Cool Spring For My Thirsty Heart by Annick Shahnazarian

Thanks to the beauty and power of her voice, she is requested to sing and animate parties (wedding ceremonies, pilgrimage, popular and religious parties) at homes, in halls, fields, mountains sites, in the village… Alone or in the company of others, on every occasion where emotions rebound and make the human soul vibrate, she sings. She already has a vast repertoire transmitted to her family and her ancestor, migrated from Moush (Western Armenian town, emptied from its inhabitants in 1915, following the Genocide, today in Turkey).

Her studies:

She does her primary and secondary studies in her area. The need to sing and the educational system in place lead her to frequent the National Conservatory of Yerevan to work on her voice. Armenia is then under the Soviet regime with institutional structures taken from the West, far from traditional schemes of musical conveying. There, she studies classical occidental music, with three years of preparation and six years of proficiency courses.

Around that time, a Traditional Music Centre of studies is created right within the conservatory. It is a place of meetings, reflection and experiences on the roots of Armenian culture. Projects of sound archiving are in the process at time.

Besides her classical vocal studies, Annick gets in contact with these researchers and devotees of traditional music. Through spending time with these musicians, she improves for years, having access to a wide, scrupulously chosen, repertoire, in the melodic as well as poetic field.

Back to the land…

At the end of her studies, Annick drops her singing carrier: her country and her roots are calling her. She leaves the capital, goes back to the village, gets married, builds a family and finds harmony with the environment she had left. A little later, three major events shake Armenia: the downfall of the Soviet regime, war in the Caucasus and the December 7th 1989 earthquake. The epicentre of the seism is located 40 kilometres from her place. Her village is destroyed and 80% of the population is annihilated. The country is mourning. A heavy silence weights on all sides: survivors keep silent, so does Annick. With her husband and daughter, she starts a new life from scratch, living in a cabin provided by humanitarian help. She cultivates the soil, take care of animals, leading a rather primitive life. All these events make her lose her sense of life and her vital energy. But, after she gives birth to second child, she starts singing again. The wheel of life gets back in motion. She has just gone through a difficult period, just like the History of the Armenian people.

Characteristics features:

Popular songs, though which Annick Shahnazarian expresses herself, are telling of lost souls, misled by human desires and sufferings. She interprets them with maturity that rough experiences have given her. These songs are intimately tied with her existence. She is in perfect harmony with the nature and the very essence of these songs. Her voice is quiet, calm and moving. She has succeeded in transforming one whole people's troubled inner life into an experience of dazzling clarity.

Despite the influence of her classical musical education on her vocal technique, her interpretation preserves the spiritual vitality of traditional tunes. Annick Shahnazarian incarnates with her voice alone a whole tradition. Her singing style sounds simple. Ornaments are not apparent but are at one with the musical structure. On the tempo and rhythm field, she stands as a narrator: we are captivated and taken by the song as a story. Musical phrases are flowing like successive waves, renewing themselves to their ending in streams of energy and emotions.

While listening to these tunes, we feel overcome with an omnipresent serenity.

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