Ganja Chamber Orchestra Concert

In the midst of all the Novruz celebrations there was also a concert put on by the Ganja Chamber Orchestra. This musical group puts on concerts 4 or 5 times a year but every time they perform I'm either out of town or I find out too late. There is no published schedule that I know of and I have to rely on word of mouth for any information. The group performs in an old Albanian church that has been renovated with the help from some Norwegian organizations in town. My Norwegian friends are the ones who let me know about the concerts, which always seem to be last minute. This time Mike and I were finally in town for a show.

We weren't sure what to expect and we've learned not to get our hopes up with anything here. But we were pleasantly surprised to be proven wrong this time around. The concert was wonderful. We were so happy to listen to beautiful live music in such nice surroundings. They opened up with a piece by Mozart and went on to perform several other short pieces by Russian and Azeri composers as well as others. There were featured soloists and the hit of the evening was this amazing Tar player. He lit up the stage. What was so unique about the concert was that although I would categorize the music as 'Western classical' every piece, even the Mozart had a subtle Eastern rhythm which added an extra flair.

There was also a group of Norwegian tourists in town for the Easter holiday so the small hall was filled with Norwegians, and we didn't feel like we were in Azerbaijan- we lived here but we were outsiders and here were these tourists who looked kind of like us but spoke a different language, too. It was kind of surreal. Hopefully we'll get to another concert before our time's up.