Laurent Boutros: Apatride, An Armenian in Paris

Description

Laurent Boutros (b. 1964, Paris) is a French-Armenian composer and guitarist whose oeuvre is shaped by a unique confluence of cultural heritages. Drawing on Armenian, Eastern, and Mediterranean traditions, his music embodies a dialogue between ancestral memory and contemporary expression. The guitar, in Boutros’ hands, becomes both a personal diary and a vessel for cross-cultural storytelling.
A student of the Argentine guitarist and composer Raúl Maldonado, and a frequent collaborator with artists such as Renaud Garcia-Fons, Jean-Louis Matinier, and Bijan Chemirani, Boutros developed a style that transcends idiomatic boundaries. His compositions are neither folkloric pastiches nor nostalgic reconstructions; rather, they inhabit a poetic middle ground where modal landscapes, rhythmic asymmetries, and melodic fragments coalesce into evocative narratives. The admiration expressed by Canadian-Armenian filmmaker Atom Egoyan for Boutros’ work attests to its cinematic quality and emotional depth.
The collection Apatride. An Armenian in Paris brings together a wide selection of his works for solo guitar—many of which are recorded here for the first time—illuminating themes of displacement, identity, and memory. Whether through intimate vignettes or broader programmatic structures, Boutros explores the experience of exile not only as a historical condition but as an aesthetic category: an emotional space where music becomes a form of belonging.

Chanson Trilce
Published by Productions d’Oz, Canada
The title Trilce is a neologism coined by the Peruvian poet César Vallejo—an amalgamation of “triste” (sad) and “dulce” (sweet)—and also the title of one of his most enigmatic poetic collections. Inspired by the expressive contradictions inherent in this invented word, Boutros offers a lyrical and introspective piece, rich in nuance and subtle harmonic shading.

Easter Waltz
Published by Productions d’Oz, Canada
Composed in April 2020, during the early stages of the COVID-19 pandemic, this piece was dedicated to the young Italian duo Fabio Bussola and Irene Sachetti. It offers a sense of lightness and renewal, serving as an antidote to the gloom of the period. The waltz, while simple in its melodic contour, carries a profound emotional resonance, marked by hope and resilience.

L’Apatride
HL 27170 Paris
The title of this waltz, meaning “stateless,” evokes the story of the composer’s grandmother, who arrived in France in 1925 bearing documents that identified her as an apatride. The music, conceived as a cultural patchwork, weaves together melodic and rhythmic elements drawn from diverse traditions, offering a poignant tribute to those who, like Boutros’ ancestors, navigate the labyrinth of exile in search of belonging.

Les Échelles du Levant
HL 26654 Paris
This piece takes its title from the historical term échelles du Levant, referring to the network of Mediterranean port cities that facilitated trade between Europe and the East, from Florence to Jerusalem. The work is dedicated to the composer’s father, who was born in Aleppo, and it functions as a musical bridge between Orient and Occident. The structure and harmonic language of the waltz reflect this cultural duality, balancing modal inflections with Western lyricism.

Vals for Atom
Published by Productions d’Oz, Canada
Dedicated to the Canadian-Armenian filmmaker Atom Egoyan, this waltz was composed for the Italian guitarist Giorgio Albiani. The piece blends the nostalgic idioms of early 20th-century Parisian musette with melodic gestures that evoke Armenian folk music. The result is a poignant homage, both intimate and cinematic in character.

Tryptyque
HL 26871 Paris
This suite comprises three short preludes—Chanson de l’arbre mort, Prélude Ciel, and Prélude Terre—that form a symbolic triptych centered on the human condition. The central metaphor is that of the human being as a tree linking Earth (represented by binary rhythms) and Sky (represented by ternary rhythms). Through subtle changes in texture and meter, Boutros evokes a cosmological vision that is both poetic and philosophical.

Comme un rêve (Unpublished)
Dedicated to guitarist Antonino Ielo, Comme un rêve alternates lively dance-like passages with more contemplative, dreamlike sections. This contrast, characteristic of Boutros’ compositional language, mirrors the dual nature of memory and reverie, suspended between motion and stillness.

Suite Caucasienne
HL 27169 Paris
Composed in 1999 for Italian guitarist Filomena Moretti, Suite Caucasienne is a large-scale work structured in four movements and lasting approximately 17 minutes. Traversing symbolic geographies—from the shores of the Sea of Marmara to the historic city of Tbilisi (formerly Tiflis)—the suite is conceived as a musical fresco.
The two inner movements, titled Pour Aram, pay tribute to Aram Khachaturian. Here, Boutros approaches the guitar orchestrally, evoking the timbres of traditional Armenian instruments such as the kanun, dehol, and duduk.
In the third movement, Journal d’Istiklâl, the composer recalls an improvisational encounter with a saz player near the Bosphorus, weaving the memory into a texture of modal color and rhythmic asymmetry.
The final movement, Tiflis, is dedicated to the legend of a king who, while hunting with a falcon in the dense forests of the Caucasus, discovered the hot springs that would give rise to the city of Tbilisi—a poetic gesture that anchors the music in ancestral memory.

Aérienne (Unpublished)
Written in 2020 for Guitare Classique magazine at the request of guitarist Valérie Duchâteau, this introspective and lyrical piece is marked by an atmosphere of suspended time. Its slow tempo and suggestive melodic line serve as a delicate tribute to Duchâteau, who passed away on 22 November 2024.

Trois Danses Populaires Arméniennes
HL 26040 Paris
This work presents three character pieces, each based on a traditional Armenian dance and distinguished by its own distinct metric and geographical reference.
Kotchari, in 2/4, is a plains dance characterized by its grounded rhythm and communal energy.
The Fishermen’s Dance, in 5/8, evokes the sea and carries a fluid, wave-like quality.
Finally, Chalakho, combining 6/8 and 3/4 meters, brings a more festive and extroverted spirit. The harmonizations remain simple, allowing the modal flavor and rhythmic identity of each dance to emerge with clarity.

Du Haut des Montagnes
HL 27878 Paris
This short didactic suite explores the theme of the mountain as a metaphor for inner and outer ascent. Drawing on modal idioms, the work integrates pedagogical clarity with poetic imagery, making it accessible yet expressive.

Annalisa
Published by Productions d’Oz, Canada
Marked by a light, summery character, Annalisa is inspired by Latin musical traditions. Joyful and effervescent, the piece invites the listener to embrace life with a smile—an example of Boutros’ ability to blend Mediterranean warmth with refined guitar writing.