MUSIC IS ETERNAL

Alakbar Tagiyev is a composer who can rightly be called a national composer of Azerbaijan. Each of his songs is a little love story: for a woman, for the motherland and for people. They touch everyone, because this is music that touches the soul and pierces the heart with simultaneous joy and sadness. Shades of emotion can change, and only when the melody is over do you realize that you are full of pride because you yourself are a particle of our country, too, you have a relationship to this fantastic music and feel strongly about how much it belongs to us.

Only a God-given talent, which this great man had, can create so much, although "had" is not quite the right word, for memory is a haven where souls live forever. That the soul of Alakbar Tagiyev was remarkably pure and good can be felt in each of his songs. We learned from the story of the composer's son Xaliq Tagiyev that his romantic nature was based on a foundation of solid principles and harmonious views on life.

Despite the national love and timeless popularity of Alakbar Tagiyev's tracks, there is still very little information about him. Even the almighty Internet provides only a couple of links and only a few lines of general information about his life and death and the number of songs written. His son explains this by the fact that Alakbar Tagiyev himself was an extremely modest man who was only proud of the fact that many of his works were considered folksongs. "So I have achieved the main goal - to get my songs into the hearts of people and make them dear to them," the composer remarked

Fate or God's gift?

The family in which Alakbar Tagiyev grew up was big, friendly and poor. Alakbar Tagiyev was the youngest of six brothers and sisters. To help his parents, the 14-year-old decided to celebrate his 16th birthday two years early in order to be able to get a job. He corrects his date of birth in documents from 1924 to 1922 and goes to work as a court secretary. Yes, not only did he love music from childhood - he could not live without music, but at that cruel time, he could not afford to think about the beautiful and high - he just had to survive.

Completely surrendering to work, Alakbar was so successful in his "career" that he entered the Soviet Correspondence Institute of Law, after which he began working as an investigator in Goycay. Alakbar Tagiyev's total work experience in the Prosecutor's Office was 30 years! And he had a lot of solved crimes to his credit. Yet fate decreed that Alakbar should become a composer, even if not immediately and after sad and mysterious events.

Alakbar Tagiyev married early - it was the love of his life, he intuitively understood that when receiving the blessing of his fiancee's parents and explaining to them the need to stage "the kidnapping of the bride". Just like Robert Burns, he was caught in the net of "love and poverty", but he decided to fight for his happiness and not to give in to fate. And he was not wrong, because after going through poverty and tragedy, his family remained the brightest oasis and refuge for him. Alakbar repeatedly recognized that only through the love and support of his wife, did he manage not to surrender to circumstances, which, incidentally, were initially cruel to the young couple. The death of their two firstborn boys was a real blow to Alakbar. He could not understand why God was punishing him and felt terribly miserable, and when his wife gave him daughters, he gave them men's names: Akifa and Arifa. Alakbar's mother, who deeply felt the grief of her son, however, was a wise woman. It was she who persuaded him that everything in this life was the will of God and, wishing to comfort his soul, she took him to a holy place. And a real miracle happened there: Alakbar gradually began to recover. All the more so during the visit to the holy place, a completely unknown woman predicted imminent joy for Alakbar - the birth of his son after which the life of his family would radically change for the better.

So it happened. Soon a boy was born into the Tagiyev family, and he was named Xaliq. But the most amazing thing is that shortly after his birth, Alakbar was given the gift to write music. He was so happy and impressed that he wrote music almost constantly. If he did not have time to write down what he had on his mind, he just sang the melody into a tape recorder, and after coming home after work, he noted it down and made an arrangement.

So appeared the first song written by Alakbar Tagiyev in Goygol where he lived with his family. It was the song Qonsu Qizi, which almost immediately became popular and was soon performed by Zeynab Xanlarova on television. Alakbar was really lucky to meet good people: it was his friend, the famous musician Akif Bakixanov, who showed the song to Zeynab Xanlarova. And then, he introduced his friend to other potential performers of his songs.

Copper pipes

It was with the help of Akif Bakixanov that Alakbar Tagiyev started to work with Zeynab Xanlarova, Nisa Qasimova, Mammadbagir Bagirzada and Kamala Rahimli. His collaboration with the singers was not limited solely to the fact that he gave them music. Alakbar Tagiyev gave his all to everything he did. Therefore, he was everything for the singers: a producer, a manager and, to use modern parlance, a sponsor. Alas, these professions did not exist at the time, but Alakbar Tagiyev did not work to earn money and a title - he simply could not do otherwise. He put a piece of his soul not only into his music, but also into his work with everyone who performed it. He made these singers popular, practising everything with them - from the manner of performance to gesture and from semi-tones to tones.

Gradually, Alakbar Tagiyev's songs became more and more popular and were performed by Rasid Behbudov, Sovkat Alakbarova, Sara Qadimova, Rubaba Muradova, Islam Rzayev and Flora Karimova.

Interestingly, many of Tagiyev's songs became "popular" during his lifetime, in all senses of the word: they were often performed without mention of the name of the songwriter. The paradox is that the composer himself took this fact philosophically, considering that everything was the will of God, although, of course, there were objective reasons for such rare "anonymity". First, Alakbar Tagiyev had no musical education, which is why he was not accepted in the Union of Composers of Azerbaijan. This explains the cautious attitude towards his work. And if he offered five or six of his songs to the arts council, without which it was impossible to achieve anything, at best only two retained the name of Alakbar Tagiyev. Maestro Niyazi and composer Tofiq Quliyev, who highly respected and supported Alakbar Tagiyev, refused to tolerate this injustice. Thanks to their efforts, the composer Alakbar Tagiyev was accepted into the Music Foundation of the USSR, thus winning recognition as a professional composer.

Rules of life

What pleasantly surprises us, especially now, is that Alakbar Tagiyev was not blinded by the rays of glory. On the contrary, he remained devoted to his family till the end of his days and adored his wife. He always said that it was thanks to his family that he managed to achieve success. At the same time, he always remained the undisputed head of this family whose word was law for all. He never raised his voice at his wife or children, but one look of the husband and father was enough for his loved ones to understand his "no", which was perfectly fair every time. Despite his tight schedule, Alakbar Tagiyev always found time for his family and every summer, he travelled outside Azerbaijan with his wife and children. The Tagiyevs often began their journey from Batumi and then set off to travel the expanses of the vast Soviet country.

The composer's friends and relatives talked about his striking sincerity, while the view of life and principles, which Alakbar Tagiyev held, were admirable. For example, he always said that "a man of true culture will never squander himself on trifles, because his task is to work for the people."

Alakbar Tagiyev called money "an indicator of man's essence", pointing out that the "filthy lucre" cannot spoil or improve anybody. But money can reveal a person's character best of all and, for this reason, someone who gets richer becomes an even greater villain, while someone else tries to do good through philanthropy.

Alakbar Tagiyev, who himself became quite a wealthy person, did not forget about his childhood even for a day, bringing up his children to respect ordinary workers. He often travelled to the Oil Rocks, because, first, he wanted to experience the challenges faced by oil workers, and second, to feel the inspiration and then sing the praises of their work in the song Xazar Oglu, although, by and large, all his songs were written under the influence of real life events.

He taught his children to follow not those who praised and flattered them, but those who were able to show them their errors, because only the truth can help to correct them. At the same time, he treated people with infinite patience, following, like Saint-Exupery, the rule: "You are responsible, forever, for what you have tamed." True, in Alakbar Tagiyev's interpretation, this famous phrase sounded a bit different: "If you share bread with someone, know its price. Even if they let you down once, forgive them. If they let you down twice, forgive them again. But the third time, just go away, without judging them, because you cannot explain true values to anyone who is not able to understand them."

Alakbar Tagiyev did not understand men who lived in depression and complained of life (he forgave women a lot). He said: "Life is like traffic lights: sometimes, when there is a danger or difficulty, you can stop, but only to think about how to move forward. And move on when the green light is on." And finally, Alakbar Tagiyev had "the rule of five no's": "Do not be shy, do not lie, do not trust, do not regret and do not be surprised."

Conclusion 

No wonder they say that a truly talented person is talented in everything. Alakbar Tagiyev was a brilliant lawyer, a wonderful composer and a man with a great soul. Throughout his life, Alakbar Tagiyev dedicated himself to becoming a worthy son of his country. He managed it. His songs are now known far beyond the borders of Azerbaijan: Arzu Qizim, Sana Qurban, Istayiram Goram Sani. His San Galmaz Oldun (and not just this song) became an object of envy and litigation, and not only concerning Armenian claims. The fact that Alakbar Tagiyev was an excellent and competent lawyer helped him to win all lawsuits for copyright protection of all his songs. People still return to Alakbar Tagiyev's songs. It is no surprise that his songs in new arrangements are performed not only by Azerbaijani but also Russian, Turkish and Moldovan singers. And we are confident that his music will last forever.