New York, USA
“Nicholas II” Orthodox Choir
- Conductor Adrian Fekula
- Festival Music Edict 2021
The “Nicholas II” ensemble is a men’s choir from New York, USA, dedicated especially to performing Russian sacred music. In its current form it was founded in 2017 - the centenary of the fateful events of Russian history of 1917.
The 1917 revolution, the abdication of the Tsar and the civil war that followed drove a large part of the Russian population into exile. This ensemble is a direct heir to the religious and cultural traditions of those first émigrés. Most of the choir’s members are of Russian, Ukrainian or Belarusian descent. All the members are Orthodox, most speak Russian, and Orthodoxy, Russian culture and music are close to all their hearts. The choir’s mission is to preserve old Russian traditions as well as to keep alive the new ones created outside Russia during the 20th and 21st centuries.
While the choir in its present form dates from 2017, the ensemble has a prehistory going back to 2015, when the Prince Vladimir Youth Association, an organisation connected with the Russian Orthodox Church Outside Russia and dedicated to connecting and uniting Russian youth abroad, founded a mixed choir in New York.
Soon after its founding, the St Vladimir Youth Choir gave its first performance in 2015 at the St Vladimir Memorial Church (a church dedicated to the millennium of the Baptism of Rus’) in New Jersey. After several performances in 2015, the choir set off on its first international tour in 2016, visiting Kyiv and other Ukrainian cities. The choir gave concerts in the caves of the Kyiv Pechersk Lavra, the Pochaiv Lavra, the Monastery of the Holy Saviour near Chernivtsi and several other places in Kyiv. Although the group was made up of amateurs, the choir was praised for the high level of professionalism and spirituality of its singing.
Shortly after the Ukrainian tour, the choir decided to become a men’s choir.
In 2017 the choir visited the Russian Federation for the first time. The group toured St Petersburg, singing the Divine Liturgy in St Isaac’s Cathedral and the Church of St Alexander Nevsky and giving several concerts. One of these concerts was held in the hall of the St Petersburg Theological Academy.
Also in 2017 the choir had its first experience of the warm hospitality of the Serbian people in the USA. In connection with the celebration of the canonisation of St Mardarije, the organisers invited the St Nicholas II choir to sing the All-Night Vigil under the patronage of His Holiness the late Patriarch Irinej in Libertyville. Their performance at the Music Edict is their first in the Republic of Serbia.
Conductor
Adrian Fekula
Adrian Fekula is the conductor of the “Nicholas II” choir. He works in finance, but studied music in high school and college. He studied conducting with Professor David Harris at the College of the Holy Cross in Massachusetts, where he was also assistant conductor. Adrian Fekula is currently assistant conductor of the choir of the Synodal Cathedral of the Icon of the Mother of God of the Sign in New York - the centre of the Russian Orthodox Church Outside Russia.
