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  • DateSunday August 7
  • Time6:00pm
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A special performance by Zela Margossian Quintet at The Drill Hall Gallery!

Zela Margossian Quintet is an ethno-jazz band based in Sydney, performing original works and arrangements carrying influences from Armenian traditional music.

Comprised of talented and multi-cultural musicians from Sydney, Zela Margossian Quintet creates an exotic musical atmosphere that is sure to take you on an emotive and pleasurable journey.

Zela Margossian Quintet has participated in different festivals in Sydney such as the Sydney International Women’s Jazz Festival in 2017, 2019, 2020, 2021, Sydney Improvised Music Association’s various jazz programs, a debut performance for Wangaratta Festival of Jazz and Blues in 2020, a debut performance at the prestigious Sydney Opera House in December 2020 and a performance at Sydney Town Hall for Sydney Festival in January 2021. A special performance to note is ZMQ’s participation in the Beirut International Jazz Festival in Lebanon in April 2018.

Transition, the band’s debut album was released digitally by the Australian record label, Art As Catharsis, on the 30th of November, 2018.

To promote their debut album, the quintet had performances in Sydney, Melbourne, Hobart, Auckland and Wellington and the album received positive reviews from different sources such as The Sydney Morning Herald, The Australian, DownBeat and JazzWise magazines to name a few.

In October 2019, ZMQ’s debut album, Transition, received an ARIA nomination for Best World Music Album category.

In 2021, ZMQ signed a record deal with the American Jazz Label, Ropeadope. The album was released internationally on the 25th of February 2022 with an album launch event on the same day in Sydney, followed by favourable reviews in the coming months from different sources from around the world.

Media quotes:

“The band’s musicianship is impeccable throughout the recording (The Road) and the results achieved are a feast of the highest quality. This is freshly minted contemporary jazz bursting with panache. – All About Jazz

“In Margossian’s case, born of Armenian parents and raised in Beirut, she produces a highly original and authentic approach drawing on two cultures that are close to her. The longer tracks on this album (The Road) … are an exposition of this style, and spread over a broader canvass each soloist respects the composer’s intent in a way that produces a series of aesthetically pleasing and emotionally powerful performances.”- Jazzwise Magazine.

“What a bright new force is pianist Zela Margossian. Her debut album, Transition, announced her range and fascination as a composer, splashing her Armenian heritage across the broad canvas of jazz.”- Sydney Morning Herald.

“Transitioning among seemingly impossible musical and rhythmic puzzles and into an effortless harmonious whole, Margossian’s strong compositional themes and organic, intuitive sense for sophisticated meters only is enhanced. Embracing her background and a shift over to jazz following classical music studies, the bandleader has carved out an entrancing and dazzingly unique kaleidoscopic niche.”- Downbeat.

“…The result is this exemplary album that is simultaneously heartfelt, authentic and wholly absorbing. This is music that can be returned to again and again, each time revealing a little more of itself with its abundance of inner detail.”- Jazzwise Magazine.

Essential COVID-19 information for visitors to the Drill Hall Gallery here

 

The Drill Hall Gallery acknowledges the Ngunnawal and Ngambri peoples, the traditional custodians of the Canberra region, and recognises their continuous connection to culture, community and Country.

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