From Hagia Sophia to the Coronation: Alexander Lingas on Byzantine Music and the Living Tradition

Dr. Alexander Lingas — musicologist, conductor, and Founding Director of Capella Romana — joins Matthew Wilkinson for one of the most wide-ranging conversations in the history of the Pursuit of Beauty podcast. From reconstructing the lost sounds of Hagia Sophia to conducting Byzantine chant at King Charles III's coronation, Lingas has spent 35 years at the intersection of sacred music scholarship and performance. This is the definitive interview on the Byzantine chant tradition, its history, its revival, and its future.Lingas traces the full arc of his career: growing up in a Greek Orthodox parish in Portland, Oregon; doctoral studies in Byzantine chant at the University of British Columbia under Dimitri Konomos; a Fulbright year in Athens studying under the legendary Lykouros Angelopoulos; postdoctoral work in Oxford under Metropolitan Kallistos Ware; and nearly two decades teaching at City University of London. Along the way he founded Capella Romana — now in its 35th year — which has become the world's leading ensemble for Byzantine and medieval Orthodox sacred music, as well as the music of the Christian East more broadly.The conversation goes deep into the musicology. Lingas explains the difference between the "new method" notation introduced in the early 19th century and the medieval Byzantine notation it replaced, and what it means to take a "what you see is what you get" approach to manuscripts that haven't been performed in 500 years. He unpacks how Capella Romana's landmark recordings — Lost Voices of Hagia Sophia, the St. Catherine's Sinai Vespers, Cyprus and Venice in the East — were constructed from manuscript sources, and why this music rarely finds its way back into parish worship. He also gives an extraordinary account of the calophonic chant style of St. John Koukouzelis and the Byzantine ars nova of the 13th and 14th centuries — a sacred music tradition so sophisticated that it eventually transcended text altogether into abstract vocables, which Lingas connects directly to the Hesychast theology of divine energies and angelic liturgy.Other topics include: the full history of Lykouros Angelopoulos and the Greek Byzantine Choir and their foundational role in the modern chant revival; the Romanian, Serbian, and Transylvanian chant traditions and how they diverged from the Byzantine mainstream; the contested question of the organ in Orthodox worship and the difference between a cappella practice and a cappella doctrine; the music of Tikey Zes and the Greek Orthodox Archdiocese of America; the Appalachian music project and its theological and musicological problems; Arvo Pärt and the Odes of Repentance recording; collaborative work with composers Robert Kyr and Einojuhani Rautavaara; and the grants, publications, and institutional infrastructure that sustain this work.Near the end of the conversation, Lingas reflects on his recent retirement from Capella Romana after 35 years, his involvement with the Institute of Sacred Arts at St. Vladimir's Orthodox Theological Seminary, and his experience at the coronation of King Charles III — where he served first as a liturgical consultant advising on how to represent the Orthodox traditions of Prince Philip, and then as the director of the Byzantine choir that performed at Westminster Abbey.This episode is essential listening for anyone serious about Orthodox sacred music, Byzantine chant, the theology of beauty, liturgical theology, or the history of Christian worship.