Tigran Hamasyan, the pianist giving jazz an Armenian twist

Somewhere, there's home-movie footage of a three-year-old Tigran Hamasyan at his childhood home in rural Armenia. He is listening to Black Sabbath's Paranoid and freaking out on a toy guitar. "That was my childhood ambition," he laughs. "Still, to this day, if I could become a killer guitar player in a couple of years, I'd quit playing the piano and start learning now. I'd love to front a thrash m