PaTRAM™ Goes To Serbia With 2021 In Sight

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After careful consideration and weighing the options of how best to achieve the recording of PaTRAM’s next landmark CD, Rachmaninoff’s “All-Night Vigil”, to be sung by a 60 member all-male choir under the leadership of Maestro Vladimir Gorbik, we have decided to produce the album in magnificent SERBIA. Additionally, a live concert tour and the singing of Divine Liturgies in several Serbian cities are on the slate along with the recording.

With the blessings of the key hierarchs of the Russian and Serbian Orthodox Churches and through the tireless work of our partners in Serbia, most notably Milan Acimovic (conductor of the Belgrade Choir), the PaTRAM executives embarked on a 10-day scouting mission in Serbia.

Co-Founder and Chairman, Alexis Lukianov; CEO, Tatiana Geringer, and Co-Founder and Artistic Director, Katya Lukianov, visited Serbia and neighboring Bosnia, scouting out locations and laying the groundwork with government authorities, church hierarchs and clergy, music industry representatives and other partners for PaTRAM’s plans to record their CD and perform in front of live audiences at several different venues around the country. With invaluable assistance from Mr. Acimovic and Deacon Vladimir Rumenic, who were both singers on PaTRAM’s upcoming CD, “More Honorable Than the Cherubim”, and new friends and partners, the group had an extremely busy schedule but was also able to make pilgrimages to a variety of different Orthodox sites.

We will share highlights of their journey, which began on October 9th, in the coming weeks in this space. We also invite you to follow us on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter and LinkedIn to see more stunning photos, learn about our trip and our exciting plans for 2021.

DAY 1:

The PaTRAM team arrived in Belgrade on October 10th and began their pilgrimage to holy sites in the Serbian capital. Still under construction and, as such, not allowing photography inside the building, the magnificent St. Sava Cathedral is clearly an architectural beauty. The interior features incredible mosaics and should be completed soon. The team was allowed into the completed lower level of St. Sava’s where services are already being held.

Also on the agenda was a visit to St. Mark’s Cathedral. Another architectural beauty that is actually the new version of the original, wooden church (built in 1835). The “new” church was built during WWII (1931-40) and divine services begun in 1941.

The day was not complete without a visit to ancient Kalemegdan Fortress and Park with panoramic views of the new city and the convergence of the Danube and Sava Rivers.

DAY 2:

The day began with the team attending Divine Liturgy services at the beautiful St. Alexander Nevsky church in Belgrade. Alex and Katya Lukianov sang the Divine Liturgy with the all-male and mixed choirs. The original church was built in 1877 and enlarged in the early 1920s, delayed by WWI in the late 1910s. It was completed in the late 1920s.

Also, on the agenda was a trip to Miljkovo Monastery where St. John of Shanghai and San Francisco was tonsured. This is important because, as many of our readers know, it was St. John, who ordained Father Valery Lukianov, Alex’s Lukianov’s father and to whom PaTRAM’s current CD “Blessed Art Thou among Women”, is dedicated. It was a real blessing for the PaTRAM team to visit the 15-century monastery and venerate St. John’s relics.

A surprise on the agenda was a late evening visit to Tumane Monastery, which houses the relics of both St. Zosim and St. Iakov as well as a Wonderworking Kursk Mother of God icon. We learned that 10,000 pilgrims had visited the monastery that day and immediately decided that we too would return in June with our choir to sing Liturgy in this very holy place. It was too dark to photograph this beautiful 14th-century monastery, but here are some photos from their website.

DAY 3:

PaTRAM CEO describes, “Serbia-Croatia-Bosnia! An incredible journey to neighboring Bosnia via Croatia. The team arrives to beautiful Banjaluka. The photos are of the newly built Christ the Savior Cathedral housing the most incredibly beautiful mosaics we have seen. This was a labor of love and deep prayer. The Cathedral was rebuilt after the original Cathedral was destroyed in WW2. Meeting with the Deputy Mayor and his colleagues not featured in this post. We are awaiting the official photos. Banjaluka is a place of where one feels welcome from the first moment. We cannot wait to return and share our music!”

Follow us on these pages in the coming weeks as we travel with the PaTRAM team through other parts of Serbia and Bosnia.