WOMAD

Tigran Aleksnayan & Dr Mostafa Shams

From Armenia, Iran, United Kingdom

Tigran Aleksnayan is an Armenian who has settled in the UK and is making a name for himself as a master of those wind instruments at the core of the meltingly mournful music of Armenia; the duduk, the zurma, and something known intriguingly as the Armenian apricot flute. Aleksnayan has recently been collaborating with Andrew Cronshaw, the UK’s don of gentle folksy experimentalism, whose CD Chrome won the Critics Award at the 2004 BBC World Music Awards. Dr Mostafa Shams is a master of the Persian goblet drum or tonbak. He is currently living and working in London where he is a lynchpin of the Iranian musical community.