Journery with Gomidas

In 2010, Anadolu Kültür has organized a series of activities in memory of Gomidas’s 140th birthday and 75th anniversaryof his death in the framework of 2010 İstanbul European Capital of Culture and İstanbulahay Projects. This occasion that brings Ayşe Tütüncü, Sıla Gerbağa, Melikcan Zaman and Çıplak Ayaklar Kumpanyası together has led to the performance titled “A Journey with Gomidas”

Gomidas (1869-1935), a well known Armenian musician, is the first ethnomusicologist who compiled and recorded countless local folkloric melodies while traveling zealously
through Istanbul and Anatolia. Gomidas left various long-lasting works to our collective
culture pursuing a versatile career as a composer, performer, trainer, and conductor.

“A Journey with Gomidas” is a show where music, dance and improvisation come
together and where performers flow with the feeling of the moment. The musicians
have made use of various methods, including approaching a song, settling in it, then
flying away from it; sometimes staying loyal to original pieces, sometimes extending
them with additional parts, and sometimes keeping those in the sacks and taking the
paths they offer. Themes like ‘feeling fragmented’, ‘uneasiness’, ‘journey’, ‘insanity’,
along with many photos, pictures, envelopes have been the starting points for
dancers.

To experience how melodies which are being improvised are turned into an
expression of movement in the bodies of the dancers, and to imagine how this
expression creates a visual association in the minds of the audience have been the
most exciting elements of this show.

We will be watching, listening to and sharing this experience all together.
Ayşe Tütüncü’s arrangements and piano meet Melikcan Zaman’s violin, Sıla
Gerbağa’s base flute, and Çıplak Ayaklar Kumpanyası’s movements and improvisations.