In 2012 the choir travelled to Poland for a singing visit to Krakow.
Click image to enlarge.
The rain held off, the sun shone most of the time, and the England football team arrived in Krakow for Euro 2012. And so did Chester Music Society Choir. On 5 June sixty five singers with friends and partners flew in from Liverpool, to be met by our local organiser, Laszlo Iriyani, for five days of touring and singing.
Krakow is well known as a beautiful and historic city, largely untouched by the ravages of war and now recovered from fifty years of Communist neglect. It proved an ideal location for yet another successful Chester Music Society tour. Walking tours and convivial meals together formed the backdrop for three formal concert performances and a couple of extra singing opportunities.
Beginning in the elaborately decorated baroque church of Saints Peter and Paul in the old town, the tour continued with a second concert in Saint Catherine’s church in the old Jewish quarter of the city. The final concert was held at the Ark of the Lord church in Nowa Huta. This is a satellite steel town a few miles form Krakow, built by the Communist government to be a showcase for the ideal socialist society; including the absence of any Christian buildings. In the event the strongly Catholic people of Poland refused to accept such an omission and after pressure from the Archbishop of Krakow Cardinal Wojtya (later to become Pope John Paul II) and even street battles with police and militia, the building of the dramatic Ark of the Lord (Arka Pana) was permitted.
The choir’s programme of music proved to be popular and well received by our audiences: Vivaldi Magnificat, Vivaldi Gloria, Bruckner Locus Iste, Mozart Ave Verum, Gabrieli Jubilate Deo. The English flavour was added by Elgar Ave Verum, and the Polish connection was maintained with the motet Memento Mei by Lukaszewski.
To add spice to the mix the choir also performed short pieces at the Corpus Christi service in Saint Catherine’s church, and in the chapel deep underground in the Wieliczka salt mine.
Throughout the tour we were guided and cajoled by Musical Director Graham Jordan Ellis and accompanied by organist Adrian Griffiths, who also provided organ solo interludes.
Yet again the Choir proved themselves perfect ambassadors for the city of Chester.
AN ODE........by Scirard Llancelyn Green
When this lovely tour is over / No Magnificats for me /
When I get my concert dress off / Oh how happy I will be.
No more church parades on Thursday / No more Durufle reprise /
We will kiss our Sergeant Major /
How he'll miss us, how he'll grieve.
No more electronic organ / No more "Jubilate" blues /
No more flattened "Locus Istes" / No more crypts with dodgy loos.
What a friend we have conducting / All those troublous notes along /
Lifting in those Krakow churches / Everything to God in song.
Oh what pitch we often forfeit /Oh what needless notes we bear /
All because we are not watching /
Every change in tempo there.
No more walks in Jewish Quarters
No more singing underground
No more inconvenient page turns
No more dsnuos ikswezsakuL !!!
For a personal diary of the Krakow Tour written by Scirard Llancelyn Green click next.
Chester Music Society Tour Report
After months of planning, and one or two dropping out when the Easyjet fare rose to near £500, causing some members to book a Ryanair flight instead, the moment arrived. To put it in context, it was the Jubilee weekend, I had a concert to organise on Friday night, Saturday and Sunday in Gloucester, a jubilee party to organise on Monday, and hope we had the right things stuffed in a case by Tuesday morning (only to find the said Easyjet flight was not full and all 68 of our party could have been accommodated!).
Our first taste of Krakow was to find the restaurant for the Traditional Polish meal had changed hands. Apart from moving the tables around (which threw the requested table plan into chaos) the change may not have been for the best as we only gave the cuisine one star or so, though the carnival atmosphere and company made up for it to a great extent.
Wednesday saw us in three groups for a walking tour of Krakow when our guide initiated us into the Polish tradition of inventing stories to explain and embellish the unexplained. First among these was the trumpeter who sounded the alarm from the tower as the Mongol Hordes invaded, and was hit by an arrow in the neck, leaving the fanfare unfinished. This, or a reinvented unfinished fanfare is played towards all four points of the compass every hour of the day and night. Another tall story explained how the two towers came to be of unequal height. Suffice it to say, however, that the towers were not built until 100 years after the supposed accident to the trumpeter. Sightseeing also took in the castle and cathedral. The reflected glory of the late Pope John Paul, a former Krakow student, one of the 200,000 at the 10 universities, (comprising 25% of the city's population) was much referred to.
After lunch we rehearsed in St Peter and St Paul Church to brush up on the music we had forgotten, and make a few cuts to fit the concert into one hour exactly (owing to another concert there later in the evening). In the event a rather thinly attended performance went well though the accoustic was very resonant and probably absorbed some of the detail.
Thursday began with a walking tour of the Jewish Quarter, including the oldest Synagogue, to which we were admitted, although it is undergoing restoration. We were fortunate to see an orthodox Jew in full regalia with prayer shawl, and were regaled by another who insisted he knew far more about the cemetery than our guide. This was doubtless true, but the salient points were that it was last used 200 years ago, and was carefully buried under 3 or 4 ft of earth to prevent the Nazi occupiers from desecrating it. Many parts of the Jewish quarter received lengthy explanations as to which part of the film "Schindler's List" was filmed there. Those of us who had only read the book were unimpressed however, and more interested in the fact that the area, although now home to only some 200 Jews, hosts the largest Jewish music and arts festival in the world. Our concert venue, St Katherines, is massive and imposing, and a friendlier acoustic. Here we sang a quick Locus Iste during Vespers, and a Duruffle Motet (Tantum Ergo) at the end, after which the "Corpus Christi" procession began. Some of us had been fortunate enough to see another such procession arriving at a different church, and most impressive it was, with clergy, choir, banners, statuary, and about 300 members of the congretation taking up the rear and chanting, led by a priest with a rather incongruous pair of loadhailers on a pole. After a rehearsal, we experienced the trams to get back to the hotel to change.
Our concert that evening was the most satisfactory, with a large and very appreciative audience. One or two non-dry eyes were reported after the Polish Motet and final Lullaby which was our encore. Several of us dined at an Italian style Polish restaurant recommended by our guide (when in Poland do as the Romans do?)
Friday was our Salt Mines tour, and after a rehearsal at the ultra modern church in the Nowa Huta suburb we awaited our time slot before descending some 400 steps to about 130 metres below ground, viewing several large and small chambers with sculptures cut from the rock salt. Most told the 700 year old history of the mine, and others were notable figures from Poland's history. One highlight (lowlight?) was the the King's Chapel, a chamber more on a cathedral scale, in which we sang our two pieces (Locus Iste and Mozart's Ave Verum) to an audience of tourists almost as large as that at our previous concert, and followed by much applause. After some lunch in the subterranean restaurant we were lifted back to the surface at high speed by an original winding engine and lift. The rock salt appears black or grey, and can be polished to look like marble, but when a torch is placed by it, it can be seen to be highly translucent, and when crushed the greyness caused by impurities (5%) is less apparent. Chandeliers were made of soft crystals.
Unfortunately our concert was poorly attended in the Nowa Huta Church, the explanation possibly being that everyone was watching a football match between Poland and Greece. Our final dinner was of a higher quality than the first, but the quantity of food was probably more than double what we could eat. The waiters were particularly impressive, carrying enormous loads of up to 7 1-litre beers in one hand (that is 6 in a circle and the 7th perched on the handles). After final speeches, and the by now traditional "Ode" (When this lovely Tour is over) we returned on foot encountering various mildly drunk Poles draped about with flags (without poles), either celebrating or bemoaning the fact that neither team had won. We probably had a more peaceful night as a consequence.
Saturday saw one group leave early for Auschwitz and the rest of us picking up on the sightseeing we had missed. Our final visit was to the trumpeter's tower. Apart from the views the climb was worth it for a sight of the internal structure alone! And so to the airport for the 3 hour wait for our flight home, the expected delays having not materialised enabling the bus to arrive an hour earlier than planned.