Macha Gharibian

Pianiste au toucher delicat, de solide formation classique, diplomee de l’Ecole Normale de Musique de Paris, c’est en quittant Paris pour New York en 2005 que Macha Gharibian rencontre le jazz et se revele dans cette ville ou tout est possible. Guidée par Ralph Alessi, Uri Caine, Jason Moran, Ravi Coltrane a la School for Improvisational Music, elle commence à ecrire et creer son univers, une musique construite par ses voyages, ses desirs, ses racines et tout ce qui a fait grandir la jeune femme partagee entre trois cultures: armenienne de ses ancetres, parisienne de coeur et new-yorkaise d’adoption. Depuis ses tournées en Asie et en Amérique du Sud au printemps 2017, Macha Gharibian a le désir d’explorer sa musique en trio, forme légendaire du jazz qui offre un espace de silence et de conversation unique, où chacun peut exprimer les différentes facettes de son instrument et sa personnalité. Un exercice de style qu’elle a envie de sonder comme une étape de travail vers un nouveau répertoire, avant de se projeter vers un nouvel album début 2020.

The slow, rising chant of « Ritual Prayer » straightaway sets the tone of the debut album of Macha Gharibian, a music shaped by her travels, loves, desires and roots, all the influences that helped her development as an artist, strands from a tapestry woven by Armenia, the land of her ancestors, Paris, where her heart lies, and New York, her adopted city. Classically trained on the piano from an early age, singer, songwriter, performer, and a bold composer for the theater and cinema, Macha Gharibian added jazz to her repertoire after a lengthy stay in New York and has achieved a natural blend of all these influences mixing jazz, Armenian folk songs and other non-Western traditions in which she has forged her own style that is urban, crossover and modern. A family tradition inherited from her guitarist father, founder of the famous French band Bratsch. Following on from Mars her first album which met with universal acclaim from the press who promised her “a bright future” (Libération) and rated her as “one of this new year’s best surprises” (A Nous Paris), « Trans Extended » is a light-filled journey, inspired by the traces left by exile, transmission and encounters of the kind which lead us to hitherto unknown places and reveal a new side to ourselves we have never previously explored. Macha Gharibian has performed in France and international venues such as the Ottawa International Jazz Festival (Canada), New York Rockwood Music Hall (US), and in Russia, China, Taïwan, Hong Kong, Colombia, Afghanistan, Armenia, Algeria, Belgium. She also played at the Paris Jazz Festival, Fête de l’Humanité, Marciac l’Astrada, Tourcoing Jazz Festival, Rocher de Palmer, Nantes Pannonica, Paris Duc des Lombards, New Morning, Café de la Danse…