Besti Sevdiyeva

Sevdiyeva Besti Sevdiyar gizi was born in 1958 in Baku, Garadagh district. Having a great interest to the national Azerbaijan mugam she started to study mugam from the early ages and worked in the art house. Besti Sevdiyeva became laureate in 1973-1975 in the mugam contest “Okhu tar” held in Baku.

Firstly she performed when she was 17 on the scene of the Azerbaijan State Philharmonic society named after Muslim Magomayev in the concert of the popular artist of Azerbaijan Islam Rzayev. In 1977 she entered the Azerbaijan State Institute of art named after M.A.Aliyev and graduated from this institute in 1982.

She got education from the popular artist, prim-a-tenor Lutfiyar Imanov at the institute and during her education learned and performed Italian and Russian romances, also arias of Azerbaijan operas written by Azerbaijan composers. Besides, she got mugam classes from the popular artist Gulu Asgerov and Djanali Akperov during her education at the institute. Mugams as “Mirze Huseyn segahi”, “Rast”, “Rahab”, “Humayun”, “Bayaty Gajar” in her performance recorded and are saved in the Azerbaijan State Television Foundation.

Also khanende performed a lot of folk, ashyg songs, tasnifs. Khanende together with trio named after Jabbar Garyagdioglu and folk instrumental ensemble named after Bakykhanov has been on tours in many regions of Azerbaijan and in foreign countries as Germany, Turkey, Vietnam and Russia. Besti Sevdiyeva is now a teacher at the Azerbaijan State University of Art and Culture and also performs on the scene of the Azerbaijan State Opera and Ballet Theater. Besti Sevdiyeva was awarded to the rank of the honored artist of Azerbaijan in 2008.