italy, the opera Purgatorio by Tigran Mansurian will be performed.

Today, 24 June — the day on which the Armenian Church commemorates the Holy Translators and the Latin Church celebrates Saint John the Baptist — open rehearsals of the choir were held at the Komitas Chamber Music House in Yerevan, attended by journalists. In addition to Maestro Mansurian, conductors Robert Mlkeyan and Armen Arabian also took part.

Maestro Tigran Mansurian’s work Purgatorio, inspired by Dante’s Divine Comedy, will therefore receive its world premiere in Yerevan on 4 July, and will be presented in Italy in September.

Speaking about Dante, Mansurian recalled the universal significance of the Florentine poet’s work. He explained that the artistic direction of the Ravenna Festival selected three composers, each of whom was commissioned to set one canticle of the Divine Comedy to music. He added that the work was originally conceived for a large symphony orchestra, but that, due to the pandemic, the number of musicians had to be reduced. Nevertheless, Mansurian preserved the original version, hoping that it may one day be performed by a full orchestra, while also adapting it for a smaller ensemble.

The composer acknowledged the difficulties posed by the Italian text. He was assisted by Grigor Ghazaryan, Professor of Italian at Yerevan State University and a distinguished specialist in the language, who collaborated closely with him. As the Hrand Nazariantz Study Centre, we are particularly proud that Prof. Ghazaryan — a long-standing friend and collaborator of ours — was able to clarify for one of the greatest living composers not only the literal meaning of every word, but also the nuances, rhythm and expressive accents of Dante’s thought and poetry.

The organisational contribution of Minas Lourian proved to be fundamental.

Finally, Maestro Armen Arabian deemed it important to stress that the Italian side covered all the expenses related to the choir’s participation in the Festival.