Saint Ephraim Male Choir – that celebrates its 15th birthday this year - is inviting the public to enter the refreshing and enchanting realm of Byzantine music in an exceptionally beautiful venue, the St Stephen's Basilica in Budapest.

Within the framework of the sixth season of the Orientale Lumen series Saint Ephraim Male Choir on April 22nd at 8 pm in Budapest’s St. Stephen Basilica gives an Orthodox Easter concert togehter with an outstanding and unique Georgian male choir, Iberi, who are on UNESCO’s list of Oral and Intangible Masterpieces of Humanity.

Blokes in black coats and boots, with rows of cartridges on their chests, long knives on their belts. Not an invasion force, but singers. Gorgeously rich, shifting blocks of improvising harmony, sometimes with wild, crowing falsetto over the growling basses and soaring tenors.

As Georgian culture has become more city-centred and pop-influenced its unique polyphonic singing has been seen as threatened, and it’s on UNESCO’s list of Oral and Intangible Masterpieces of Humanity, but a new wave of singers are embracing it.

The outstanding vocal group Iberi (in ancient times Georgia was called Iberia) performs in Hungary for the first time.
Saint Ephraim Male Choir founded in 2002 specialized in Greek, Russian and Hungarian Byzantine music. Today, it is the most acclaimed vocal group in the country, renowned for quality performances.

The exceptional abilities of its members enables the choir to choose from a wide selection of repertoire, indeed. They have sung together with such well-known performers as the King's Singers, Márta Sebestyén, the Budapesti Fesztiválzenekar and the choir of the Moscow Patriarch and also in the presence of the Moroccanprincess, Lalla Salma.

On 22nd April at their Orthodox Easter concert the Saint Ephraim Male Choir apart from Easter folk songs will sing pieces of Boksay, Ljudkevics, Ligeti and Zombola.

Tickets - adult: 3500 Ft,
Student/pensioner 2500 Ft – can be bought via www.jegymester.hu or on the premises.

More: http://szentefrem.hu/