At a young age, he began taking a liking for music and would sing old Kurdish folk songs that were passed on through generations. He worked as a mercenary soldier in the French Foreign Legion for nearly 15 years.[4] He married Yeva of the Azizyan family in the Syrian city of Qamishli, where he was a legionnaire in 1936.[5] They had four daughters and a son. He and his family migrated to Armenian Soviet Socialist Republic and settled in Yerevan in 1946.[3] He formulated his experiences of the genocide.[6] Karapete Xaço worked for the Kurdish language service of Yerevan Radio[4] and was popular among the Kurdish people.