Description

• Composer: Mary Kouyoumdjian (1983-)
• Instrumentation: Chamber Ensemble, Electronics
• Work: This Should Feel Like Home (2013)
• Binding:
• Pages: None

Description

Duration| 20′

for large ensemble, pre-recorded backing track, and live processing

Instrumentation: flute, alto flute, clarinet, bass clarinet, 2 percussion, piano, electric guitar, violin, viola, cello, contrabass

The idea of returning to my ancestral homeland had been engrained in me since childhood, so when I took my first trip to Armenia in 2012, my expectations were extraordinary. My homecoming experience was everything I was told it would be­ – emotional, strengthening, a feeling of immense connection to the beautiful land and the generously warm people. It was also sobering – harshly exposing the current economic state of Armenia’s citizens, the younger generation’s mass migration to escape extreme poverty and limited opportunity, political corruption, and the lingering remains of the Soviet influence on a nation that only recently gained independence. I gazed upon Mt. Ararat, an adopted symbol of the country, now behind Turkish borders, and felt the weight of the Armenian Genocide on this small country, now almost 100 years later.