Born in Armenia, Ara Vartanian obtained a Doctorate from the Yereván State Conservatory, where he worked extensively as a teacher and performer.

His extensive repertoire as a soloist also includes a series of concerts entitled "Anthology of Sonatas for Violin and Piano", performed with pianist and harpsichordist Elena Otieva, which includes about fifty sonatas, the history of this genre in masterpieces.

He has been a soloist with the "Violin Ensemble" and the RTV Symphony Orchestra of Armenia. On the advice of the conductor, Emin Khachaturian, and under his guidance, he began to take his first steps in the field of conducting.

At the "Romanos Melikyan" conservatory, he created the "Violin Ensemble" and the "Chamber Orchestra". In 1991, he founded and directed a professional ensemble, the chamber orchestra "Zvartnotz", an ensemble known for its action in favor of orphans victims of the Armenian earthquake of 1988.

In April 1992 he moved to Spain and in September of that same year he got a place in the Philharmonic Orchestra of Málaga. At the same time, he developed an intense work of pedagogy and orchestral direction, to implement his ideas on the importance of the large orchestral repertoire and chamber music in the education of young musicians, concretizing his activity through creation of various orchestral ensembles and the performance of numerous concerts. Since 1995, he has also been requested as a teacher to teach violin and chamber music with the Youth Orchestra of Andalusia.

In 1999, with Elena Otieva, he created the "Centro Experimental de Estudios Musicales". This institution has a large number of students, several chamber and orchestral ensembles, the "Solistas de Málaga" Chamber Orchestra and the CEEM Symphony Orchestra.

He has conducted many masterpieces such as Beethoven's 5th, 6th and 7th Symphonies, Tchaikovsky's 6th Symphony, Dvorak's Symphony No. 9 "From the New World", Rimsky-Korsakov's "Scheherazade", “Noches en los jardines de España” and “El Sombrero de tres picos” de Falla. He has accompanied numerous concerts for different instruments and orchestras by Mozart, Mendelssohn, Tchaikovsky, Strauss, Khachaturian and Falla, among others.

It is worth mentioning the 5 annual performances "Conciertos en Familia" with Fernando Argenta, as well as in concerts of choral and lyrical repertoire in the Auditorium DE Falla in Granada, Madrid, Marbella, etc., Mozart's Requiem, "Carmina Burana" by C. Orff, Cantatas and "Passion according to Saint Matthew" by Bach, several Lyric Galas of "La Traviata", "Carmen", "Dido and Aeneas" and Christmas and Easter concerts. With the CEEM symphony orchestra, he has been invited several times to the International Festival of Young Orchestras in France Eurochestries and to Choral Music Festivals. In 2013, he created and conducted "Le Chœur du CEEM" in all his concerts until the temporary shutdown related to COVID19.

From the 2010s until Christmas 2019 every quarter, he organized CONCERTS-MARATHON of 10-12 hours of duration, where all the students and teachers of the CEEM, the musicians and the guest choirs played.

During the Malaga Film Festival in 2019 he directed with the program of the Soundtrack "Super-Galaxy-Story". In Samuel Alarcón's documentary on the life of Goya "Oscuro y Lucientes", he recorded the orchestral part of the soundtrack of the Malaga composer Eneko Vadillo.

Soon, together with young musicians from Malaga, they will also perform "Cosi fan tutte" by Mozart and Concert Monographique "by Malaga composer Antonio Rozas.

CEEM students and orchestras, in addition to a very high number of concerts, have successfully participated in numerous competitions and musical events. They also joined several conservatories in Europe and America, obtained teaching positions in several conservatories in Andalusia and several of them founded their own new study centers.