Campus Update

(June 27, 2007)

Chamber Singers Tour France and Spain

The University at Albany was recently represented in Spain and in France by the Chamber Singers students under the direction of David Janower.

Janower combined 18 students from the Chamber Singers with about a dozen adults from Albany Pro Musica and several other community singers for a trip May 21-30 that included touring Barcelona and visiting the dramatic coast of the Cote d'Azur along the Mediterranean between France and Italy.

"What a fantastic experience for them," Janower said. "And I was delighted that our students not only sang wonderfully, but they represented our University, our state, and our country wonderfully, in their deportment, in their affability, in their respect for the cultures we visited, and, of course, musically…I heard from many people – the conductors, tour guides, and so forth - how nice our students were to be with, and I believe that's important."

The group performed its first concert in Monserrat Abbey outside of Barcelona, for several hundred people, and then went on to perform outdoors at a community arts center in nearby Sitges.

In France, the students performed at two concerts with French choirs. In St.-Martin-de-Crau outside Arles, at L'Etang des Aulnes, there were dozens of requests for Chamber Singers CDs "and the audience applauded long and stamped loudly for encores," Janower said.

After the concerts, they were guests at receptions put on by the French choirs, at which they met local singers. "Many people in France speak English, so all of our students were able to spend some time with their French counterparts, eating and drinking together and singing back and forth for and with each other," Janower concluded.