Karine Gilanyan was born in 1981 in Yerevan in family of musicians. From her very childhood she showed her outstanding creative abilities in music, painting and literature (her flight of fancy and eloquence, in particular, were brightly reflected in her story “Planet of Ice”, published in “Elitarnaya gazeta” dated March 25, 2000). In 1987 K. Gilanyan entered the Tchaikovski Republican Specialized Musical School for gifted children (the piano class by N. Aharonyan) and in 1998 graduated from it with distinction and in the same year she entered Komitas Yerevan State Conservatory to Professor Yavryan’s class. In 2003 K. Gilanyan accomplished her study at the Conservatory with honour and an assignment to postgraduate study. Nowadays she is a post-graduate student of Yerevan Conservatory (class by Professor Yavryan) and a concertmaster at the faculty of string instruments. Also in 2004 she entered Luebeck Music High-school in , the class of Prof. James Tocco. From April 2005 she will continue her study in .
In 1995 K. Gilanyan was awarded a diploma of Competition of young performers “Amadeus”. In 1996-1997 K. Gilanyan attended speciality master-class given by Professor of Hamburg Conservatory M. Weber, who came to Yerevan for summer months, and in 2003 and 2004 she attended ensemble music master-class given by Professor M. Egelhof () and in 2004 she had several lessons given by Prof. Volker Banfield from Music High-school in Hamburg, .
K. Gilanyan has since her school years constantly performed both as a soloist, and at summary, anniversary concerts in Yerevan and in Armenian regions, as well as abroad – in Hungary and Italy. The pianist is also fond of ensemble music. During her study at the Conservatory she repeatedly performed in that area of music. Yet she has included an ensemble composition into the program of one of her solo concerts. “It was an unexpectedly pleasant surprise to hear Hindemit’s Sonata for Trombone and Piano in K. Gilanyan’s solo concert. This is a fine chance for showing the student’s wide performing abilities”. (“Make way to young generation” by G. Shagoyan, magazine “Muzikalnaya Armenia” № 2 dated March 2000).
The program of K. Gilanyan’s performances is remarkable for variety of different styles. She is equally skilled in music both by classics, romantics, impressionists and by modern composers. And this is no wonder because of her brilliant technical abilities and her skill to penetrate into a complicated lyric and psychological sphere of the compositions. Owing to Karine Gilanyan in Armenia first time were performed Alfred Schnittke’s “Improvisation and Fugue” and some etudes of Gyorgy Ligeti.