Tigran Hamasyan has shared the music video for “Leninagone,” a song from his album An Ancient Observer, which was release in March on Nonesuch Records. Hamasyan dedicates the song and video to the children who survived the devastating Armenian earthquake that hit his home town of Gyumri (its Soviet name was Leninakan) on December 7, 1988, twenty-nine years ago today, Nonesuch Records reports.
“I come from the generation of children whose lives were directly affected by this tragic event, followed by the collapse of the Soviet Union three years later,” says Hamasyan.
The video, directed and edited by Melanya Hamasyan, features video footage from the pianist’s second-grade end-of-the-year performance in 1995, capture on VHS tape by a member of the audience.
“This is school N. 10, which at the time was a temporary school that the children attended while the real building was being constructed,” Hamasyan recalls. “When I found this tape in my parents’ video archives, I felt that this footage was the visual reflection of what I felt when I wrote the song ‘Leninagone.’ The video portrays the struggle and the hope of all the generations that lived through this apocalyptic time.”
