Hayedeh

Hayedeh came to singing through the classical avaz tradition, a student of the composer Ali Tajvidi, and entered through Radio Tehran's Golha programs, the vetted center of mid century Persian music. Her voice was a true contralto, rare in Persian pop, and she carried the formality of avaz into three minute songs without diminishing either. She left Iran six months before the revolution and never went back; she sang for the audience that had also left, in London and Los Angeles, until she died the day after a concert. Her grave at Westwood Village Memorial Park has become a place of pilgrimage for the diaspora.