On Avet Terterian and his Music
His innovative compositions have echoed in Armenia and worldwide, suggesting of the new ways in the development of the national simphonism.
Edward Mirzoyan, President Composers Assotiation of Armenia Sovetakan Arvest, 1979, #1
I liked most Avet Terterian’s 4th symphony. It is sincere, full of thought, authentic and, I believe, will long be remembered.
L. Pestalozzi, 1979
For Avet Terterian as a composer symphonism is a most natural expressive means. He was born a symphonist. Terterian’s talent is vast and multiform, his music has its own authentic world in sound, which is so rare nowadays.
Ksh. Meyer, Poland-Germany, 1980
Avet Terterian is an ingenious composer whose scores always abound in the most stimulating innovations. He is a generous artist and yet he is a miser. Occasionally it would seem that nothing at all happens within a lengthy musical fragment but all of a sudden you realize that the motion has never ceased, it has been progressing towards a definite goal which the composer discloses at the moment that he deems appropriate.
Conductor Gennady Rozhdestvensky
While in Armenia, I was astonished by the emotional power of your symphony. (Symphony #5)
A. Lui, Toronto, 30 June 1982
As musicians and critics noted, first performance of Avet Terterian’s symphony #6 was one of the memorable events of the festival (12th International Music Festival “Biennale”).
Muzykalnaya zhizn, #17, 1983
Avet Terterian’s explosive scores win my special admiration.
S. Mattus, Berlin 1984
His conception, determined through Nature, in this works constructs a music bridge to Universe Harmony (Soviet Realism is over.)
Frankfurter Rundschau, 1985
Terterian’s talent is powerful and imaginative, and so natural is his constant endeavour… to seek new expressive means that would let him follow the path of renewal and transformation of the free music, open toward other horizons and emotional spaces.
Luigi Nono, 1986
… brilliantly refined score (Symphony #6).
Berliner Morgenpost, 11 September 1986, West Berlin
Avet Terterinan’s works flow into European music culture, enrichening it. They have their own important place in it.
V. Kholopova
Every new composition by Avet Terterian amazes, enters this world as a revelation. It is always an event in the musical life, both in our country and abroad. For me, a “rencontre” with Terterian’s music is every time a source of deepest emotions, a precious breakthrough out to other time and space.
Sophia Gubaidulina, 1989
… the symphony deals wholly in monolithic and austere ritual gestures, minimalist in material whilst maximalist in rhetorical power.
Times, 1994
Avet Terterian’s symphonism have shifted the hardened layers of tradition, setting free the creative thinking, awakening talents, human souls.
M. Roukhian, Musikalnaya Akademia, #1, 1996, Moscow