Interview with Farhad Poupel (II)

HT: Please tell us more about this piece and your background with this orchestra.
FP
: My acquaintance with the eminent American pianist, Jeffrey Biegel, was made through my piano work, Fantasia on One Note.
Fantasia on One Note was my first professional work for piano, which had its world premiere by the great pianist Peter Jablonski in Sweden, and it has been performed by various pianists in the UK, Germany, France, and the Czech Republic. The recording of this work has also been broadcast on the Dutch public radio, NPR Radio 4.
Since 1999, the prominent American pianist and professor at the Brooklyn Conservatory, Jeffrey Biegel, after working with Ellen Taaffe Zwilich, the first Pulitzer Prize-winning female composer, began to collaborate with the most prominent American composers on new commissions for solo and orchestra performances. This includes Kenneth Fuch, Richard Danielpour and… I was the first non-American composer that worked with him. After some talk, we came to the story of Bijan and Manijeh, and after my explanation about the Shahnameh, he suggested the use of the Persian choir. I myself did not expect to be able to use Ferdowsi’s poems in Farsi, so I eagerly accepted.
The Windows Symphony Orchestra in Canada was the first professional orchestra to perform my work, Zayandeh Rud for string orchestra in April 2019 (This work could have had its world premiere by Deutsche Radio Philharmonie; however, the concert was cancelled unfortunately). The orchestra performed Zayndeh Rud in seven concerts conducted by Daniel Wiley (Daniel Wiley is now the assistant conductor of the Cincinnati Orchestra and will soon be performing my Childhood Memories under his direction with the Cincinnati Youth Orchestra), and since then, I’m having a close relationship with this orchestra.
HT: Will this piece be performed by other orchestras as well?
FP
: Yes, it will be performed with Key Chorale in February 2024 in Florida. This work could have been performed with the Cincinnati Youth Orchestra, which unfortunately was cancelled due to planning for the choir, and the Childhood Memories will be performed instead. Probably, other orchestras will perform The Legend Bijan and Manijeh in the future, which will be announced.
HT: The complete audio file or the video of this concert has not been released yet; is there any reasons behind this
?
FP: Unfortunately, we have not yet been able to release the recording of the premiere footage due to specific laws in Canada and Ontario regarding the release of the recording. But the Florida performance of this work will be released.
HT: Have you been happy with this commission and will you continue working with them?
FP: Windows Symphony Orchestra is a professional and flexible orchestra (the premiere was done well with only two rehearsals), especially due to its conductor and music director, Robert Franz, who has previously worked with the Iranian composer, Behzad Ranjbaran.
HT: You are one of Dr. Mohammad Saeed Sharifian’s most successful pupils; do you still find his influence in your work
?
FP: You are very kind. He influenced me enormously, from composing to understanding music and even how to look at life.
A very significant point was his freedom in education so that each of his students has a different philosophy and style from each other. I had the honour of being his student for five and a half years and if I were born again, I would definitely repeat the same choice.

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Five Major Myths About Mozart’s Life

Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, the renowned Austrian composer, is undoubtedly one of the greatest geniuses in the history of classical music. However, his life is surrounded by numerous myths and legends, some of which are not based on facts. This article explores five of the most common misconceptions about Mozart’s life.

Bahma Rajabi Passed Away!

Bahman Rajabi, the renowned tonbak (Persian goblet drum) player and educator, passed away at his home at the age of 86 due to a heart condition. He was the founder of a distinctive school of tonbak playing, and his teaching methods have been widely used by instructors of the instrument for decades..

From Past Days…

History’s Impact on Evaluating a Work of Art

With this description, we have automatically included a criterion called “History”, Until we know the time of the creation of a work of art, we cannot judge whether it has been easy to create or not. Suppose that, in a historical study, we find a musical work that is similar in compositional techniques (including form, melody, context, and orchestration) to a minor work of the nineteenth century; however, our research proves that, this work dates back to 200 years prior to that date. Can we still consider this work insignificant? Definitely not! So this is where the first use of history-based judgment comes into play.

Rouhollah Khaleghi Artistic Center established in Washington DC

Golnoush Khaleghi (1941-2021), a Washington-based Persian musician and the daughter of the contemporary Persian (Iranian) composer and theoretician Rouhollah Khaleghi (1906-1965) founded a musical center called RKAC to keep the name and the work of her father alive.

A brief examination of Ardavan Kamkar’s Santour playing style

I still think of those fish in a crystal bowl for the Haft sin table and those disappointed old men who went out to sell blackfish.

Interview with Farhad Poupel (II)

Fantasia on One Note was my first professional work for piano, which had its world premiere by the great pianist Peter Jablonski in Sweden, and it has been performed by various pianists in the UK, Germany, France, and the Czech Republic. The recording of this work has also been broadcast on the Dutch public radio, NPR Radio 4.

Fereydoun Shahbazian, An Iranian Musical Icon Passed Away

Fereydoun Shahbazian, the renowned Iranian composer, passed away at the age of 82 due to respiratory illness in Tehran. His last significant activity was leading the National Orchestra before the appointment of Homayoun Rahimian.

Musical Sense or Technique?

One of the most popular terms used by Iranian instrumentalists is the existence or a lack of musical “sense”. Both musicians and fans of music consider having “sense” while playing music as an important principle to the extent that they use it vis-a-vis having technique.

Women Musicians in Large Iranian Orchestras

It is more than a century now that the sociologists consider the presence of women in different social domains as a benchmark for a society’s progress. They analyze the presence of women in society by the means of available statistics. Unfortunately, as with regard to the Iranian society, statistics related to women’s engagement, has not been available to the researchers, if they existed at all.

The First Saba Student Music Festival Concluded in Tehran

Preparations for Saba Student Music Festival started in the summer of 2016; the Student Music Festival will be held annually by the students of music at Arts University. The first part of the closing ceremony of the Festival was dedicated to the celebration of the life, work and strives by Maestro Hossein Dehlavi to upgrade the level of music as an academic discipline. The name of the award-winning students and ensembles were announced at the second part of the ceremony.

New Technique for Playing Classical Guitar (I)

Joint application of the two techniques of “Lip” and “Nose” could be effectively applied for hearing and playing far-away intervals, by the Classical Guitar. Before this, a Classical Guitar player had to waive playing intervals not possible with the left hand, and had to replace or eliminate some notes, making it possible to play such intervals; specifically the capability of the left hand of the musician, was also a factor in such a selection. These methods are hereby illustrated by photographs and a video-file, in order to provide optimum comprehension of applying these methods, invented by the author; specifically the “Lip” technique, which is considered to be a more significant technique, emphasized by the author.

Non-profit “Microtona” Project Released

Microtona is a sixty-eight-page Booklet with personal comments by the contributing microtonal artists. The booklet also includes a DVD which consists of 8 original video tracks and 9 original audio tracks. The project is an international one featuring unpublished pieces by composers from Iran, Japan, U.S., France, Austria, Germany and Belgium.