Peyman Heydarian

Born in Shiraz, Iran, Dr. Peyman Heydarian is an award-winning computer scientist and santurist. Peyman learned Persian music under the supervision of music masters, such as Mojtaba Mirzadeh and Pashang Kamkar. His main instrument is the santur. He developed his own performance style and adopted innovative tuning systems and techniques to play a multi-ethnic repertoire on the instrument. Peyman has taught music and signal processing courses at different universities and has established and presided over a number of musical societies and bands, including the Music Association of Iranian Students (1998) and the National Iranian Students Orchestra (1999-2004).

Since 1982, he has performed in Iran, USA, Canada, Syria, Jordan, Turkey, Greece, Italy, Hong Kong, Poland, the UK, and New Zealand. Peyman has been composing and recording music for films, including a Getty Film project “Axis of Light” and an Aljazeera TV film “Lover Boys”. His PhD was on developing algorithms for automatic recognition of dastgàh / maqàm in audio musical signals. He is currently researching the possibilities of pushing the boundaries of the Persian music and santur performance; and developing computational algorithms for music recommendation, in the University of Waikato, New Zealand.

Due to the Coronavirus pandemic, Peyman was not able to travel to the UK to perform in this Oxford Lieder Festival concert in person. He was however able to lead the band remotely. He also recorded “The Road to the Sea” on the santur and, “Sufinameh” with vocalist, Parastoo Heydarian, which are available to watch in the Oxford Lieder Festival Digital Concert Hall.