St Mary’s Byzantine Catholic Church in New York City will have a celebration of the Divine Liturgy of St John Chrysostom, with music by Roman Hurko, this coming Sunday, June 2, at 6:00 p.m. The Liturgy will be sung in English and Church Slavonic; the church is located at 246 East 15th Street, and the event is free and is open to the public. This is fourth and final part of the church’s current program of classical Slavic Church music, presented in the context for which it was written, as the music of the Divine Liturgy, giving the congregation the opportunity to be immersed in the experience as part of their worship.
A member of the Composers’ Union of Ukraine since 2004, Roman Hurko began writing music while still in high school; his first composition, “Ave Maria” for SATB choir, was premiered by the Toronto Mendelssohn Youth Choir, at the Guelph Spring Festival in 1983. A graduate of the University of Toronto (Music History and Theory), as well as the Yale Institute of Sacred Music (Masters of Arts in Religion), he has also studied privately with composer Ivan Moody in Portugal. In the fall of 1985, he co-founded the St Evtymyj Youth Choir at St Nicholas Ukrainian Catholic Church in Toronto. Hurko soon began setting parts of the liturgy for his choir, and in 1999 decided to complete and record the entire Divine Liturgy of St. John Chrysostom, to commemorate the second millenium of Christianity. He has composed and recorded five major pieces of sacred music: three complete settings of the Liturgy of St John Chrysostom, as well as a Panachyda (Requiem) for the Victims of Chornobyl, and Vespers.
Hurko’s setting of Kindly Light from Byzantine Vespers.
The music will be performed by St Mary’s choir-in-residence, the Theoria Chamber Choir, directed by Andrew Skitko, Artistic Director/Conductor. Mr Skitko earned his bachelor’s and master’s degrees in Music at Westminster Choir College, and has performed with the world’s leading conductors and orchestras at venues such as Carnegie Hall and Lincoln Center. He sings regularly with several choirs, and is a cantor for the Byzantine-Ruthenian Church; he is also an alumnus of the Studium Carpatho-Ruthenorum of the University of Presov, Slovakia, having completed courses in Carpatho-Rusyn history, language, and culture. He has studied Russian choral music and conducting at St. Vladimir’s Orthodox Seminary with maestro Vladimir Gorbik, musical director and conductor at the Moscow Representation Church of the Holy Trinity-St. Sergius Monastery, and has participated in the PaTRAM Russian-American Music Institute.
The backdrop for the choral event is sure to just as inspiring. St Mary’s Byzantine Catholic Church is one of the most unusual religious buildings in Manhattan and provides a beautiful venue for the program of Slavic Liturgical Music. For more information call 212-677-0516, or visit https://www.stmarybccnyc.org/.
