Well, we noticed that from the beginning. What unfolded was a crushing avalanche of music at maximum intensity, poured relentlessly over the listener. From the very first note to the final outburst, it was an overwhelming barrage, executed with machine-like precision and utterly flawless, leaving little room, little air, to process what was happening.

Tigran and his three virtuosic companions operated like a hyper-charged, overclocked robot, their technical prowess stretching the limits of the believable. The band performed works from the album The Bird of a Thousand Voices and some new stuff, surpassing even the fiercest storms we’ve come to expect from the Armenian masters. And yet, cutting straight through the intimidating jazz-rock storm, through the odd meters, the merciless arrangements with hammering drum blows (Arman Mnatsakanyan) doubled by subterranean bass tones (Marc Karapetian), there remained that unmistakable lyrical voice from the slopes of Mount Ararat.

Tigran’s dizzying piano runs were shadowed continuously and seamlessly by multi-instrumentalist Yessaï Karapetian on synthesizer and flute, whose fleet-fingered playing matched the bandleader’s every twist and turn. Layered atop this came bursts of collective spiritual chanting and etheric voices.

Unsuspecting visitors, who had wandered in thinking they were attending a jazz concert, staggered out gasping for breath. The die-hards pushed through the purgatory and stayed for the finale, which erupted into audience participation, a standing ovation, and an encore: an ultra-fast sixteenth-note sprint in which every musician emptied the last reserves of their energy.

Dazed, overwhelmed, and slack-jawed, the audience drifted out of the hall, and then out of the building, half-breathless, wondering what on earth they had just witnessed.

Line-up: