Mariam Kharatyan

The Armenian-Norwegian pianist Mariam Kharatyan performs internationally as both a soloist and a chamber musician. Critics have described her concerts as a rare musical experience. She captivates audiences with her interpretations, and her playing comes across as sensitive, natural, and free, as if the music were being created in the moment.

Kharatyan is a classically trained pianist with two master’s degrees in piano performance: one from the Komitas State Conservatory in Yerevan, Armenia, and one from the University of Agder in Kristiansand. She has lived in Kristiansand since 2012 and is currently an associate professor at the Department of Classical Music and Music Education.

She is regularly invited to perform solo recitals and chamber music at international music festivals. Among other events, she has participated in “Volt Classics” in Bergen, “Kamar Art” in Yerevan, the “Protest Festival” in Kristiansand alongside Arve Tellefsen, the “Edvard Grieg Festival” in Münster, and “European Notespor” in Leipzig. In 2020 and 2021, she was also artist-in-residence at Troldhaugen, the Edvard Grieg Museum in Bergen.

From 2015 to 2019, Kharatyan worked on an artistic doctoral project (Ph.D.) titled *Armenian Fingerprints: Interpreting the Piano Music of Komitas and Khachaturian in Light of Armenian Folk Music*. The project was part of the Norwegian Program for Artistic Development and was published on researchcatalogue.net in 2019. That same year, she released two albums during a concert at Sentralen in Oslo: Khachaturian, Chamber Music (Simax Classics), in collaboration with Adam Grüchot, Stig Nordhagen, and Leonardo Sesenna, and Komitas, Shoror (Grappa Musikkforlag), featuring solo works by Komitas Vardapet and Armenian folk songs in new interpretations alongside folk musician Vigen Balasanyan on the blul and duduk. Both albums were warmly received by audiences and received enthusiastic reviews from international critics.

Kharatyan has also performed as a soloist with the Kristiansand Symphony Orchestra in Aram Khachaturian’s Piano Concerto. This was a major highlight of her doctoral project, *Armenian Fingerprints*. The concert was recorded live atperforming arts centre Kilden performing arts centre the baton of conductor Eivind Gullberg Jensen. In Fædrelandsvennen, the performance received a glowing review:
“She gave a formidable performance of Aram Khachaturian’s Piano Concerto in D major. Elegant, playfully light, beautifully veiled where needed, and with exquisite use of the pedal. This was music and a performance to be both inspired and delighted by” (2018).

She has also collaborated with the Norwegian composer Konrad Mikal Øhrn. In 2015, she premiered his *Concert Piece for Piano, Strings, and Timpani* with the string orchestra of the Academy of Music in Sarajevo and conductor Tijana Vignevic. In 2017, she performed Øhrn’s Nansen Suite as part of the Musical Dialogues concert project at the National Gallery in Washington, D.C.

Kharatyan has won prizes at several international piano competitions and has given concerts in Sweden, Germany, Italy, Hungary, Poland, Romania, Belarus, Lithuania, the United States, and Armenia.