Tonin Harapi

Tonin Harapi (9 June 1926 – 30 July 1992) was an Albanian composer, pianist and teacher.¹ He was one of the major figures of twentieth-century Albanian classical music and was associated with the first generations of professional Albanian composers trained after the Second World War.²

Harapi was born in Shkodër, a city with a strong musical tradition, and later studied at the Artistic Lyceum of Tirana and the Tchaikovsky Conservatory in Moscow.³ He became a professor of composition at the Conservatory of Tirana, where he trained later Albanian composers.⁴

His output included opera, operetta, choral works, orchestral music, chamber music, piano pieces, romances, children’s songs and arrangements of folk songs.³ His final large work, Requiem, was premiered after his death and has been described by the National Theatre of Opera and Ballet as a unique work in the Albanian musical repertoire.³

Harapi was born in Shkodër on 9 June 1926.³ He grew up in a musical environment shaped by Shkodër musicians such as Palokë Kurti, Frano Ndoja, Martin Gjoka, Mikel Koliqi, Zef Shestani and Prenkë Jakova. According to the National Theatre of Opera and Ballet, several of these figures were also among his early teachers and conductors in the musical formations in which he participated as a young musician.³

He studied at the Jesuit Papal Seminary in Shkodër before the post-war communist authorities suppressed religious institutions and restricted clerical cultural activity. After the Second World War, Harapi continued to study piano and composition partly as an autodidact. In 1947, he resumed formal studies at the Artistic Lyceum in Tirana, where he studied with musicians including Lola Gjoka, Tonin Guraziu and Kostandin Trako.³

In 1959, Harapi was allowed to pursue higher studies at the Tchaikovsky Conservatory in Moscow. He remained there for about two years, before returning to Albania during the period of Albania's break with the Soviet Union.³ After returning, he completed his professional formation in Tirana and became active in the country's developing system of higher musical education.

Harapi was a teacher of composition at the Conservatory of Tirana, later part of the University of Arts, Tirana.⁴ He became one of the key figures of the composition department and taught several generations of Albanian composers.⁵

Composer Thoma Simaku studied composition under Harapi at the State Conservatory of Music in Tirana. In a 2018 interview, Simaku recalled that Harapi had studied at the Moscow Conservatory and described him as a teacher who allowed students a degree of creative freedom despite the restrictions of the communist period.⁶

Harapi composed in almost all the main genres cultivated in Albanian classical music during the socialist period. His works included the children's melodrama Kufitarët, the children's operetta Mësimi i pyllit, the children's tale Djali guximtar, the opera Zgjimi, 19 romances, instrumental works for orchestra and chamber music.³

His music is often associated with lyricism, direct melodic writing and the use of Albanian folk-inspired material. Piano Classics describes Harapi, together with Simon Gjoni and Çesk Zadeja, as part of the first generation of professional composers from Albania, who studied abroad and then returned to Tirana to shape the country's musical life during decades of cultural isolation.²

A 1982 article in Contact: A Journal for Contemporary Music described Harapi as one of Albania's prolific composers and discussed works such as the choral suite Vullnetarët, the opera Zgjimi and his Second Rhapsody for piano and orchestra.⁷

Harapi's piano works form an important part of his output and have been recorded outside Albania. The album Këngë: Albanian Piano Music, Volume 1, performed by pianist Kirsten Johnson, includes seven short piano works by Harapi: Romance in A-flat major, Valle: andante con moto, Nji dhimbje e vogël ("A Little Pain"), Valle: allegro vivo, Romanze in A minor, Moll' e kuqe top sheqere ("A Candied Apple") and Waltz on a Popular Theme.⁸

Johnson's second Albanian piano album, Rapsodi: Albanian Piano Music, Volume 2, includes Harapi's Sonatina, Këngë mbrëmje ("Evening Song") and Theme and Variations.⁹ Johnson describes Harapi as highly regarded in Albania and notes that his output includes operas, works for choir and orchestra, songs, a string quartet, a piano concerto and numerous solo piano pieces.⁹

Harapi's Requiem was his final large-scale work and was performed only after his death.⁵ The National Theatre of Opera and Ballet describes it as one of his most important vocal works and as a unique work of its genre in the Albanian musical repertoire. The work is divided into 24 parts and was first performed by the National Theatre of Opera and Ballet on 3 June 1999.³

The work returned to the stage in 2022, when artists of the National Theatre of Opera and Ballet performed a concert programme centred on Requiem and other works by Harapi.¹⁰

Harapi received several prizes and titles during his career. He held the title Artist i Merituar ("Artist of Merit"), and after his death he was awarded the title People's Artist of Albania.⁹³ On 4 May 2016, President Bujar Nishani posthumously awarded him the Honour of the Nation Decoration.³⁴

In 2018, the University of Arts in Tirana organised a week of activities in honour of Harapi. The programme included concerts of his instrumental and vocal works, and the inauguration of a lecture hall bearing his name.¹¹

Since 2019, a concert hall at the "Jordan Misja" Artistic Lyceum in Tirana has carried Harapi's name.⁴¹²

• Kufitarët – children's melodrama³
• Mësimi i pyllit – children's operetta³
• Djali guximtar – children's tale³
• Zgjimi – opera³
• Vullnetarët – choral suite¹³
• Second Rhapsody – for piano and orchestra¹⁴
• Requiem – for soloists, choir and orchestra³
• Sonatina – for piano⁹
• Theme and Variations – for piano⁹
• Këngë mbrëmje – for piano⁹
• Nji dhimbje e vogël – for piano⁸
• Moll' e kuqe top sheqere – for piano⁸
• Waltz on a Popular Theme – for piano⁸

• Këngë: Albanian Piano Music, Volume 1, Kirsten Johnson, piano, Guild GMCD 7257; includes Harapi's Romance in A-flat major, Valle: andante con moto, Nji dhimbje e vogël, Valle: allegro vivo, Romanze in A minor, Moll' e kuqe top sheqere and Waltz on a Popular Theme.⁸
• Rapsodi: Albanian Piano Music, Volume 2, Kirsten Johnson, piano, Guild GMCD 7300; includes Harapi's Sonatina, Këngë mbrëmje and Theme and Variations.⁹
• Albanian Piano Music, Marsida Koni, piano; includes Harapi's Ja gëzimi kthen përsëri.²