Coronado’s best, and least known, ensemble Musica Vitale held its first concert in the Coronado Library’s reading room ten years ago. It was to have been a one time event to raise funds for the victims of Hurricane Katrina. The reaction of the audience convinced Elena Vizuet, who organized the fundraiser, that there was an audience for the rich body of Eastern and Western European choral music that she had loved since childhood.
Last Friday the classical choral group celebrated it’s Tenth Anniversary with a concert at Sacred Heart Church. It was an all Russian program full of songs of devotion, renewal, remembrance and love.
It featured Sergey Rachmaninov’s “Liturgy of St. John Chrysostom” and “All Night Vigil,” and a work by Georgy Sviridov, a late twentieth century choral music master, “Pushin’s Wreath,” a choral cycle using the words of Alexander Pushkin, Russia’s best-known and most beloved poet.
“It is the music that speaks most to me,” she said. She had studied music in her native Russia before moving to Coronado to marry.
The ensemble is made up of professional singers, many of whom sing with the San Diego Opera. Vizuet has been a member of its chorus for 14 years and has appeared in a number of minor roles.
The concert began with the performers in the choir loft singing “Old Buddhist Prayer” by Lili Boulanger. Vizuet noted that the composer, renowned for her sacred music, was not Russian. True, but Boulanger’s mother was a Russian Princess.
The song was part of what might be called the sacred portion of the program. It begin with Monsignor Dennis Shahean leading the audience in the Lord’s Prayer and ending with the choir singing Rachmaninov’s “Hail Mary.”
Some 150 people filled the pews at Sacred Heart Church, where Vizuet serves a choir director.
While Musica Vitale began in Coronado and has performed in a number of local churches, including St. Paul’s and Christ Episcopal, it has a large following throughout San Diego County. A number of people joined locals for the anniversary concert.
“I love what they do,” said Ann Evans, who first heard Musica Vitale perform at her church, All Souls in Point Loma, three or four years ago and has been following the group ever since. “I’m a fan,” she said.
The Irving Gill church was hot and its pews hard, but the audience was transfixed by the music and gave the chorus a standing ovation after Youri Boutsko’s rousing “At the Spring” that speaks of “unrequited love.”
While the anniversary concert was all Russian, the group’s repertoire features music from the Renaissance to the Twentieth Century sung with vitality and richness, not just hitting the notes, but elevating them, as can be seen in this rehearsal video (Alastair, Choir Director Elena Vizuet’s son, has added beautiful imagery to it) for the Tenth Anniversary Concert.
The San Diego Reader called Musica Vitale San Diego’s best choir and also noted that “not too many people knew of it.”
With a dedicated and active board headed by Cathy Woiwode, a $9,800 grant from the City of Coronado, and the strong backing of the city’s Cultural Arts Commission that is about to change. The commission promoted the concert on its webpage and planted a banner that stretched across the median at Orange Avenue and Seventh Street, just down the street from Sacred Heart.
“The commission was delighted to use its resources to promote this event and encourage Musica Vitale to bring beauty and joy to our world for many decades to come,” said Kelly Purvis, the city’s Contract Arts Administrator.
This fall the ensemble will bring an educational program to Coronado Schools.
“We hope to begin in August,” said Woiwode. “We want to expose the kids to the different range of voices and different kinds of music, not only classical but also folk and what it takes to put it all together.”
