The brief article tells a litte of João Kouyoumdjian's story and recommends his first CD Surfboard: Solo Guitar Works from Brazil. The english translation follows below.

International

Guitar

Applauded at Carnegie Hall,

the São Paulo born João Kouyoumdjian

records CD of Brazilian music

João Kouyoumdjian learned to play guitar with professor

Preto Moreno in São José do Rio Preto, countryside area of

the state of São Paulo, where he was born 28 years ago.

When switching popular to classical, he

refined his studies with Paulo Martelli.

The next chord was to arrive at the Kennedy

Airport, in New York. Being admitted at The Juilliard

School was his highest dream. The centennial school

gained importance due to students such as

Miles Davis, who attended but did not graduate, at the age of

eighteen years old; cellist Yo-Yo Ma; Itzhak Perlman and others.

Kouyoumdjian won the spot in 2007 competing among 39 other candidates.

In 2009 he came back to Brazil to implement the Guri

Santa Marcelina project in the outskirt areas of Sao Paulo and

the Horizontes do Violão (“Guitar Horizons”) project, in partnership with Juilliard. 

Back to the United States he presented concerts at Carnegie Hall and Kennedy Center.

After the third of his concerts at Carnegie Hall, entitled “Brazilian Guitar: Tradition

and Tendencies”, in November of 2011, he was invited by the owner of label Pomegranate Music, Raffi Meneshian,

to record two CDs with world-wide release until 2015. The first, “Surfboard” is now getting out of the oven.

It consists of fifteen tracks of solo guitar, all by Brazilian composers. The track that borrows the CD’s title is by Tom Jobim.

CD on sale at iTunes, Amazon and promotional concerts

[August at Livraria da Vila – SP]

livrariadavila.com.br

joaokouyoumdjian.com  

pomegranatemusic.com