Gomidas at the
Concertgebouw

At a sold-out Kleine Zaal on 17 October 2026, Falcon soprano Natali Boghossian, joined by her Zartonk Consort, made her Concertgebouw debut with a programme that gave Armenian classical song the intimacy and dramatic scope of music theatre. Love, landscape, loss and return formed its emotional arc, with Boghossian’s voice and expressive stage presence at its centre.

Together with her Zartonk Consort, Boghossian brought Gomidas’s songs into a vivid dialogue between her Falcon soprano voice and an ensemble of piano, cello, duduk, qanun and kamancha. Arrangements by Istanbul-Armenian composer Dr Ardashes Agoshian, created especially for her voice and Zartonk Consort, gave each musical encounter its own colour and character. Agoshian received the Gomidas Award from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Armenia in recognition of his contributions to the music of Gomidas.

Part of the Nieuwe Blik Terug series, the concert was curated, produced and presented by Orville Breeveld. Through his series, Breeveld gives voice to composers whose music deserves to be heard more often, helping to tell a fuller story of music history. His spoken introductions placed the music in its historical and cultural context, while Boghossian carried the audience through its human stories.

The evening ended with a standing ovation: a Concertgebouw debut that brought together the singer, the researcher and the storyteller.