Biography




Lena Chamamyan is a Syrian-Armenian singer, one of the few Eastern women who write, produce, play instruments, and sing. She sings mainly in Arabic, Armenian and other languages such as Syriac, English, French and Italian.


Lena lent her voice to a number of TV series and dramatic works in Syria and abroad: Nizar Qabani series, Grandmas Tattoos (a Swedish-Armenian movie), Behind the Mirror (an Algerian-French movie)

She also actively contributes to many cultural endeavours, such as the initiative to catalogue Syrian music and the radio programme Douzana.



Themes and Style


Through her music, Lena revives folkloric songs (Syrian, Armenian and Lately Bahraini) with modern styles and arrangements, creating a link between oriental classical music and contemporary world music.


This style is embodied in her first two albums, Hal Asmar El-Lon and Shamat, which Lena collected traditional folkloric songs from the Levant and re-mixed them. She shows off her full range of musical skill in her third album Ghazal El-Banat to become one of the few eastern women who write, produce, play instruments, and sing.


Since she met Gksel Baktagir in 2013, Lena Chamamyan and Maher Sabra affected by his music, they lead their lyrics over some of his compositions. Thus, new songs were born joining some of Lenas compositions in a new album, so called LAWNAN (2 Colours). 


The written lyrics are in Arabic. As in her previous albums, Lena offers her audience a revisited Armenian folk song. Moreover, the audience will explore Lena’s new scat singing. The album is a challenging musical work gathering emotions, creativity and energy.

Lena is leading some projects about revisiting the folk music in several Arabic countries.



Education


2002 - Graduated from the Economic Management Department at Damascus University.

2007 - Graduated from the Higher Institute of Music in Damascus as a soprano dramatic singer.



Awards


2005 Egypt - The Cultural Resource Price

2006 Paris - The first Monte Carlo music award

2007 Syria - The best Young Arabic Woman Voice on the Radio

2008 Austria - Rated five stars as a world music singer by Austrian media

2010 UAE - Ranked among the 500 most influential Arab figures in the Arab society



Albums


2006 - Asmar Ellon 

2007 - Shamat

2013 - Ghazl El Banat

2016 - LAWNAN

- Lately, Lena is working on occidental with each of the composer and the pianist Andr Manoukian including a variety of languages: Arabic, Armenian, Syriac, French and English.



Achievements


- In 2014, Lena Chamamyan was invited, as a jury member and a special guest, to the international contest for Armenian music Tsovits Tsov at the Kremlin Theatre- Moscow, gathering for the first time multiple style of the Armenian music from all over the world.


- Considered as the Syrian ambassador spreading the Jasmin voice of Damascus on prestigious international venues: Kremlin Theatre (Moscow), Zorlu Performance Centre, Yildiz Palace & Istanbul Congress Centre (Istanbul), Barbican Theatre (London), Victoria Hall (Geneva), Roman Theatre (Amman), National Theatre (Bahrain), Kampnagel-Hamburg (Germany), Beiteddine Festival (Lebanon), Saint Georges Hall (Liverpool), Berwaldhallen (Stockholm).


- Specialized in Armenian classical school of singing with the Armenian Opera singer Arax Tchekidjian.


- Collaboration with: Maestro Valter Sivolotti (Italy), Jan Akkerman (Holland), Gksel Baktagir (Turkey), Andr Manoukian (France), Gloria Schalchi (Italy), Manfred Leuchter (Germany), Carmen Villata (Italy).