Music of Georgia

Participant: Nino Tsitsishvili

Since 1996 Dr Nino Tsitsishvili has been affiliated with the School of Music-Conservatorium, where she gained her Masters and PhD degrees. She is currently an Honorary Research Associate. Nino has undertaken extensive research into the music of Georgia, the former Soviet republic near the Black Sea. Her research initially focused on traditional music of rural communities but it has been extended to include popular music, jazz, hip-hop, rock and other sub-genres.

Nino has published articles on topic that involve anthropological, political and social perspectives such as gender and music (in Ethnomusicology), music and cultural politics of the Middle Eastern-related duduki music (Journal of Musicological Research), and UNESCO’s Intangible Heritage projects and Georgian cultural nationalism (Music and Politics), (forthcoming), and a chapter in the book Urban Cultures, Urban Futures: City Culture and City Planning in Georgia, edited by Kristof Van Assche, J. Salukvadze, and N. Shavishvili. Mellen Press. Georgian version: Tbilisi: Tbilisi State University Press.

Currently, Nino is completing an edited book project, Cultural Archetypes and Political Change in the Caucasus, contracted by Nova Science Inc Publishers, New York. Nino has contributed several entries on Georgian popular music for The Encyclopedia of Popular Music of the World, to be published by The Continuum International Publishing Group Limited, UK.

Nino has performed and taught Georgian traditional choral music in Australia as well as the UK, France, USA, and Canada since 1996, individually and with the ensemble of Georgian music ‘Golden Fleece’. The ensemble produced a CD with Move Records in 1999.