Successful Performance of “Shen Joan Kukuzeli” Byzantine Choir of Chanters in Nis of Serbia.
The Music Edict Festival, which is the 8th International Church Music Festival, was organized in Nis of Serbia from 20th to 23 rd of June 2021. The main goal of this festival is to build bridges of friendship between peoples through culture, music and art. Part of this festival was “St. Joan Kukuzeli” Byzantine choir of chanters from the Archiepiscopate of Tirana, Albania, which is supervised by Maestro Theodhor Peci.
This festival was organized to honor St. Costantine the Great, the emperor, as well as the signing of the Edict of Milan by this Emperor, who proclaimed the freedom of Christian faith.
Nis, which is also the hometown of St. Costantine the Great, has an important position in the Christian map. It is the intersection point with the old Roman road to Constantinople and also the link between the East and the West.
The Music Edict Festival has been held six times so far, every two years since 2009. Over one hundred music ensembles from different countries took part in it. This year, the artistic and religious activity was professionally and carefully organized working out every detail. Special hospitality was offered by His Grace Arsen, Metropolitan of Nis and by Ms. Sara Cincarevic, the music conductor and the main organizer of the festival.
The festival lasted for four sequent musical evenings and was held in the complex of the Holy Trinity Cathedral of the city. The choirs which participated this year came from the United States, Russia, Bulgaria, Poland, Lithuania, Georgia, Albania, Romania and Serbia. They professionally performed religious music in their own native languages.
St. Joan Kukuzeli Byzantine Choir of Chanters performed for about twenty minutes on the evening of the 21st of June. The various church hymns were sung in Albanian and were carefully selected from a repertoire of composers such as Petro Lambadhari, Joan Protopsalti, Gjerasim Kanelidhi, Partheni, the Hieromonk and Theodhor Peci.
The Byzantine Choir from Albania, which was the only one that performed in the Byzantine monophonic style, had a special success and was long applauded by the spectators. The dignified performance of this choir spoke for the tremendous effort put in the field of psaltic art in Albania during a long time, promoting therefore the achievements and the hard work which is done under the leadership of Archbishop Anastasios in all the fields in the last three decades.
At the end of such an impressive event, everyone left with the best impressions, more friends and the hope to meet again at other activities in the future.
