Chandos Tour 2017

Tea with the monks in Huysberg - not quite what we expected! Well, we're all back home safe and sound, and reunited with our luggage!  Now the dust has settled it's time to take stock of what happened, and what we achieved. Many kuchen were eaten and much bier drunk, but we all remained in control of our faculties well enough to enjoy the experiences on offer.  Leipzig was explored, Colditz and Dresden, the UNESCO World Heritage site of Quedlinburg and Lutherstadt Wittenberg, in the 500th year of Luther's Reformation, were visited - and we even managed to give three concerts! Audiences abroad are always large and enthusiastic, but those we sang to were the best of the lot!  we had well over 120 at each performance, and the applause was loud and sustained.  Many lovely comments were passed to us at the end of each concert, and even a couple of autographs were sought!

After a day in Lutherstadt Wittenberg, a delightful concert hall awaited us in Bad Schmiedeberg. Part of a spa hotel it is decorated in the German art nouveau, or jugendstil   style. It's unusual for us to perform in a hall on tour, our usual venues are churches. This meant that there was no organ, but a good grand piano instead. We were also able to do some non-sacred music, so the anthems by Barstow and Ireland were put aside in favour of Elgar's From the Bavarian Highlands , of which we did four. We opened with the Hal lelujah Chorus , a hit as usual, and then the unaccompanied Mendelssohn motets. Rosie Asher was a great success with her three musical theatre numbers, and then the Elgar, which went down well. After Byrd's Ave Verum and Gjelo's Ubi Caritas we raised the roof to finish with O Thou t he Cen tral Orb by Charles Wood. As always, John had to shout to announce our encore! The audiences have been wonderful on this tour. Not only have they

As you now know, when we're not singing on a Chandos Tour abroad, we're generally eating or getting up to mischief! Yesterday in Lutherstadt Wittenberg, Stephen the accompanist, John the conductor and myself stopped for some sustenance to fuel our energy levels for our concert later on at Bad Schmiedeberg. Being terribly fond of tomato soup, I gave in to temptation and ordered the 'tomato soup with a swirl of cream'. What, in fact, arrived, was a bowl of cream with a swirl of tomato, as you can see! However it arrived, though, it still tasted delicious, and when eaten al fresco in a town with UNESCO sites all around, and with good friends, it was perfect!

As you would expect of a choir of some fifty plus members, there are a range of trades and skills among our number. We have teachers, civil servants, engineers, home-makers, even an MEP, singing with us every Tuesday night and on Tour. One of our number on the Tour, Gwen, informed us after our visit to Colditz (where we heard about the daring attempt by the prisoners at building a glider to fly 16 of them over the perimeter wall) that her brother was also a glider pilot and that she came from a family of fliers. So, in the true spirit of the Colditz glider, Solihull Chandos Choir is proud to present it's own prototype version of the Leipzig Glider, as constructed by Gwen Badham, made out of a post-it note. Complete with flaps!

An Army may march on it's stomach. Solihull Chandos sings on Strudel......!! We've had a wonderful food experience here in Germany.....here is a photo of just one of the delicacies most of us have partaken of! This was purchased and consumed in double quick time by Yours Truly in the gorgeous little town of Quedlinburg, on the way to Huysburg Monastery.

Solihull Chandos Tours are not all about singing! Sure, it's the 'tie which binds us', but we also have an awful lot of down time too. Inevitably, with a large group (we are 64 on this occasion), it can be tricky making sure everyone is 'accounted for', especially in the evenings when there is not a scheduled event/meal, but we try to ensure that everyone who wants to be is taken care of and is never on their own if they don't want to be. So here are some of our 'chill-ax' moments, taken in Leipzig itself and on our adventures out and about. The first photo is of a small group of us at the Westerburg Hotel, after our successful concert at the Huysburg Monastery. The second photo is of another group of us in the centre of Leipzig at the Auerbach Keller. See, it's not ALL hard work; we really do abide by the old adage 'All Work And No Play Makes Chandos A Dull Choir'!

The day started with a visit to the UNESCO World Heritage town of Quedlinburg, a beautiful medieval place well worth a visit.  Then it was on to the Benedictine Monastery at Huysberg. We were welcomed by Brother Jacob, and John allowed us one of the shortest rehearsals on record! The acoustic is almost perfect, plenty of resonance without being too "boomy", and Stephen was happy with the organ, and the sightlines - once we'd worked out where to stand. Our beautiful venue The afternoon concert was very well attended by over 170 people. Brother Jacob asked them to save their applause until the end. Even so, our opening Halle lujah Chorus provoked much applause, as did Stephen's solo. The rest of the programme went very well, and the applause, when it came at last was deafening! John had almost to shout in order to announce our Rutter encore. The monks gave us tea, and then, at their invitation, we attended their Vespers and sang Ola Gjelo's Ubi Ca

Here are some pictures of our walking tour around Leipzig. Our tour guide, Sylvia, told us of how the demonstrations which led to the bringing down of the Berlin Wall started in Leipzig. 70,000 people took to the streets and what resulted (in only one month - just shows you what 'people power can do') led to the reunification of the nation. The pictures are of the mural dedicated to those demonstations and the church and small square where it all began. And also a picture of our walking group. We're not off on a demo - note, no placards! - but to see this wonderful city.

Our music-free day today took us to the infamous Colditz Castle, home to hundreds of Second World War POW's from many nations. There were 300 attempts made to escape it's alleged impenetrable walls; 31 were successful, including one by 1970's politician Lieutenant Colonel Airey Middleton Sheffield Neave, who was later assassinated by the INLA. We learnt of life within it's walls during an excellent guided tour. The prison housed mainly Officers of the Allied Armies (and the naughty people who had escaped from other camps!)and, contrary to the usual view of POW camps, had 3 meals a day, were allowed privileges, parcels from home and were allowed to write to, and receive letters from,  loved ones. One very sombre part of the Castle's history is the murder of 84 people who were 'euthanased' by Hitler in 1938 by being starved to death there, before it became a Prisoner of War establishment. There was a Dutch clergyman interred there during the war who play

Our first full day in Leipzig was busy and informative. One of the main features was seeing the monument statue dedicated to Johann Sebastian Bach. Apparently he was third in line for the job at St. Thomas's Church! Just shows - third time lucky! We learnt that the name Leipzig is thought to come from something to do with 'dirty water'! Not very glamorous! However, the name Solihull derives from 'soily hill' or 'soily hole' (as registered in the Doomsday Book) so the guide was happy that we weren't too disappointed with this rather unexotic name for her city!

We didn't have much time to explore the lovely old university town of Jena, because it was straight in to rehearsal as soon as we arrived. The Lutheran church is beautiful in it's stark simplicity, with a wonderful acoustic. We began the Hall elujah Chorus far too fast, in that echo it just sounded a mush of noise! However, slowing it down a bit worked wonders. After dinner came the concert. There were about 130 in the audience, with many younger people. Immediately there was an "issue". Stephen, our organist, was at the back of the church up in the organ loft; we were on the Sanctuary steps at the front. Between John and Stephen were a couple of large chandeliers. They were turned off during the rehearsal, but now they were on. John and Stephen couldn't now see each other, so the first few pieces got off to slightly tricky starts! However, they were eventually turned off and all was well. The audience were hugely appreciative, with much sustained app

As it is now only  24 hours till the Choir departs for Leipzig,  my mind is transported back to the last time we were on Tour in Germany (Berlin). Our first concert was in a beautiful medieval town called Neuruppen. Upon our arrival, we were greeted like royalty by the local choir, who told us that they had arranged a boat trip around the lake with lunch served on board. This was an added bonus and we were soon boarded and enjoying a peaceful, leisurely sail around Neuruppen lake. The clock hit midday and a tannoy announcement brought the welcome news that lunch would be served. Some of us had discovered menus on board and most of the choir had already decided what they would be feasting on. "The lunch today is soup" Mr Tannoy announced. "You may have this soup with a sausage or without a sausage in it. All you need to say to the waiter is 'with' or 'without'." It was certainly an unusual way to order lunch and soup with a frankfurter in it

After eighteen months of planning, we had our final rehearsal in the U.K. tonight  before we jet off to Leipzig on Thursday for our Concert Tour. You may think that our musical director would have dismissed us at the end with a few gems of musical wisdom to ruminate and cogitate upon,  passages to practice, and swathes of music to commit to memory to improve our performance. Not a bit of it! We left St Helens Church with these profound nuggets of  excellence ringing in our ears: Sopranos are permitted to sound young and innocent. The altos, on the other hand, are expected to sound mature and like they have been "round the block a bit"! And if  anything should go wrong (this never happens, of course!), just imagine you've trodden in a cow pat. But don't worry if you do this; just continue to enjoy the view! You can continue to follow our blog whilst we are abroad. See you in Leipzig!