Moscow Synodal Choir performs new sacred music at Christmas Fest.

MOSCOW, January 10 (Itar-Tass) -- New pieces of sacred music were
presented at the First Christmas Festival of Sacred Music, which opened in
the Russian capital on Sunday evening. A prominent conductor and violinist
Vladimir Spivakov and Metropolitan Hilarion Alfeyev, who is also known as
a composer of sacred music, put forward the idea of the festival.
The Moscow Synodal Choir began a concert with famous pieces of sacred
music by Alexander Kastalsky and Sergei Rachmaninov and then performed not
popular or absolutely new pieces of sacred music. Nikolai Golovanov's
sacred music has made a greater part of the Sunday concert. In the Soviet
times he was the chief conductor at the Bolshoi Theatre and was unknown as
a composer of sacred music. More and more scores of his sacred music are
found now. Conductor of the Moscow Synodal Choir Honoured Artist of Russia
Alexei Puzakov contributes much to the revival of Golovanov's heritage of
sacred music. The suite "Joy of all who Sorrow" was performed for the
first time among Golovanov's ten sacred pieces at the concert.
The discovery for the broad audience was a modern famous Russian
composer Alexei Rybnikov's concert for the choir and organ "The Light of
God is Everlasting", which was performed at a Catholic cathedral six weeks
ago. A powerful oratorio was welcomed with loud applauds.
Rybnikov told Itar-Tass that he considers the foresaid concert as a
piece of secular music. "There are icons for the church and there are
secular pictures with the sacred plot, so, I consider my music as secular,
where I express my speculations," the composer noted.
The audience also welcomed loudly the liturgical chants composed by
Metropolitan Hilarion Alfeyev. These liturgical chants were composed five
year ago and are performed at the Divine Liturgies now, particularly at
two Moscow churches and at a cathedral in the Vienna eparchy, which
Hilarion Alfeyev had headed for several years.
Five festival concerts, which are held at the Svetlanovsky Hall of the
Moscow International House of Music, represent various Christian
traditions, ancient and new pieces of sacred music. "I would like this
festival to turn into a place of meetings between the human soul and the
world of beauty, between various Christian spiritual cultures, between the
musical culture of the Christian East and the Christian West,"
Metropolitan Hilarion told reporters before the concert.
The Choir of the Holy Echmiadzin Cathedral of the Armenian Apostolic
Church and the Serbian Choir in honour of St. Stephen of Dechani from the
city of Novi Sad will perform in Moscow for the first time on January 14.
A concert by the Choir of Westminster Abbey conducted by James O'Donnell
is one of the highlights of the festival. The Choir of the Sretensky
Monastery of Moscow will give a concert on January 19. The National
Philharmonic Orchestra of Russia led by Vladimir Spivakov and the Petrov
Choir of the Academy of Choral Art will give a closing concert of the
First Christmas Festival of Sacred Music in Moscow on January 23. The
National Philharmonic Orchestra of Russia will perform Igor Stravinsky's
Symphony of Psalms, Leonard Bernstein's Chichester Psalms and Metropolitan
Hilarion Alfeyev's Christmas Oratorio.
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