By Adonia Agayan

YEREVAN, November 7 — “A concert with the participation of popular Norwegian conductor Terry Mickelson and trumpeter Tormod Asgard will be held in the capital of Armenia on November 9. The concert will be dedicated to the celebration of the 150th anniversary of humanist and missionary Fridtjof Nansen,” Armenian pianist Armen Babakhanyan said.

“I’m very glad we managed to invite two very popular Norwegian musicians to the Republic of Armenia,” he said.

The concert program will include works of both Armenian and Norwegian composers. The concert will start with Aram Khachaturian’s “Requiem” from ballet Spartacus and will be dedicated to the remembrance of terrorist Anders Breivik’s victims. (The terrorist act was committed on Utoeya this summer.)

The chairman of Nansen fund in the Republic of Armenia Felix Bakhchinyan said that the concert program was made considering the humanist’s music preferences about which he used to tell in letters addressed to his daughter.

Conductor Mickelson, in his turn, said that Armenian music comprises tragedy, which is closely related to the difficult fortune of the Armenian people and their strive for life. This is the conductor’s first visit to the Republic of Armenia.

The conductor also underlined the high level of professionalism musicians of the Armenian National Opera and Ballet Theater Orchestra.

Two things the conductor noted about Armenian people are their friendliness and their longing for changes.

Yerevan Report