new flower, nor tsaghik
Saxophone players are rare in this world; female sax players doubly so. I had been listening to Ada Rovatti the night before; I love her hard bop sound, her song Airbop. I am sure there must be a female, Armenian sax player somewhere as well, holding court in a jazz club in Beirut or London; I have yet to find her. Who I did find is, though, is Liana Papyan, a Yerevan-based dudukaharoohi, or duduk player. The video is very sincere, which I appreciate. What struck me the most, though, is her sound. So much of the duduk's droning music is played as a lament, which makes perfect sense, since the the horn can summon up pure grief easily (when I first heard the duduk, in Gyumri, I thought of rocks crying in the mountains). But that is not the only direction a person can take the duduk and deep down I have always been hoping to find someone who'll do with the duduk what Dizzy Gillespie did with the trumpet; take it in directions no one else has tried. I won't say because of this one video Papyan is the heir apparent to Gillespie but the burden of potential is there. So, if one day you are able to read this, Liana, I think you can do it; I want to see a bebop duduk player.
No sleep. New flower, nor tsaghik, has sprung.
No roots, yet. Perhaps memory will creep
back. A new flower, nor tsaghik, has flung
out her hennaed song far from where her deep
roots were laid, were hennaed. That is the song
I want you to hear. Do not cheer, do not
think that this small song can forget its long
past. No cause for applause. Who has forgot
to wake and sing? Who has forgot that small
song they were born under, that will withhold
nothing? No pause. Stay awake. Wooden flute,
a new flower, nor tsaghik. Now recall
the notes they taught you; recall just how old
they are; how far you are from the first root.