Paul Salamunovich (June 7, 1927 – April 3, 2014) was a Grammy-nominated American conductor and educator.
He was the music director of the Los Angeles Master Chorale from 1991 to 2001 and its music director emeritus from 2001 until his death in 2014. He served as director of music at St. Charles Borromeo Church in North Hollywood, California, for 60 years between 1949 and 2009. In addition, he held academic positions at many Southern California universities. He was also a master clinician, having been invited to conduct just under 1000 festivals and workshops worldwide including an unprecedented four consecutive ACDA national conventions—all with different groups.
He was acknowledged as an expert in Gregorian chant and has long been recognized for his contributions in the field of sacred music, most notably receiving a Pro Ecclesia et Pontifice from Pope Benedict XVI in 2013 and was appointed knight commander of the Order of St Gregory the Great from Pope Paul VI in 1969.
The youngest of five sons born to immigrant parents from what is now Croatia, he was born on June 7, 1927 in Redondo Beach, California, where he attended St. James Elementary School.
Salamunovich recalled a pivotal moment when he was about 8 years old and attended a double feature at the local movie house. At the end of both films, during a MovieTone newsreel, a story about the buildup of tensions in Europe featured eight bars of a cappella music which so captivated him, he sat through both films again for another four hours to hear that same music one more time when the newsreel repeated. It turned out to be the Sancta Maria portion of the Ave Maria by Victoria which became one of his signature conducting pieces throughout his career. When a young priest, Father Louis Buechner, arrived at the parish and started a boy's choir, Salamunovich joined and, as he says, "I was hooked." This choir sang exclusively in Gregorian chant, and "all we did was sing funerals," he said. This early foundation in Gregorian chant, he added, "influenced the music I specialize in, and the techniques I use."
In 1940, at the age of 13, Salamunovich and his family moved to Hollywood, California, where they joined a new church, Blessed Sacrament, and attended its parochial school. The men's and boy's choirs were led by Richard Keys Biggs, the organ teacher of famed choral director Roger Wagner. Despite starting in the boy's choir three years older than was typical, Salamunovich impressed Biggs with his tone and was allowed to join. He remained in the choir after moving to Hollywood High School the following year. At age 14, he began singing with Wagner.
At Hollywood High School, he met Dorothy Hilton, and they became high school sweethearts. (They later married on May 20, 1950, and had five children.)
Upon graduation from high school in 1945, he enlisted in the United States Navy and spent a year in Pearl Harbor, replacing sailors sent home after World War II.
After completing his Naval enlistment, Salamunovich returned to Southern California at the age of 19. Hearing of his return, Roger Wagner contacted Salamunovich and asked him to join his newly formed Los Angeles Concert Youth Chorus, whose other members included 13-year-old Marilyn Horne and 14-year-old Marni Nixon; this choir later evolved into the Roger Wagner Chorale in 1948. Wagner eventually suggested that Salamunovich study music in college at Los Angeles City College, where he achieved an associate of arts degree and his classmates included future collaborator Jerry Goldsmith. This led to the beginning of his professional music career. Salamunovich was regularly hired as a professional singer on both live performances and in recordings for such conductors and composers as Arturo Toscanini, Alfred Wallenstein, Igor Stravinsky, and others, singing in all styles of popular and classical music. He sang the tenor solo on César Franck's Panis Angelicus on The Wagner Chorale's album, "The House of the Lord". He was one of the quartet of jazz great Stan Kenton's vocal group, "The Modern Men" who sang on Kenton's album, "Kenton With Voices" in 1957. He was a "ghost singer" along with a semi-regular group of contract singers that included Horne, Nixon, Harve Presnell and Salli Teri singing on multiple film soundtrack recordings between 1946 and 1964, when his increasing conducting duties no longer allowed him the time for studio singing. He soon began contracting and conducting choral segments in films for the next 45 years ending in 2009 after working on 100 film and television productions.
When Wagner was offered a better-paying church job, he decided to install the 21-year-old Salamunovich as choir director at to replace him at St. Charles Borromeo Church in North Hollywood, California in 1949 so that he was free to leave his position there. With great trepidation due to his complete lack of any previous conducting or keyboard experience, Salamunovich reluctantly accepted the position at Wagner's insistence.
Over the next sixty years, he led the choir in regular services and a number of high-profile performances, including an unprecedented 4 consecutive appearances with 4 different groups at the American Choral Directors Association (ACDA) Biennial National Conventions. Most notably, the St. Charles Borromeo Choir sang for Pope John Paul II in a private audience at the Vatican, for the official Mass of Greeting with John Paul II presiding in St. Vibiana's Cathedral in Los Angeles, and in St. Peter's Square on the Feasts of St. Peter and St. Paul with John Paul II presiding at high Mass. They hold the distinction of being the only American choir to be honored with this invitation. The St. Charles Choir has performed on the soundtracks of the motion pictures "Flatliners", "Grand Canyon" and "True Confessions", for which Salamunovich also coached Robert De Niro on the sung responses of the Latin Mass. The choir also performed on television programs, including The NBC Doc Severinsen Christmas Special, "The Sounds of Christmas" that played for many years on Christmas Eve in place of "The Tonight Show." His St. Charles Boy's Choir served as the Disneyland Boy's Choir on the original "It's A Small World" album. This album was one of 25 recordings designated for landmark preservation status by the Library of Congress in 2022. They also performed with Lucille Ball on The Lucy Show in the 1965 episode "Lucy The Choirmaster" and on the soundtracks of The Godfather in 1971 and the 1964 film Dead Ringer starring Bette Davis. They also performed with the Los Angeles Philharmonic, the San Francisco Opera and the Los Angeles Master Chorale.
Salamunovich was hired to conduct the choirs at Mount St. Mary's college during the late 1950s and while teaching there, received his bachelor's degree in 1961. In 1964, Father Richard Trame, S.J. brought Salamunovich out to then, Loyola University (Los Angeles) to start a choral department from scratch. By the time Salamunovich left there to take over as conductor of the Los Angeles Master Chorale in 1991, he had brought Loyola Marymount University's Choral department to preeminence as one of the nation's leading collegiate choral programs and he regularly conducted major works and premiers there. Salamunovich was honored with an honorary doctorate from LMU and was one of the inaugural inductees into the university's Faculty Hall of Fame.
He served as assistant conductor of the Roger Wagner Chorale from 1953 to 1977. When Wagner formed the Los Angeles Master Chorale, Salamunovich became assistant conductor of the Master Chorale. In this capacity, he led the majority of the Master Chorale's rehearsals, with Wagner stepping in to conduct the performances and some of the dress rehearsals. He also prepared the Master Chorale and other choirs for numerous performances with the Los Angeles Philharmonic, including those conducted by Igor Stravinsky, Bruno Walter, Eugene Ormandy, Georg Solti, Zubin Mehta, Carlo Maria Giulini, Valeri Gergiev, and Simon Rattle, among many others. He served in the capacity until his own conducting invitations precluded his continuing as assistant conductor to Wagner.