Vartan Margosian, the Nightingale of Kharpert

Written by Harry Kezelian

Vartan Margosian was born January 9, 1891 in the village of Sheikh Hadji, in the district of Kharpert. The district was said to have 365 Armenian villages, one for each day of the year, surrounding the city of Kharpert, which was built on a large rocky hill. The village of Sheikh Hadji was one of the farthest from the city. It was built at the foot of Mt. Masdar, between the mountain and the Aradzani River (Murat Su or Lower Euphrates). In fact, if one had gone much further past Sheikh Hadji, one would cross the “county line” and be in the District of Palu.

Kharpert was considered one of the most educated regions of Western Armenia, with a large number of schools run by either the Armenian Church or by Protestant and Catholic missionaries. The dialect of Armenian spoken there was considered one of the closest to standard literary Western Armenian. Due to the large Protestant population among the Armenians, ties to America were close and Kharpert was both the source of the earliest Armenian immigrants to America. Due to these factors, the music of the Armenians from Kharpert became one of the most important ingredients in the Armenian-American folk music scene.

On November 21, 1908, Vartan Margosian arrived at Ellis Island. Evidently, he had taken advantage of the more open travel allowed by the Ottoman Constitution of 1908. Making his life in New York, Margosian found work as a photoengraver, a rather lucrative career which at the time was heavily dominated by Armenians in the Northeast. Vartan married Asdghig (Stella) Khalaf, a native of Dikranagerd, at the Armenian Evangelical Church of New York. Living in Manhattan, they later moved to the Bronx and raised a family.

Vartan’s style of music was unique. He was not a highly trained musician, and he wasn not even a “master player” in the folk tradition. There were probably any number of Armenians like him who knew how to play an instrument and who knew the folk songs of their local area. That does not mean he was not great, but one might ask how many Vartans we lost due to the Armenian Genocide. Vartan’s special quality lies in two things, as far as this listener is concerned: his near-heroic attempt to document the songs of his native land by pressing an incredible amount of records on his own dime; and his irrepressible spirit which shines through in all his recordings and in the surviving photographs, a man who must have been a naturally happy person, subjected to loss and destruction of his homeland and most likely, his parents and extended family. Vartan’s singing verges from deeply, emotionally melancholic to sprightly, happy and contented, reflecting his and his people’s loss on the one hand and his successful realization of the American Dream and happy family life on the other. 

The songs included here are mostly from his early recordings and mostly from the second half of 1923 and the first half 1924. 

“Te Hairenyats' ' is an Armenian march of sorts, a poem about the Battle of Vartanants (451 AD) written by 19th-century poet and clergyman, Bishop Karekin Servantzdiants. The composer of the music is unknown to us. The poem mentions the metaphorical crowning of St. Vartan Mamigonian and his companions with the crown of martyrdom, and the hero’s crown; for this reason it became popular in the late 19th century as an outdoor wedding processional (a little too solemn by today’s standards, but still practiced by some Armenians), since the Armenian wedding is also known as the Rite of Crowning, where bride and groom are crowned as King and Queen of their new family. 

“Emyeress” (i.e., Im Yares or Eem Yarus), meaning “My Sweetheart,” is perhaps Vartan Margosian’s most influential recording, despite its early and primitive nature. Most likely, this song was the source of the still-popular “Khuntsorin Dzarin Dagin.” In 1930, the latter song was published by an Armenian composer named Harout Mehrab, who was born in the Caucasus and came to America in 1923, where he worked as a choral director and “master musician” as did several other classically trained Armenian immigrants, particularly from the Caucasus. Although Mehrab claimed authorship of “Khuntsori Dzari Dagin” and attributed the lyrics to Soviet-Armenian poet Avedik Isahakian, Margosian’s recording made seven years prior already uses the same melody. As for the lyrics, Margosian sings four stanzas, and the last two lines of the last stanza are “Yes im yares siretsi, khuntsori dzarin daguh” (I loved my sweetheart under the apple tree); Isahakian’s lyrics are essentially those two lines repeated over and over, in different combinations.

Apparently the authorship of “Khuntsorin Dzarin Dagin” was known as controversial in Mehrab’s own time. An interviewer reportedly spoke to Mehrab’s widow in later years, and asked whether Mehrab had really composed the song or whether it was a folk song; Mrs. Mehrab became irate and defensive.

What likely happened is that Mehrab heard Vartan’s recording and enjoyed it. After several attempts to compose Armenian “folk songs” it seems Mehrab’s songs were not successful with the Armenian-American public among whom he was trying to make a career. By taking a folk melody from one of the folk musicians of the people, namely Vartan Margosian, and arranging it into a classical composition, and then performing the song with a vocal chorus on a widely-promoted radio broadcast of Armenian music in 1930, Mehrab burst into popularity as “the composer of Khuntsorin Dzarin Dagin.” But he couldn’t have done it without Vartan.

Vartan’s original song, incidentally, is primarily about a Mulberry Tree (Tooti Dzar) and not about an Apple Tree (Khuntsori Dzar). Most likely, this is a traditional Kharpert melody and song, though it’s possible Vartan made it up himself. It’s even more likely that Vartan made up this song according to the folk tradition, where earlier material is utilized and improvised upon. In that sense, it is unfair to accuse Mehrab of “stealing” but it was also unfair of Mehrab to claim himself as the “composer” and not to give Vartan Margosian and the folk tradition any credit.  

A final interesting fact sheds light on the Western Armenian music tradition which was transferred to America and misunderstood by many. Vartan’s original song is performed in the 10/8 time signature which is the most popular rhythm in Western Armenian folk dance. However, this rhythm was never understood by the classically trained music elite from the Russian Empire (including Eastern Armenia / present-day Armenia), because the 10/8 rhythm does not exist in European Classical music nor does it exist (at least not anymore) in Eastern Armenian folk music, Caucasus Music, Russian Music, or even Persian Music, with which the trained musicians were familiar. Due to this lack of understanding, the 10/8 rhythm, with some extremely rare exceptions, only survived in Armenian folk music in America after the Genocide of 1915, not in the rest of the Diaspora and certainly not in Armenia (again, with the exception of isolated individuals or groups familiar with it, such as Western Armenian refugees in some rural villages of Soviet Armenia). 

Mehrab’s song “Khuntsori Dzarin Dagin” was composed in 6/8 rhythm as that is how the classically-trained Armenian musicians typically interpret 10/8 melodies that they hear. The final irony is that although Mehrab’s version of the song is actually more pleasing in some ways, with the addition of a bridge and simplified lyrics, the Armenian-American folk musicians reappropriated the new version “back” into the “Kharpertsi” style and by the 1940s we have recordings of Oscar Kevorkian in Fresno singing the Mehrab version of the song with folk instrumentation – but in 10/8 rhythm! Groups like the Vosbikian Band of Philadelphia continue to play Mehrab’s version in 10/8 to this day, while almost no one is aware of Margosian’s original version of the melody and lyrics. 

Both Te Hairenyats and Emyeress feature Vartan Margosian playing violin by himself and singing, with no other accompaniment. His earliest recordings were all performed in this way.

“Paregentan” sees the second stage of the Margosian recordings with the addition of the dumbeg player, H. Karagosian. This song refers to the festival of Poon Paregentan (Armenian equivalent to Fat Tuesday / Carnival / Mardi Gras, which in the Armenian Church falls on a Sunday), as Vartan sings “Paregentan yeger eh, paregentan yeger eh, yaris hakver shukver eh, yaris hakver eh shukver eh” (loosely translated, “Paregentan has come, my sweetheart is dressed to the nines”). The joy and energy inherent in this performance is a rare document from the early 1920s where we see how Vartan probably sounded if performing live at a wedding or other festival, though it is likely he had more instruments to accompany him.

“Gamavor Kerrin,” recorded in early 1924 sees the first addition of new band members to the Margosian orchestra. The oud player is Maksoud Sariyan, also known as “Oudi Karakash” (1897-1946), who was born in Bursa, Turkey. The clarinet player, Mesrob Takakjian (1894-1976) was a native of Palu who became the most accomplished folk clarinetist in the immigrant generation, after moving to Fresno a few years later. Takakjian, living in Providence, Rhode Island, and Sariyan, living in New Jersey, apparently struck up a partnership. Being from Palu, Takakjian’s clarinet style was similar to what became known as “Kharpertsi style” and in keeping with Margosian’s regional material.

Gamavor Kerin is a “fedayee song”, that is a ballad devoted to Armenian freedom fighters, in this case, Arshag Kavafian, a native of Erzurum who adopted the nom de guerre “Keri” (“Maternal Uncle”). The song is usually titled “Keriyin Yerke” (Keri’s Song), though Vartan’s title translates to “Volunteer Keri.” As told in the song, Keri commanded the 4th Battalion of the Armenian Volunteer (Gamavor) Troops in the Russian Army on the Caucasus Front during World War I, which after the fall of Tsarist Russia, became part of the military of the First Republic of Armenia. The casual listener will notice that Vartan employs an even more “Middle Eastern” vocal style in some ways in this song. That is because the fedayee ballads were typically written by wandering minstrels (“ashughs”) who sang in a declamatory style that had Middle Eastern influences. In this case, the song was written by one Ashugh Michaz, of whom we have little other information. Vartan’s presentation is in keeping with the Armenian minstrel style.

The next two songs, “Aghchig Serma” and “Boyed Neman” are both done in the Kharpertsi 10/8 style. Here we have two nice examples of Armenian love songs. “Boyed Neman” is an old song that was known before Vartan’s time, though rarely heard today. It is attributed to the Armenian minstrel Miskin-Bourji (1810-1847). It is unclear what Miskin-Bourji’s real name was; minstrels usually adopted Persian-sounding stage names. Miskin-Bourji was born in Nakhichevan and spent most of his career traveling through the villages in the vicinity of Gandzak (now Ganja, Azerbaijan). He died in Askeran, Karabagh, and is buried in the Askeran fortress. It would seem unlikely that Miskin-Bourji originally performed this song the same way that Vartan does, he would have used the slower 6/8 rhythm popular among Armenian minstrels in the Caucasus. Vartan, following a common practice of folk musicians, interprets the song in his own Western Armenian style and in particular the regional style of Kharpert, using the 10/8 rhythm. After the Genocide destroyed Armenian life in Western Armenia, American-Armenian musicians used the same practice to replenish their repertoire of songs; new songs learned from Soviet Armenian recordings would be interpreted in the 10/8 rhythm of the Western Armenian folk dance style, thus new songs could be added to the repertoire even though the homeland of the style was destroyed. Though some attribute this practice to American-born groups like the Vosbikian Band in the 1940s, we can see that Vartan Margosian was already doing it in the 1920s – and most likely, they were doing the same thing back in his hometown of Kharpert.

“Aghchig Serma Mazerut” (Girl, Your Hair is Like Golden Strands) is an untraced folk song, which probably originated with Vartan himself. Again, it is interpreted in a joyous manner in the 10/8 rhythm.

The next recording “Mer Khuntsore” is another happy folk song or love song in the 10/8 rhythm and in Kharpert style. The title line is “Mer Khuntsore Dzaghger Eh” (Our Apple Has Blossomed). Evidently, Vartan either wrote this song himself or added his own lyrics, as we see from lines like “Yares indzi pargatser, tsker Boston eh katser” (My girlfriend got mad at me, she left and went to Boston).

The flipside of “Mer Khuntsore,” “Hey Nozanum” is a well known Armenian folk song, that is more typical in Eastern Armenia, where it was collected and arranged by Gomidas. We don’t know whether Vartan learned this from the Gomidas version, or whether it was also sung in Kharpert/Western Armenia and he learned it there. In any case, he interprets it once again in 10/8 style, and sings it with his own lyrics, that he possibly wrote himself. Here we see a typical feature of the authentic Armenian rural folk songs, which is their earthiness, as Vartan sings lines such as “truly the one who embraces and lies with you, goes to heaven.” Despite the strict traditional morality and arranged marriages in Armenian culture before 1915, these types of expressions were common in folk songs, the implication generally being that the person was talking about someone they wanted to marry, a common theme in Vartan’s other songs as well. In these last four recordings, again we have Vartan accompanied only by his own violin and by the dumbeg of H. Karagosian.

The United Catalog of Armenian-American records, printed around 1926, says the following about Vartan: “It is a simple truth when we say of him that he is the ‘Nightingale of Kharpert’; he being born and raised there, he knows and he sings the soul of Kharpert.