By Azernews

By Laman Ismayilova

National Music Day in Azerbaijan is celebrated on September 18 each year. The date is the birthday of Azerbaijan's prominent composer Uzeyir Hajibayli. The composer has had an invaluable contribution to Azerbaijani and world music.

Public and cultural figures have visited the grave of the great composer, Azernews reports.

Culture Minister Anar Karimov, Rector of the Baku Music Academy, People's Artist of the USSR and Azerbaijan Farhad Badalbayli, Rector of the Azerbaijan National Conservatory, People's Artist of Azerbaijan Siyavush Karimi, Director of the Azerbaijani State Academic Philharmonic Society, People's Artist Murad Adigozalzada, Director of the International Mugham Center, People's Artist Murad Huseynov, Head of the Azerbaijan State Choir, People's Artist Gulbaji Imanova paid tribute to Uzeyir Hajibayli.

In his speech, Anar Karimov praised Uzeyir Hajibayli's contribution to the musical culture who raised Azerbaijani music to the global level.

He noted that the Azerbaijani state has always paid great attention to the composer's legacy.

People's Artist Farhad Badalbayli and Siyavush Karimi stressed Uzeyir Hajibayli's merits in the development and promotion of national musical art.

Further, the participants in the event laid flowers at the graves of prominent figures of national musical art including Uzeyir Hajibayli, Bulbul, Muslim Magomayev, Niyazi, Gara Garayev, Fikrat Amirov, and others.

Uzeyir Hajibayli laid the foundation of a national musical style. He was the first composer of an opera in the Islamic world.

The opera Leyli and Majnun (1908) is based on traditional folk music and dance, musical genres that relied on oral traditions.

Furthermore, the composer wrote his second opera Sheyx Sanan, Rustam and Sohrab, Asli and Karam, Shah Abbas, Khurshudbanu and Harun and Leyli entirely based on the national folk music elements, primarily mugham.

He also composed three comedies including, Husband and Wife (1910), If not this one, that one (1911), and Arshin Mal Alan (1913).

Arshin Mal Alan or The Cloth Peddler was the latest and one of the most popular operettas of the eminent composer.

The operetta has been successfully performed in a plethora of languages in over 60 countries of the world, including in the U.S., Austria, France, China, Greece, India, Russia, and Turkey.