The Music of Armenia Vol. 1: Sacred Choral Music

Armenian church music is the sacred chant and liturgical repertoire of the Armenian Apostolic Church, sung primarily in Classical Armenian (Grabar) and preserved through oral transmission, medieval neumatic (khaz) notation, and later staff transcriptions. It centers on the Divine Liturgy (Badarak), the daily offices, and a vast corpus of hymns known as sharakans. Musically, the tradition is fundamentally monophonic and modal, drawing on an eight-mode (oktoechos) system with characteristically stepwise melodies, narrow to moderate ambitus, and expressive melismas. While the historical tradition is a cappella and unaccompanied, modern choral harmonizations (notably by Makar Yekmalyan and Komitas Vardapet) are also widely performed, carefully respecting the modal flavor of the original chants. The sound is solemn, luminous, and contemplative, with an emphasis on textual clarity, rhetorical pacing, and devotional atmosphere.

Armenian music encompasses the sacred and secular traditions of the Armenian Highlands, with roots that trace back to Bronze Age ritual, epic song, and village dance. Over millennia it developed a distinct modal language, ornate vocal style, complex additive rhythms, and a celebrated palette of timbres—most famously the warm, breathy voice of the apricot-wood duduk. A continuous sacred tradition (Armenian chant, or sharakans) evolved alongside folk practices (work songs, laments, lullabies, and dance suites such as kochari and shalakho). Medieval Armenians created the khaz neumatic notation, one of the world’s earliest indigenous systems for recording melody. In the late 19th and early 20th centuries, Komitas Vardapet collected and reimagined village repertories, helping found a modern national school later broadened by composers like Aram Khachaturian, Alexander Arutiunian, and Arno Babajanian. Today, Armenian music ranges from liturgical choirs and duduk ensembles to jazz, rock, and electronic fusions. Diasporic and local scenes share a common aesthetic: modal melody with expressive ornamentation, heterophonic textures, and asymmetric meters that invite communal dance and lyrical introspection alike.