The Chikovani Family Musical Ensemble
The Chikovani family musical ensemble history goes back to the love story of Zurab Chikovani and Iphigenia (Ito) Sharashidze who were in the same year at Tbilisi Medical University and, therefore, were colleagues as well. Zurab played the piano very well, and Ito played the guitar. Their children still remember the fascinating and enchanting impression that the parents’ singing created when, deeply moved by listening to the famous Georgian songs “Suliko” or “Tsitsinatela” they would even start crying. The natural musical gift and the influence of the parents contributed to the willingness to sing in the elder children, Marika and Gigla. For the father who had passionate love for music and singing this became an additional motivation to work professionally with the children. Zurab Chikovani had already formed a vocal ensemble together with his friends while attending the Conservatory that aimed to collect and popularize national Georgian songs. The creation by him of the family musical ensemble undoubtedly pursued the same goal. The father taught his children both national Georgian and classical Georgian and foreign songs. He mastered full piano scores and accompanied his children himself. The music classes were often not without tears for the young children wanted to play and have fun too. The father was consistent and exacting. As a result, Marika and Gigla were 7 and 6, correspondingly, when they first found themselves on the stage and the songs they performed, among which were Georgian songs, as well as the Italian “Cucarello”, the Ukrainian “Susidka” and the Russian “Lake Baikal” soon became popular.
The children were prize- and gold medal winners of many events and school competitions. In this period of their life they, together with other children, performed in Moscow and participated in the all-USSR central TV program “Flowers of Georgia”. The third child in the family, Eka, also turned up to be musically gifted and she asserted herself a place beside her siblings on her own initiative, so to say. At one of the concerts she slipped away from her mother in the audience, ran up on to the stage where Gigla and Marika stood and asked her father to let her sing her favourite song. At the cordial request of the audience Eka performed a song from a famous children’s movie, thus starting her participation in the family ensemble. All the family – the father, the mother and the three children first sang together in 1969, when they made their debut in the “Iavnana” program of the Georgian central TV. The birth of the fourth child, Gvantsa, marked a new stage in the musical creativity of the Chikovani family. The three-year-old Gvantsa together with the family performed a popular song “Suliko”, then sunk in obscurity, singing the solo part.
All the members of the family had musical education that together with hard professional work enabled them from the young age to perform the most sophisticated choral pieces of music without any musical accompaniment. Among the pieces they sang were “The Evening” by Pfeil from the repertoire of the Czech musician and conductor Josef Ratil, “The Song of the Sword” by Carl Maria von Weber, “The Thunderstorm” by Cezar Kewy, “The Hunters’ Song” by Alabiev, “Waiting for the Spring” by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart and many others.
The creativity of the family is based and founded on the Georgian music, folk songs, and the Tbilisi city folk songs. This includes songs the authors of which are Zurab and Gigla Chikovani themselves and also those composed by Georgian composers and other talented music amateurs. The family ensemble repertoire includes the masterpieces of the famous Georgian folk song music of all the provinces of Georgia: “Ia da Vardo Tamaro” of Kakheti, naduris (kind of a folk song) of Guria, Samegrelo and Abkhazia, “Rikhi” of Kartli, mgzavruli (journey songs) of Imereti and many others.
The family ensemble rehearsals were an agreeable daily activity, especially when the children of the family grew up and became adults. For two or three hours the family would be absorbed in music not aware of the time passing. These were the hours filled with humour, jokes, tranquility, and delight both for the family members and for those who surrounded them. Apart from active musical creativity, the family led everyday life too, each of its members doing their everyday work, their daily routine. The life was full of issues, sadness, moments of great sorrow,
alternated with joy and happiness, the way life is generally. But the natural gift for music, the deep and passionate love for music and singing and the highly cultured milieu were the powerful vigour that helped the family endure the hardships and obstacles.
While on stage the Chikovani ensemble took part in numerous concerts, international festivals of amateur ensembles and TV and radio programs in Georgia and beyond the borders of the republic too, performing in both large and small concert halls of the former Soviet Union. In 1982 they gave a solo concert at the Art House in Moscow. In 1972 they performed twice in the Hall of Columns in Moscow, first, participating in the opening concert dedicated to the USSR trades union convention of the medical workers and the next day, giving a solo performance, at the urgent request of the convention delegates. The family ensemble had been sent to the convention concert in Moscow by the Georgian trade union of medical workers as the father and the mother of the family both were doctors themselves. The Chikovani family ensemble performance was a great success followed by a thunderous and prolonged applause. Many in the audience had tears in their eyes. The ensemble was given a great ovation that would not stop, and despite the very precise time limit, the ensemble had to sing an encore. It should be noted, that from all the participants of the opening concert the Chikovani ensemble was the only one invited to give a solo concert. In 1982 at the analogous forum at the request of the convention delegates and with the decision of the organizers all the opening concert was given by the Chikovani family ensemble. These were cases that had no precedent in the history of the similar forums and in the long history of this famous hall and it also was a tremendous and highly memorable success of the Georgian family ensemble.
The participation in the state concert at the Tbilisi Z. Paliashvili Opera and Ballet Thearte is also an unforgettable memory, being the first appearance on stage of the four-year-old Gvantsa, then so little that the guitar would almost completely cover her when she took it to her family from the backstage on to the stage. The family ensemble performed Pfeil’s famous song “The Evening”, their performance being of an individual manner, in the romance style. The song had been performed without any musical accompaniment before. The performance was followed by a storm of applause. The ensemble members can never forget the strange sounds that accompanied the ovation. They turned out to be the sounds of the strings struck at the string instruments – the delighted orchestra members saluted them from their seats.
The musical evening dedicated to the 104th anniversary of the great Georgian writer and public figure Ilia Chavchavadze in the Mossovet State Theatre in 1980 was also very special and unforgettable. Almost all the famous vocal and choreographic ensembles and solo performers from Georgia took part in the musical evening. The Chikovani family sang two songs at the end of the concert, one composed on the poem of Ilia Chavchavadze “Gakhsovs, Turpav” and the other one – a Russian folk song “The Steppes”, revised by the ensemble. The delighted audience gave them a prolonged applause. Later, the supervisor of the theatre company gathered the company members and told them to perform the Russian song the way the soloist Gigla Chikovani and the family sang it.
The ensemble gave charity solo concerts in the Georgian State Philharmonic Hall in 1986 to aid the natural disaster victims in Georgia, and in 1992 to help the refugees from Abkhazia.
One can say with certainty that every appearance of the Chikovani family on the stage was of great influential power. People listening to them often had tears in their eyes and the smile of joy on their faces. The ensemble often got letters from their fans. Poems written in different languages were dedicated to them.
The ensemble appeared in numerous TV programs both in Georgia and in the former USSR. The Soviet central TV made a film about the family. Their musical creativity is precious part of the gold archives of both the Georgian and the Soviet radio. It is regrettable that the family ensemble despite being invited many times (among them, to former Yugoslavia and former West Germany) never performed beyond the borders of the former USSR though their songs were
broadcast by the Eurovision channel, and not only once. The West German LBL “Sonart” recorded five songs of the ensemble and included them in the anthology of Georgian folk songs issues be the LBL. In 1984 the Soviet LBL “Melodia” issued a gramophone record of their songs. In 1999 an audio cassette with the songs of the Chikovani family ensemble was issued, and in 2006 the LBL “Sano Studio” issued a CD “ The Chikovani Family Songs”.
The Chikovani family episodically appeared in a well-known Georgian film “Several Interviews on Private Issues” made by the famous Georgian producer Lana Ghoghoberidze representing a generalized character of an unanimous family where the act of singing creates an atmosphere for the peace of mind and inner harmony.
The Chikovani family has often hosted events of international value in their own house where the guests were introduced to the traditions of the Georgian feast (supra). Zurab Chikovani, a passionate lover of music and poetry is an excellent tamada (toastmaster at the Georgian supra) as well. At various times the family hosted the participants of the Tbilisi jazz festival in 1986, with the famous musician Oleg Lundstrem among the guests. At the request of the guests each were presented with an autographed record of the Chikovani family ensemble. The family also hosted the guests of the international symposium of psychiatrists, the managers of the German LBL “Sonart”, an American family that arrived in Tbilisi under the aegis of the Soviet-American friendship in 1988, and many other guests.
The Chikovani family ensemble is a family where the two main traits of the Georgian nation – patriotism and tolerance, the truly democratic values are combined in perfect harmony.