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The Armenian-born soprano, Sona Gargaloyan, began her piano lessons at the age of 7 in Aslamazyan music school. Later, she turned to vocal music and chorus direction, attending the special Choral Association of Armenia. She studied at the Komitas State Conservatoire under the well-known soprano Professor Gohar Gasparian obtaining the Master Diploma with distinction. Following decision by the Examination Committee she was named “Opera and Concert Soloist and Singing Professor”.
Sona Gargaloyan sang in concerts and recitals at the State Opera and Ballet Theatre of Armenia. She also interpreted on stage the principal roles in Verdi’s La Traviata and Donizetti’s Lucia di Lammermoor. She appeared as a soloist in the celebration concerts of the 2004 Cyprus’ accession to the European Union and the 50th anniversary of the Cyprus Republic in 2010 respectively. In 2006, in the main hall of Unesco in Paris, she performed Luciano Berio's Folk Songs accompanied by the Ensemble Philharmonia under the direction of Spiros Pisinos. She repeatedly performed as soloist with the Cyprus Symphony Orchestra.
Sona Gargaloyan repeatedly performed as soloist with the Cyprus Symphony Orchestra, including a performance at the inauguration ceremony for the re-opening of the Nicosia Municipal Theatre in 2006, where she interpreted the role of Gilda in Verdi’s Rigoletto. In 2007, she appeared in the concert series Tribute to Armenia and in 2008 in an extensive “Community Outreach Programme”. In the Easter concert 2010 of the Cyprus Symphony Orchestra «A Musical Pilgrimage Across Five Continents» she interpreted works including the first Cyprus premieres of Gustav Mahler's Symphony No. 4, Des Knaben Wunderhorn and Heitor Villa-Lobos' Bachianas Brasileiras No. 5.
Sona Gargaloyan has collaborated with conductors Aram Katanian, Vigen Tchartchoglian, Majei Zoltowsky, Haig Utidjian, Karen Durgaryan, Vardan Hakobyan, Edward Higginbottom, Spiros Pisinos and Sedrak Yerkanyan. She is very active in events involving the reunification of the two communities (Greek Cypriots and Turkish Cypriots) and has participated in many concerts both in the South and the North of Cyprus the most spectacular of which ‘Hands Across the Divide’ in the Pallas Theater in 2010, where only women musicians took part. She has also given concerts in Germany, Italy, Malta, France and Greece.
Moreover, Sona Gargaloyan has more than fifteen years of pedagogic practice and has revealed and supported several young talents. She is a singing lecturer in the Music Department of the European University Cyprus. |
