The word ‘Gorani’ represents both a place and an idea. Once a village in Karin, Western Armenia, Gorani also describes the agriculture system of the Daron region. The word evokes a longing for the homeland, as represented in the traditional dance Msho Gorani. The mission of Boston Hamazkayin’s Gorani project is to sustain and grow this longing through the land connections embedded in traditional Armenian dances, spanning from Western to Eastern Armenia.
Gorani’s dance lessons will pursue an ethnographic approach, meaning that the music and dances we will learn are not manufactured. The body of dances comes from the field work of Armenia’s past and contemporary ethnographers who have gathered music and dance material from the homeland’s communities. In understanding and learning the feel and context of the various dances, Gorani seeks to enrich its members with a cultural education that imparts a fundamental understanding of the regional styles and diversity of Armenian traditional dance.
These lessons will also include learning Armenian song-dances (պարերգեր), songs that correspond to specific dances in which both are engaged in simultaneously. By its very nature, the project will foster an even greater sense of community and purpose.
Alex Avaneszadeh, the project’s artistic director and instructor, has nearly a decade of experience in Armenian traditional dance. Over the years, he has immersed himself in the ethnographic dance scene in Armenia, particularly having spent significant time learning from the Karin Ethnographic Dance Ensemble under the late Gagik Ginosyan. Established in 2017, he co-founded the Lernazang Ensemble in Los Angeles (under the artistic direction of Natalie Kamajian and Armen Adamian), which is a music, song and dance collective that seeks to strengthen Armenian cultural heritage and ethnographic education in the diaspora. Alex has taught and given Armenian dance workshops to a multitude of Armenian schools, communities and diaspora organizations across the eastern and western United States.
Register by August 31 for lessons that will run from September 15, 2024 to June 15, 2025. Classes will be held at the Armenian Cultural and Educational Center, 47 Nichols Ave., Watertown, Massachusetts.
Guest Contributor
Latest posts by Guest Contributor (see all)
- Second Annual Kerr Family Lecture to be held at UCLA - September 13, 2024
- USC Institute of Armenian Studies to host multidisciplinary symposium on Artsakh - September 13, 2024
- Letter to the Editor | Mapping the sequence of the warfare against Armenians in the Middle East - September 10, 2024
Be the first to comment