German premiere
Tickets 32 | 27 | 24 €
Jazztime members €3 discount
CHOIR Vienna Philharmonia Chorus
CONDUCTOR Davorin Mori GESANG Rita Movsesian
PIANO Karen Asatrian TROMPETE Daniel Nosig
DOUBLE BASS Uli Langthaler SCHLAGZEUG Emil Krištof
The approximately 80-minute mass for choir and jazz ensemble, Prayer Wheel, is an extraordinary work. One could well understand it in the tradition of Carla Bley's and Michael Mantler's Jazz Composer's Orchestra, Keith Tippett's Centipede or Kamasi Washington. The violinist, pianist and composer Karén Asatrián, born in Yerevan (Armenia) in 1972, leads into an atmosphere mixed with world music. Occident and Orient as well as Buddhist prayer wheels seem to be present. The choir and the jazz ensemble open up a rousingly modern, almost massive approach into the early Christian liturgy along the Kyrie, Gloria, Credo, Sanctus and Agnus Dei. Regarding his work »Prayer Wheel«, which - after its premiere in 2015 and as part of the Salzburg Festival a year later - was able to reach a larger and enthusiastic audience, Karén Asatrián writes: »I wrote the mass on the basis of the Christian liturgy in Latin language, but understand it as an open and interdenominational work whose message is: humanity, tolerance and respect are due to all people, regardless of their origin, skin color or religion may be.«
Our association serves as the platform for a project by Karen Asatrian. He and several other individuals from Carinthia support students at the Yerevan-based Tchaikovsky Music School, who are talented but indigent, by paying monthly grants to them. Karen Asatrian’s career as a pianist and composer once began at this Tchaikovsky Music School.
The scholarship holders:
Currently, there is a cooperation between the Tchaikovsky Music School in Yerevan, the Gustav Mahler Private University in Klagenfurt and our association “Spirit of Armenia”. Focus is laid on learning from each other, playing music together and expertise in teaching methodology.
Donations requested tot he following account at BAWAG-PSK-BANK:
IBAN: AT901400005010359041
SWIFT: BAWAATWW