TRIBUTE TO AZERI JAZZ PIANIST VAGIF MUSTAFAZADEH
Vagif Mustafazadeh was born in 1940 in Baku. In 1963 he graduated from Asaf Zeynally Baku Music School and a year later was enrolled by the Azerbaijani State Conservatorium. In 1965 he quitted the conservatorium and went to Tbilisi to lead the "Orero" musical ensemble. Later he created the "Qafqaz" (Caucasus) jazz trio at the Georgian State Philharmonic. Vagif became a laureate at the "Tallinn 66" festival and was selected the best pianist at "Tbilisi-78" All-Soviet Union Jazz Festival. He founded the "Leyli" women’s quartet in 1970 and some time later, the “Sevil" and “Mugham” vocal-instrumental ensembles.
Pianist and composer Vagif Mustafazade was the creator of the jazz mugham style in Azerbaijan in the 1960-s. By merging two musical genres - Western jazz and Eastern mugham, a type of traditional improvisational modal music, - Vagif Mustafazadeh created "mugham jazz", a new sound that was uniquely Azerbaijani.
In 1978, he won the First Prize at the Eighth International Jazz Festival in Monaco for his composition "Waiting for Aziza". In 1979, he was named People’s Artist of Azerbaijan. Later the same year, he suddenly collapsed and died while performing onstage in Uzbekistan. He was only 39 years old.
The participants of the conference emphasized that the heritage of Vagif, as a pioneer of jazz mugham style, preceded his own time and still strongly impacts on how jazz is performed in Azerbaijan today.
The commemoration event also featured several Vagif’s compositions performed by Retro-Sevil vocal group and a group of saxophonists.
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