Orthodox chants have been part of the Orthodox Divine Service for many centuries. Through unique, heavenly art, they reveal the transcendental essence of life.
At the creation of our Church there was no choir, and individual singers, known as acolyte, took part in the Church Service. These were people that knew Liturgy singing before they came to Canada. The first, and a very good singer at that, at the old Church on Trinity Street was Dimitar Stoyanoff. After him acolytes were Chris Balkoff, George Traicheff, Petar Popkrasteff and Lazar Bosheff. They sang in the new Church, as well. Following them for a short period an acolyte was Sido Doncheff. In 1965, Simeon Marcheff became Sunday singer and remained as such for full 20 years. During this time, Church singers in the weekdays were presbytera Elisaveta Dimitrova (1966-1973), and presbytera Zlatka Popova (1974-1985).
The first Choir at the Sts. Cyril and Methody Cathedral was formed in 1927 and its first conductor was Mr. Benou Beneff. Later Father Haralampi Elieff organized a Church Choir for the Divine Service at the Cathedral. Conductors were: 1941 – Panovsky; 1942 – V.Kukuruza; 1944 – Yoshkevich; 1945 – Dr. Kozaruk; 1946 – N.Huravsky; from 1948 to 1946 – V. Mihailichenko; 1965 – I. Chaus; 1965-1966 – Y.Dimoff; from 1966 to 1971 – M.Milusheff; from 1971 to 1975 – N.Naneff; and from 1975 to 1985 – S.Marcheff.
In 1985, Father Ivan Minchev was selected as a priest and presbytera Lili Mincheva took part in the Church Service as an acolyte.
Today the Church Choir sings chants for the Morning and Divine Liturgies at the Cathedral. Members of the Choir are volunteers.
From April 2017, the Church Choir of our Cathedral has a new choir master - Svetlina Vasilkova, who has graduated from Pleven Music School and Plovdiv Academy of Music, specializing in choral conducting and musical pedagogy.
Svetlina is very enthusiastic and has a great desire to increase the number of singers in the church choir, as well as to achieve new, higher levels of performance and quality of the church chanting.
Everyone, who can sing and have a desire, can join the church choir at the Cathedral.
