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About Optina Pustyn Male Choir: The Optina Pustyn male choir was founded in the Dormition Metochion of the Optina Pustyn monastery in St. Petersburg in 1996. On September 15, 1996, on Anthony and Theodosius of Kiev feast day, the first znamenny liturgy was celebrated. Besides ancient Russian one-voiced chants, various types of Russian polyphonic chants were performed at the service: strochnoye singing, znamenny polyphony and early partsong, as well as chants from Orthodox cantatory traditions — Greek, Serbian, Bulgarian and Georgian. At services the choir sings according to the 17th century ‘Kievan znamya’ that synodic one-voiced song books are printed in. The absolute majority of composers, including P.I. Tchaikovsky and S.V. Rachmaninoff, based their sacred music on chants from those books. Besides decipherments of ancient Russian polyphony, the choir performs their own and composer versions of church chants, as well as the most outstanding works by church composers. The singing tradition that has been e
