Mae­stro Jose Maria Vi­ti­er and his par­ty ar­rived in Trinidad last Sat­ur­day to the warm wel­come of Dr Pat Bish­op, and a small group of Ly­di­ans who sang for him at the Pi­ar­co In­ter­na­tion­al Air­port. Vis­i­bly moved, Vi­ti­er con­fessed that this was the best wel­come he had ever had in ar­riv­ing to a new coun­try.

Vi­ti­er is a Cuban mu­sic com­pos­er and pi­anist. He has made mu­sic for movies and tele­vi­sion, as well as com­po­si­tions for pi­ano, sym­phon­ic or­ches­tra, cham­ber or­ches­tra, among oth­er for­mats. His style of­ten com­bines the clas­si­cal and Cuban folk mu­sic styles. Dr Bish­op, Mae­stro Vi­ti­er, and per­cus­sion­ist Abel Acos­ta, who al­so hap­pens to be the deputy min­is­ter of cul­ture in Cu­ba, spoke at length about the types of drums that would be in­cor­po­rat­ed in­to the Ly­di­ans' per­for­mance of the Misa Cubana. These in­clude In­di­an tas­sa drums, to­geth­er with African drums. Acos­ta al­so brought drums from Cu­ba to ac­com­pa­ny the Ly­di­ans and the Christ­mas per­for­mance of the Misa Cubana.

The first re­hearsal with Mae­stro Vi­ti­er took place last De­cem­ber 5 at the East Mu­cu­rapo Sec­ondary School hall with the full cast–Des­per­a­does Steel Or­ches­tra, the Soogrim Ram Tas­sa Drum­mers, the Mal­ick Folk Drum­mers, mem­bers of the Ly­di­ans Steel Or­ches­tra, ac­com­pa­nists Lindy-Ann Bod­den-Ritch, Myr­tle Cum­ber­batch , and Jerome Din­chong, per­cus­sion­ists John Ja­cob and Abel Acos­ta, Mae­stro Jose Maria Vi­ti­er, and ap­prox­i­mate­ly 100 Ly­di­an voic­es.

For more in­for­ma­tion on Misa Cubana, con­tact the Queen's Hall Box of­fice at 621-5103, Ext 1.