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The National Chamber Orchestra of Armenia (NCOA) will start its spring season with a concert with the participation of legendary French accordionist Richard Galliano on March 5, at 7:00 pm at Aram Khachaturian Concert Hall (Artistic Director and Principal Conductor: Vahan Mardirossian), the press service of NCOA reports. 

The concert will feature Vivaldi’s Four Seasons, Piazzolla’s Four Seasons in Buenos Aires and Galliano’s Opale Concerto (for accordion and chamber string orchestra).

Galliano will perform with the National Chamber Orchestra of Armenia at Mezzo Club in Yerevan on March 4, at 9:30 pm.

Richard Galliano was born on December 12, 1950 in France.

He was drawn to music at an early age, starting with the accordion at 4, influenced by his father Luciano, an accordionist originally from Italy, living in Nice.

After a long and intense period of study (he took up lessons on the trombone, harmony, and counterpoint at the Academy of Music in Nice), at 14, in a search to expand his ideas on the accordion, he began listening to jazz and heard records by the trumpet player Clifford Brown. "I copied all the choruses of Clifford Brown, impressed by his tone and his drive, his way of phrasing over the thunderous playing of Max Roach." Fascinated by this new world, Richard was amazed that the accordion had never been part of this musical adventure. In this period, Galliano won twice the first prize in the "world accordion cap competition" which took place in Spain (1966) and France (1967). In the Spanish competition, the participants' duty work was "Chaconne" by the Israeli accordionist Yehuda Oppenheimer. Galliano and Oppenheimer kept up their musical collaboration and personal friendship until Oppenheimer's death in 2012.

Some later collaborations include George Mraz, Brigitte Fontaine, Al Foster, Juliette Greco, Charles Aznavour, Ron Carter, Chet Baker, Enrico Rava, Martial Solal, Miroslav Vitouš, Trilok Gurtu, Jan Garbarek, Michel Petrucciani, Michel Portal, Eddy Louiss, Biréli Lagrène, Ivan Paduart, Anouar Brahem, Wynton Marsalis, and Toots Thielemans. He was a key member of Claude Nougaro's band for several years as a pianist and accordionist.