To be fair, not all Gurdjieff’s music was from Gomidas. Actually a number of them were reconstructed from memory and were Arabic and tribal songs from the Caucasus and general region of Greece and Armenia, from which Gurdjieff had come when he arrived in Russia. Here is a very good example of what Gurdjieff could not present to his dance students in France, but which we can construct today from what little remains of the cultures he encountered back in the late 19th and early 20th centuries.
Well, first off, a good deal of Gurdjieff’s Sacred Music wasn’t Gurdjieff’s music in the first place; it was copied laboriously from the musical notations compiled for many years by Gomidas Vertabed, the Father of Armenian Apostolic Music. Gomidas had collected tribal and folk music for quite some time, and used it as the basis for his Apostolic Mass and other works.
Gomidas lost his mind during the massacre of hundreds of thousands of Armenians at the time of World War I, 1914-1918. Gurdjieff visited him weekly at the sanitarium near Paris, until Gomidas’ death in the mid-thirties. The trunk containing most of the music was sold at auction when Gurdjieff’s dance academy at Fontainbleau collapsed in the midst of the depression.
Gurdjieff had resolved to single-handedly save Gomidas’ work, and used it liberally in his sacred dance movements and recitals, playing them often on a specially tuned harmonium. Gurdjieff managed to save a large portion of Gomidas music which would otherwise surely have been lost.
Gurdjieff first encountered Gomidas while serving as an altar boy at the same church where Madame Maria Tercemann was in charge of the linens. Her story is recorded elsewhere.
Here is some of what happened to the Gomidas music over the years:
My friend Lucine Zakarian recorded on the same label as I did in the 1960s, for my producer, Mustafa Siam at Arab Tunes, Cairo & Los Angeles.
Here is an incredible performance by Lucine of one of Gomidas’ best-known pieces, which was successfully and beautifully duplicated in piano by de Hartmann.
Here is an example of an easily recognizable Gomidas piece which can be quickly and without doubt — from even a non-musician — that it is, indeed, the same piece found in the Gurdjieff/Hartmann repertoire; the song is called “Groong“, which translates into “Crane”, which is held in high religious regard as it is in other religions as well. It is probably the most popular song in Armenia, bar none.
And here is a modern band in the same Gomidas Lineage, with some inventive additions and alterations, the very foundation of Folk Music!!!
http://youtu.be/nODFE_JP0WM
All these approaches to the Gomidas Work are good for me; how about you? Tell me your opinions and make comments on the videos on youtube — tell them Gorebagg sent you!!!