The Return

Thoughts of home dominate much of the music pianist Raffi Besalyan performs here.

Rachmaninoff’s “B-Minor Prelude” was inspired by The Return, a painting by Arnold Böcklin. Although it was written before his emigration the work was a constant companion in his exile, a favorite for his own recitals and a reminder of his years in Russia.

Similarly, the folk-inspired piano music of Arno Babajanian recalls a distant homeland. Based in Moscow for much of his adult life, Babajanian looked back to his native Armenia in music that mixed the folk idioms of his people with the virtuosic pianism of the Russian school.

And now Besalyan, an Armenian pianist based in the United States, brings their music together in a program infused with warm memories, evocations of far-off places, and reminders of earlier times.

Raffi Besalyan – Piano