Summer in Azerbaijan

Caspian Sea shore

As summer arrives in Azerbaijan, and the temperature in the capital city Baku soars, then the lure of the surrounding countryside increases exponentially. Even the smartest city folk jump into a car or bus at a moment´s notice, and head for the country´s beaches or forested mountains.

With the improving road system, travelling is fast becoming quick and comfortable; favourite destinations can be reached very easily indeed. Choose between a day trip or a longer stay, go wild camping in luxuriant meadows, or get pampered in 5 star world class luxury hotels, the choice is yours depending on just how close you want to be to nature.Because I like to travel in Azerbaijan, and have done for several years, Azerbaijani people often ask me where my favourite place is in their country. Maybe they secretly hope it will be the village home of a favourite grandparent! Faced with such a tremendous choice of destinations, often special to me for very different reasons, I try to visit each in turn, and with each visit try to explore just a little further than before. Travelling here always reveals special moments and, without exception, I feel totally privileged to be a guest in this most amazing country. A wonderful feeling results, both energising and uplifting. So please, take yourself out of Baku, and chill… You will return so refreshed that you can tackle the heat head-on.

The First Eastern Opera "Leyli and Majnun"

Uzeyir Hajibeyov and his wife Maleka in 1926

Leyli and Majnun was first performed on 12 January 1908 (25 January in the modern calendar). Ninety-five years later the opera remains a popular fixture in the repertoire of the Azerbaijan State Academic Opera and Ballet Theatre.

Uzeyir Hajibayov made Azerbaijani opera history when he composed Leyli and Majnun. The opera is based on Azerbaijani mugam and folklore, which gives it originality and endears it to audiences.

Birth of an Opera

Shusha, 1898: a 13-year-old boy watches a dramatization of the story of Majnun at Leyli’s Tombstone. He is astonished at the performance of the amateur actors. That boy was Uzeyir Hajibayov. Remembering the occasion, the great composer wrote: "That performance affected me so much that when I came to Baku years later, I decided to write something like that." So, Leyli and Majnun was born in the heart of 13-year-old Uzeyir in 1898.

The opera’s first director was Huseyn Arablinski and its first conductor was Abdurahimbey Hagverdiyev, a famous Azerbaijani writer. All the parts were played by men, as at that time women were not allowed to perform on stage.

STONE TALE OF BAKU

They say even the walls help make a home… They are familiar and strong supports. They promise cosiness and safety. This can be said of both house and whole city walls.

300 years ago Baku was surrounded by a double set of walls on the landside, and a single wall separated it from the sea. Before joining the Russian empire, the city was practically fully enclosed within its fortified walls and surrounded by a deep moat. But Baku has “escaped” from the fortress, expanding beyond it and continues to grow. And the old part of the city, Icheri Sheher (Inner City) has remained a historic reserve, where people come to enjoy the silence, the gorgeous primeval architecture and to find out more about the roots. There are monuments to antiquity everywhere in Icheri Sheher- the mosques, baths and the simple houses. But even the walls that embrace the old city deserve special attention.

Mstislav Leopoldovich Rostropovich

Born on 27 March 1927 in Baku, Azerbaijan, Mstislav Rostropovich began musical studies in early childhood with his parents. His mother was an accomplished pianist, and his father a distinguished cellist who had studied with Pablo Casals. At the age of sixteen he entered the Moscow Conservatory where he studied composition with Prokofiev and Shostakovich. In 1945 he came to prominence overnight as a cellist when he won the gold medal in the first ever Soviet Union competition for young musicians. Thereafter, despite his continued battle with the communist authorities, he became one of the central figures of the music life there, for twenty five years inspiring Soviet cellists, composers and audiences alike.

Due to international recording contracts and foreign tours, Mstislav Rostropovich also came to the attention of the West. He recorded nearly the entire cello literature during this time and attracted an unprecedented large quantity of new repertoire for the instrument through his personal contact to composers such as Benjamin Britten, who wrote his Cello Symphony, his Sonata for Cello and Piano and the three Suites for Solo Cello especially with Rostropovich in mind. Other composers who have written for Rostropovich include Prokofiev, Shostakovich, Khachaturian, Boulez, Berio, Messiaen, Schnittke, Bernstein, Dutilleux and Lutoslawski.

DID YOU KNOW THAT?

WELCOME!

We are greeting you with typical Azeri hospitality. 

We come from an extraordinary country called Azerbaijan. Some people say it is in Europe, others say it is in Asia. Well, both are right as one fourth of this little country falls into Europe and the rest into Asia. The country borders Turkey and Armenia in the west, Georgia and Russia in the north, Iran in the south and the Caspian Sea in the east. The sea is also extraordinary. It is called a "sea", but in reality it is the biggest lake in the WORLD.

You are going to find a lot of interesting facts about Baku and Azerbaijan here! Why read pages of boring stuff, you can learn much more in a few minutes! 

It is time to brief you on the wonderland Azerbaijan.