The Chorale in Israel July 18-21

For the past few days, Jerusalem has been swarming with Collegiate Chorale members. One spot many of us made sure to visit was Saint Anne’s Church. At the start of the Via Dolorosa, this church is a very beautiful, very plain, and very old building. It is reputedly the place where the Virgin Mary was born, and it is definitely a place of miraculously fine acoustics A note sung in this church will resonate for three or four seconds, so that you can sing in harmony with yourself. One morning, a quartet of professional singers from the Chorale was tempted to experiment with the acoustics by trying out some of their concert pieces in the space. So a lucky group of tourists was treated to an impromptu concert.
Aside from that, the Collegiate Chorale's last three concerts were one small one in Jerusalem (just the Bach), a repeat in Haifa (the same wobbly chairs to climb on, but we got there on time, and so did the conductor), and the grand finale in Jerusalem at the convention center, which includes a large, attractive theatre with nice bright acoustics.
The morning of the last concert, we visited Yad VaShem, the Holocaust Memorial. Whatever your ancestry or religion, this is a place that evokes deep emotions and stays in your thoughts for a long time. Inevitably, our experience at Yad VaShem colored our performance that evening of the Sacred Service--a piece written, in the 1930s, by a man coming to terms with his Jewish heritage. For other reasons as well, this was a highly charged concert for us. It was our last performance, and the last night of our very intense experience in Israel. And it was taking place actually in Jerusalem, the spiritual center of the piece. Thomas Hampson came backstage in the interval before the performance to tell us how important performing the Sacred Service had been for him, and to thank us for sharing the experience with him. "I will be hearing the sound of your glorious chorus in my mind for a long time," he told us.
In almost all respects, we gave our best performance yet. In the tumultuous ovation at the end, it looked like Zubin Mehta might forget to acknowledge our soprano and alto soloists--but Thomas Hampson turned and acknowledged them, with great enthusiasm. Then Zubin Mehta took the bouquets that had been presented to him and to the cantor (I certainly hope with the cantor’s assent), brought them back and presented them to Hai-Ting and Jeanmarie, and kissed them both. And then he raised his hands over the whole chorus in a kind of benediction and said, "I hope to see you again very soon." We certainly felt blessed.