Georgian chant

Georgian chant is the music sung in the Georgian Orthodox Church for daily and weekly services. It is sung in three-voiced polyphony without instrumental accompaniment. There are many musical styles and performance practices, and a long history of transmission and musical development. It has been sung since at least 326 AD, when Saint Nino, Enlightener of Georgians, converted King Mirian and Queen Nana of Iberia, a Georgian speaking kingdom in the South Caucasus region.

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Recent Posts

Maksime Sharadze

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Maksime Sharadze (1859-1908) Publisher, Cultural activist, Organizer See original 2005 publication of this article here.       Maksime Sharadze remains a relatively unknown figure to historians. Few personal artifacts, photographs, or written accounts... Read More

Karbelashvili brothers history

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Karbelashvili brothers   In the nineteenth century, as Georgia was subsumed into the cultural and political arena of the expanding Russian Empire, various traditional art forms began to be forgotten amidst increasing urbanization,... Read More

Kviria – Svan Ritual Chant

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  One of the most important and historically layered Svan ritual songs is the hymn Kviria. Like many hymns passed down orally over the centuries, Kviria exists in multiple variants. However, some of... Read More

Svanetian Chant: Introduction

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    Svaneti’s culture is famed in Georgia for being archaic and harsh, with Upper Svaneti often described as a “living museum” that offers insights into the worldview and customs of ancient Georgia.... Read More

One Old Georgian Musical Term (Mortuleba)

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      Of the musical terms attested in Medieval Georgian written sources, special attention attaches to the term mortuleba (“harmony”). It is polysemantic and occurs in various branches of Georgian literature (theological... Read More

The Georgian Modal System

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1. INTRODUCTION The present paper discusses selected results from my dissertation work on “The History of Georgian Chant Notation and the Georgian Musical System” (Erkvanidze, 2014). One of the main challenges in the... Read More