Hrant Kenkulian, known as Udi Hrant, is one of those artists whose influence and importance in Armenian culture is difficult to overstate. The irony is that this influence, though incredibly profound, has mostly been felt in the Western Armenian Diaspora and especially in the United States, while in Armenia his name is hardly known. The reason for this is undoubtedly the fact that he lived and worked for most of his life in Republican Turkey. Despite that fact, he became a model for progressive developments in oud technique. He was known for his inimitable soulful, intimate style of playing and singing, and especially his mastery of taksim, or solo modal improvisation. For Armenian oudists, in the Diaspora but also in Soviet and modern-day Armenia, he has been the primary model. He has been hailed as a legend in oud music and the greatest Armenian oud player of all time.

Hrant was born in Adapazar, Ottoman Turkey, in 1901 and was declared blind within two months by the best doctors in Constantinople. Despite this fact, he begged his parents to send him to the local elementary school. With a little help from friends he was able to excel, especially in math. His teachers in Adapazar, such as Mr. Krikor Mekjian (the future Fr. Agop Mekjian, longtime pastor of Our Saviour Armenian Church in Worcester, MA) and local pastor Fr. Raphael noticed his musical talent and good voice and encouraged him to sing sharagans in the local Armenian church.

When WWI broke out, Hrant’s father was drafted into the Turkish Army and never seen again. In 1915 during the Armenian Genocide, the Armenians of Adapazar were deported to the Syrian Desert by way of Konya. The governor of Konya, Mehmet Celal Bey, known as “the Turkish Oskar Schindler,” defied the deportation orders of the central government.Hrant and his mother and sisters remained in the city of Konya for the duration of the war.

Ironically, it was during the Genocide, while the family was living in complete poverty in Konya, living on leftover fruit from the neighbors and cattle entrails from the butcher shops, that Hrant first took up the oud. The blind 16-year-old developed a deep desire toward music upon befriending another young Armenian man, a deportee from Bandirma named Garabed who played the oud. Saving up pocket change, Hrant purchased a dilapidated instrument and began taking lessons from his friend, who was drafted into the Turkish army soon afterward. Although the family was often in need of kindling, Hrant protected his wooden instrument under his bed covers. He practiced it, shaking, until he was able to play the local dance melodies of Konya; soon, neighborhood women were inviting him to play at their gatherings in exchange for a plate of food or some pocket money.

After the 1918 Armistice, the Kenkulians returned to Adapazar and then relocated to Istanbul, where they rented a home in the Elmadağ neighborhood. Initially, Hrant made some pocket money playing the oud at a coffeehouse next door. Later, he accompanied his mother to the nightclub at the property of the Surp Agop Armenian Cemetery (now part of Istanbul’s Gezi Park), where she would wash dishes and he would listen to the music played by a group of local Armenian musicians.

Encouraged by his friends and improving on his instrument, Hrant began playing in local coffeehouses and nightclubs in the Beyoğlu neighborhood, known as the center of Istanbul’s nightlife. He also took lessons from violinist-vocalist Agopos Alyanakian (a fellow native of Adapazar), violinist Dikran Katsakhian, oudist-vocalist Kirkor Berberian, and master-singer Yeghiazar Garabedian (a native of Agn [Egin] in the Vilayet of Harput). 

Hrant’s early career was marked by disappointment: a journey to Paris in 1921 to attend a school for the blind was prevented by the contraction of typhus; in response to this Hrant decided to stay in Istanbul and open a music store, but the music store failed in 1923; Hrant then went to Vienna for medical treatment, hosted by the Mekhitarist Armenian Catholic brotherhood, but the Vienna doctors weren’t able to do anything for his blindness. He returned to Istanbul again, playing in dive bars and coffeehouses. In 1928, he met the love of his life, Aghavni, while giving an home oud lesson to another Armenian girl from the neighborhood. Enthralled simply by her mannerisms and the sound of her voice, Hrant courted Aghavni for four months until her parents forbade her from marrying a blind musician.

Despite these setbacks, by1931 he was being called upon to play more professional gigs in restaurants and cabaret gardens. By 1934 Hrant had begun writing his own songs. Pursuant to the Turkish Surname Law of the same year, he took the legal name “Hırant Emre,” apparently choosing this name himself, which means “loving friend” or “older brother.” In the same year he met a record store owner named Ara Keğecik, who recognized his talent in the art of taksim.Keğecik agreed to finance Hrant’s first recordings. These first recordings were made in 1935 of taksims in the modes Hijaz and Huzzam. They were immediately recognized as masterpieces and quickly repressed for distribution abroad, including the United States. These two recordings were followed by two more taksims in Huseyni and Kurdili Hijazkiar (included in this post). In 1937, while on his way to a gig in the Arnavutköy neighborhood, he ran into Aghavni at the bus stop with an aunt, and invited them to come see him play; before going on stage he proposed to Aghavni over a beer and a week later she received her mother’s permission to marry Hrant.

Over the next ten years, Hrant began to find more steady work, and finally in 1947 the Turkish musicians Kanuni İsmail Şençalar, Hakkı Derman, and Şerif İçli interceded to get him hired at the more sophisticated Novotni Gazino, leading to steady work at the more upscale cabarets of 1940s and 1950s Istanbul. 

It was while working at a cabaret in Instanbul in December of 1949 that Hrant was approached by a wealthy Greek-American “tourist,” who happened to be at the establishment enjoying the music. He was excited to hear that the oud player was none other than Udi Hrant, whose records he had back home at his New York City apartment. This “American gentleman,” offered to pay for Hrant to travel to the United States for medical treatment. Hrant had other plans, though. Upon arriving in New York a week before Easter in 1950, his first order of business was to attend every single Armenian church in the city for one of the Holy Week services, during which he joined in the singing as he had done in Istanbul and Adapazar since his childhood. During the holidays, he also visited with his childhood friend Hrant Nshanian and other Adapazar natives living in New York. After seeing the doctors, who of course could not cure his blindness, Hrant embarked on a concert tour promoted and financed by his Adapazar friends, performing in Boston, New York, Detroit, Los Angeles, Fresno, and Philadelphia.

The success of Hrant’s first tour inspired him to make annual or biennial trips to the United States from 1950 until 1963. He also travelled to Lebanon and France, and in 1966 to Soviet Armenia. In 1969 he bestowed the title of Udi, designating a master of the oud, upon 5 of his students/followers in the United States: Charles “Chick” Ganimian, George Mgrdichian, Harry Minassian, Richard A. Hagopian, and John Berberian. A staunch member of the Armenian Church and community until the end, he died in Istanbul in 1978.

Of the recordings included here, 3 are among his lesser known works and were pressed on the “Hrant” label in Detroit during his 1950 US tour: Serut Indzi Mishd Gayre (Your Love Burns Me Always), a Hrant original; Haley, a traditional Armenian men's dance which is introduced by Hrant's shouting: “Haley! Dance, boys, it's Udi Hrant who's playing!”; and Antif Tarer Taparesank (We Wandered For Countless Ages), a rare example of Hrant singing an Armenian patriotic song — in this case, about the rebirth of Armenia, and attributed to one Mary Tavitian.

To round out Hrant's oeuvre, we have included a taksim in the mode Kurdili Hijazkar, recorded in the 1930s, and the song Agin, a very old Armenian folk song lamenting the separation of loved ones due to emigration. This song, which originates in the Eastern Anatolian city of Agn, was most likely taught to Hrant by his teacher Yeghiazar Effendi Garabedian. Finally, we included Anush Yarin, a composition by Hrant in the mode Hijaz (his favorite) and in the 6/8 meter. This song, which along with Agin was recorded in 1950 on the Smyrnaphon label in California, was probably written by Hrant that same year, as the lyrics seem to reference his fear and loneliness traveling to America for the first time by himself (eg., “antser em dzov oo tsamak, mnatser em mis minak” [I passed over sea and land, I was left all alone]) and being apart from his beloved Aghanvi (“Anush yares heratsa” [I went away from my sweet love]). Hrant's strong faith, which he mentions often in his memoirs, is also in evidence here: “Asdoodzo gamke ullah, tzerke tne mer vrah” (May the will of God be done, may he place his hand upon us).

A special thanks to the SJS Charitable Trust for their generous support of our work to digitize and share our collection of 78 rpm records.