A visit from Aizada
Yesterday I had from Aizada. She’s the Director of one of the city’s Music Schools – The Children’s Musical School Number 7.
I am not sure why the schools here are given numbers rather than names, but that’s the system here. They name virtually everything else in honour of some notable character or other. The National Museum of Fine Arts, for example, is named in honour of the famous Kyrgyz artists Gapar Aitiev; The Sports Palace is named after Kojumkol, a giant of a man famous for his fantastic feats of strength; The Philharmonia Concert Hall is named for Satylganov Toktogul, a notable akyn and manaschi … and so on. There are some exceptions, but on the whole, schools, hospitals and many other buildings are unimaginatively identified by just a number.
Now, every school pupil is supposed to have music lessons and the system here is that these are provided by a network of specialist schools that give individual lessons after normal hours.
Music School No 7 celebrated its fortieth anniversary last year with a special concert and they published a short book outlining the school’s history. It’s the only one in the southern micro-regions, (suburbs) which comprise the biggest housing estate in the city.
The school’s pupils number more than 250 children at any one time and in its forty years many hundreds have graduated from the school. In order to learn an instrument they study for five years. Not all of them choose to continue their studies after their course finishes, but a large number of them have done so and continued to study at the Conservatory in Bishkek and some have gone on to become professional musicians.
They are trained on many musical instruments, such as: piano, bayan (a kind of accordion), accordion, violin, komuz, temir komuz (or iron komuz — commonly known in the West as the “Jew’s Harp” or Jaw’s Harp”), chopo choor, guitar, trumpet and a variety of percussion instruments. Besides the solo performers there are a number of ensembles: two choruses – or choirs, ensembles of komuzists, violinists, bayanists, temir komuzists and a folk ensemble – Jetigen.
Students and teachers give numerous concerts and lecture-concerts at the Philharmonic Society. They have take part in city and republican competitions such as «Young Talents» (regularly since 1997); at the festival Osh — 3000; at competitions of the «Meerim» foundation; competitions to mark the anniversary of Altay Ogonbaev, (where they received a diploma and prize for virtuousness); and several international festivals abroad, (for example in Astana, Moscow, Kazan and Bulgaria – where they won the Grand Prix) and they have been awarded an honorary deed by the Ministry of Education and Culture.
.
I have known Aizada for about ten years. She is a member of the Management Council of the Mayoralty of Culture and is a representative on the Bishkek Council of Directors of Children’s Musical and Creative Schools. She appeared in the office one day and told me that the school had a children’s musical ensemble and they would be happy to perform for tourists. Now there are lots of musical ensembles in Kyrgyzstan, some are professional, others comprised of talented amateurs, and we already had several contacts that could provide concerts, but something about her enthusiasm intrigued me. So I asked if they could come to the hotel and give me a demonstration.
She agreed and a couple of days later we met at the hotel at they played some specimen pieces. There were about eight young people in their teens, (pupils at the school), and a couple of teachers.
I thought that I was going to be the only person in the audience, but as they were playing some of the staff, having heard the music, came and stood near the doorway. We invited them in and they sat at the back. They were rapturous in their applause, and when the impromptu concert was over some of them came up and commented on how well the children had played. Well, I could tell that, but it was nice to get confirmation from others – especially Kyrgyz who knew the traditions and music far better than I did.
So I agreed to “sign them up”, but warned them that the number of concerts may not be very high. It would depend on many things. One of the most important is that the school year, (when the group would be available), finishes early – May 25th – and the tourist season hasn’t really started by then. Still, it would be good experience for them and also be a useful way of supplementing the school’s funds as well as offering clients an interesting experience.
What’s more, not all clients want to see a group of schoolchildren – maybe they remember the embarrassing moments in school concerts when they were young, or where their children performed. On the other hand, however, the performances of even the youngest of these performers were equal to that of many older and more experienced performers.
One group of tourists to whom we offered the choice of a profession ensemble or Jetigen, said that they would be happy to encourage a group of schoolchildren. As it happens, whilst they were undertaking a city tour during the day, they saw that there was going to be a performance by a well known local ensemble that afternoon in the Opera and Ballet theatre, and they decided to go. They purchased their tickets and sat in the auditorium and had a thoroughly good time. Then they rushed back to the hotel and sat through another performance – this time by Jetigen. They told me afterwards that they enjoyed this far better because they were “up close” and could get a real good look at the instruments, the enthusiasm on the faces of the children was infectious, and they were able to interact and ask questions. Since then, the tour leaders have been back several times and they always request for Aizada’s group to give their group a performance.
.
Over the years, as well as arranging concerts for our clients, we have also worked on several projects with school, including helping them with recording a CD of music, (here’s a sample of some of the tracks from the CD: Jetigen 13 Sarinzhe Bakoi – a traditional Kyrgyz Melody based on a legend of two brothers, one of whom is dying and asks his brother to take care of his son, wose name is Sarinji Bokoy, and Jetigen 16 Ak Nomak, Kak Tomak by Atay Ogonbaev, which represents a duet between two songbirds — each singing about its own land, but when the two fall in love with each other their two songs glow together), and a short video presentation as well being one of the sponsors for some of their other activities such as their trips to different festivals.
The reason Aizada came to see me yesterday is that they are planning another of their activities – a competition for young musicians from the city’s Music Schools. Of course, she is looking for sponsorship. The last one they held was in March 2005 – as it happens in the week of March 24th, and although it was severely disrupted by the events of the Tulip Revolution, they were still able to hold successfully. They were originally planning to hold this new competition in March next year, but as other activities will be happening at that time it has been put back to May.
I do hope that this isn’t going to be another case of déjà vu!
Anyway, I am very pleased to see that she is busy working on it now. Unlike a lot of people here, she realizes that events like this don’t just materialize out of thin air and need considerable amounts of preparation – hence she is starting now – five months early.
Yes, for the record, I agreed to be one of the sponsors.
Bishkek