Great Music under a Byzantine Dome is the concert ministry of the Greek Orthodox Archdiocesan Cathedral of the Holy Trinity in New York City. It programs a diverse series of concerts and performances every year, featuring performers from the Cathedral Choir and from the New York area, singing music from the sacred Orthodox tradition, the Greek folk and popular traditions, and Western classical and musical theater repertoire.

The Cathedral Music Ministry has a rich history of adding beauty to the Cathedral worship experience, performing the music of composers such as Theodore Bogdanos, Anna Gallos, Alexander Gretchaninov, Dimitrios Pappas, George Raptis, Nancy Takis, Tikey Zes, and many more, in addition to arrangements by the late Maestro Dr. Dino Anagnost, music director of the choir for many years. The renowned Cathedral Choir, formed by a core of music professionals and volunteers, is featured most Sundays at the Archdiocesan Cathedral.

Baritone and conductor Costas Tsourakis is the Artistic Director of Great Music under a Byzantine Dome and a native of Astoria, NY. Opera credits include the title role in Don Giovanni with Theater Rudolstadt, El barbero de Sevilla (Bataglia) with New Camerata Opera, ManonLescaut (Geronte), Carmen (Zuniga), La Battaglia di Legnano (Podesta), Die Fledermaus (Frosch), all with Sarasota Opera, La Cenerentola (Don Magnifico) in Syros, Greece for the Festival of the Aegean, Gianni Schicchi (title role) at the Trentino Music Festival in Italy, Don Carlo (Filippo II) with Vocal Productions NYC, Carmen (Zuniga), Die Fledermaus (Falke) with NY Opera Exchange, La Bohème (Colline), Le Nozze Di Figaro (Don Bartolo), Die Zauberflöte (Sarastro), Gianni Schicchi (Betto) with Opera on the Avalon in St. John’s, Newfoundland, and Cosi Fan Tutte (Don Alfonso), Gianni Schicchi (Simone), and Amahl And The Night Visitors (Balthazaar) with Purchase Opera.

Musical theatre credits include Oklahoma! (Jud), Guys and Dolls (Big Jule) and Knickerbocker Holiday (Anthony von Corlear) recorded at Alice Tully Hall and released by Albany Records.

Solo concert credits include Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony, Finzi’s In Terra Pax, Haydn’s Nelsonmesse, Rheinberger’s Star Of Bethlehem, Vaughan Williams’ Fantasia on Christmas Carols and Handel’s Messiah. Mr. Tsourakis has performed at the Verbier Music Festival in Verbier, Switzerland, and concerts in Tel Aviv, Haifa and Jerusalem with the Israeli Philharmonic.

As a conductor, credits include Handel’s Messiah, Mozart’s Requiem, and The Centennial Concert: From Byzantium to America at the Metropolitan Museum of Art.

In addition to his passion for performing, Mr. Tsourakis is a dedicated music educator who regularly teaches young musicians and is the Director of the famed Archdiocesan Cathedral Choir and Youth Choirs of the Archdiocesan Cathedral of the Holy Trinity. 

Mezzo-soprano and conductor Hilary Baboukis is the Associate Conductor of the Choir at the Greek Orthodox Archdiocesan Cathedral of the Holy Trinity in NYC and the Administrator of Great Music under a Byzantine Dome and The Georgia Giannakopoulos and Peter Katsoris Kaye Archdiocesan Cathedral Music Library. She collaborates regularly with ensembles across New York and New Jersey, including work with Artefact Ensemble, Big Apple Baroque, Cappella Romana, the Choral Art Society of NJ, Church of the Holy Apostles, Co-Cathedral of St. Joseph, Masterwork Chorale of New Jersey, Melodia, New York Opera Forum, Ridgewood Gilbert and Sullivan, (slightly) Tipsy Opera, Summit Chorale, The Saint Tikhon Choir, Vocala, and Voices of Ascension. She also collaborates regularly with the Cairo Choral Society and the Lions of Cairo.

Her recent engagements have included Die Fledermaus (Orlofsky), Yeomen of the Guard (Phoebe), Xerxes (title role), and Der Rosenkavalier (Octavian), and appearances as mezzo/alto soloist in Beethoven’s Mass in C and Ninth Symphony, Mendelssohn’s Elijah, and Mozart’s Requiem. Her coming engagements include Saint-Saëns’ Christmas Oratorio and Handel’s Messiah.

Ms. Baboukis teaches voice at Wagner College of Staten Island, as well as teaching voice and piano privately. She is also an arranger/orchestrator and music engraver for The Georgia Giannakopoulos and Peter Katsoris Kaye Archdiocesan Cathedral Music Library and frequently takes private commissions. She studied at Columbia College (NYC — BA, Music), the American University in Cairo (non-degree), and Oklahoma State University (Stillwater — MM, Vocal Performance and Pedagogy).

Dawn Helene was named the Dino Anagnost Artist-in-Residence at the Archdiocesan Cathedral Choir’s Christmas concert in 2019. Prior to her conversion to Orthodoxy in 2016, Dawn earned a Master’s degree in Piano Performance and had served as a chorister, organist, and choir director in several Lutheran and Episcopal parishes in Minnesota, California, and New York.

After her first season singing with the Cathedral Choir, Dawn started studying Byzantine chant, a pursuit she continues to this day, and the following season she submitted her first choral arrangement for the choir’s use. Since then she has written dozens of arrangements for liturgical use as well as concert performance, including the Great Doxology premiered by the National Forum of Greek Orthodox Church Musicians as the finale of the Greek Orthodox Archdiocese of America’s Centennial Concert with the Archdiocesan Byzantine Choir at the Metropolitan Museum of Art.