“I love the Silkroad Ensemble because it feels like a musical extension of my own experience,” said cellist and vocalist Karen Ouzounian during a Zoom call. “It reflects my family’s immigration and growing up in a diasporic community.”
Ouzounian, who is of Armenian heritage, is one of the stellar performer-composers from the Silkroad Ensemble who will roll into Portland to perform April 1 in the group’s “Uplifted Voices” program at the Arlene Schnitzer Concert Hall. The concert will feature musical storytelling by women and non-binary members of the group that draws on homeland, ancestors, community, and family to present a fresh take on under-represented music from around the world.
The concert program fits perfectly with the group’s mission to exchange ideas, traditions, and create a fresh, innovative experience that collaborates across borders. Founded by Yo-Yo Ma in 1998, the Grammy-award-winning Silkroad Ensemble is a collective of stellar musicians from around the world who are making a positive impact through their cross-cultural music. Since 2020, the group has been led by Artistic Director Rhiannon Giddens and recently released a CD entitled “American Railroad,” which celebrates the stories of those who built the Transcontinental Railroad and connecting railways across the nation.
In addition to Ouzounian, the “Uplifted Voices” program will feature five members of the Silkroad Ensemble: Celtic harpist and vocalist Maeve Gilchrist, violinists and vocalists Mazz Swift and Layale Chaker, percussionist Haruka Fujii, and special guest lap-steel slide guitarist Pura Fé from the Tuscarora Nation in North Carolina. They met in Seattle to rehearse the music, which will touch on their personal journeys to make a distinctive and powerful concert.
Born to Lebanese-Armenian parents in Toronto, Karen Ouzounian went to an Armenian school before becoming a classically trained cellist with bachelor’s and master’s degrees from Julliard.
“The Silkroad Ensemble has been a fertile place for me to explore my Armenian heritage,” said Ouzounian, “and that is something that I have been bringing much more to my own work. It’s been an excellent catalyst for me over the years.”
During “Uplifted Voices,” concertgoers will hear Ouzounian’s “Der Zor”.
“This piece refers to the Syrian desert of Der Zor,” explained Ouzounian. “During the Armenian genocide in 1915 and 1916, hundreds of thousands of Armenians were forcibly marched to the desert by the Ottoman government. This song was sung by Armenians during those marches. It was a way for Armenians to say what they were witnessing. It is painful to read. I got a recording from the archive of the Library of Congress, including a man singing this song. There’s a number of Armenians who live in Fresno, California, where he lived. I took the melody and created a piece with it. I had learned that song in Armenian school. If you go to that area, the bones of your ancestors are there.”
Ouzounian’s “Imagined Anatolian Dance” will also be performed.
“I took a part of a larger piece called ‘Dear Mountains’ that I had written with my husband Lembit Beecher, who is also a composer. My grandmother’s life is woven into this music. It has an imagined idea of mine about Anatolia and Armenian villages where she grew up. I took rhythmic and melodic modes from this region and reimagined them.”
This is the third time that the group has taken “Uplifted Voices” on tour. But according to Maeve Gilchrist at least two-thirds of the songs on the program will be new, including some arrangements from her native Scotland.
“I am bringing a suite of two tunes,” said Gilchrist over Zoom. “The first tune reimagines a Gaelic song, ‘Fonn Gun Bhi Trom’ which means I am disposed to mirth. I coupled it with playful lyrics from an Irish children’s song. That transitions to my piece called ‘Ancestral Mud,’ where the cello, violins, marimba and harp toss phrases around. That piece was inspired by a Samuel Beckett monologue that has a lot of repeated words: my mother’s mother, my father’s father. A murky, ancestral piece of music.”
Even though she now writes music for classical musicians, Gilchrist initially learned by ear and heard lots of folk music.
“Many of the best harpists in Scotland and Ireland play folk music,” commented Gilchrist, “for playing around the kitchen table and the pubs. I went to the Berklee School of Music in Boston at age 17 as a vocal major. Then I switched to harp, and met people from countries that had their own harp traditions like Venezuela, Colombia, and Paraguay. Those countries have a tradition to use the harp in a more rhythmic way. So I’ve learned a lot from them.”
Silkroad Ensemble brings its “Uplifted Voices” tour to the Arlene Schnitzer Concert Hall on April 1, 2025. The ensemble features Mazz Swift on violin and vocals.Sean D. Elliot
Another ultra-talented performer on the program is the Juilliard-trained violinist and composer Mazz Swift.
Swift, who identifies as non-binary, started playing violin when they were six.
“Apparently, I was going around telling everyone that I was a violinist,” recalled Swift. “I took to it very quickly when I finally got one.”
The “Uplifted Voices” program includes Swift’s “O Shout,” which is based on a slave/work song/spiritual called “O Shout Away,” and it is in the “American Railroad” album.
“All of the performers will be singing,” said Swift. “I love to sing, and it has become as important to me as playing the violin.”
“The Silkroad Ensemble performances are very special,” remarked Swift. “We perform with love – full of grace. We love each other’s music and learn more about each other every time we get together. It’s amazing.”
7:30 p.m. Tuesday, April 1, Arlene Schnitzer Concert Hall, 1037 S.W. Broadway; $25, orsymphony.org.