UMd. Chamber Singers in Orleans and Chartres

The University of Maryland Singers travel to France for a singing tour through some of the country's most beautiful and historic venues. Follow their journey with photos, updates, and more.

Time to play catch up!

After breakfast in , we hopped on the bus and headed to Chartres, where we were to give a concert that afternoon. We had a good, long rehearsal that morning, and after a sound check in the Chartres Cathedral (how many choirs can say that??), we were on our own for lunch to try our hands at ordering in French.

While out with fellow Chamber Singer Doug Yocum, I made hopefully my only lost-in-translation purchase of the trip. I knew “marron de glacees” meant glazed fruit of some kind, but I didn’t know that it meant glazed dates, which were not as delicious as I had hoped…

But anywho, onto the concert! After a tour guided by Elizabeth, Chamber Singers gave a concert in the Chartres Cathedral. We had a very good audience, made up of mostly Chartres natives. We sang all of our sacred pieces, which included music by Poulenc, Durufle, Brahms, Verdi and a few spirituals and Renaissance motets. It was a beautiful experience, singing amazing music while surrounded by 12th Century stained glass and marble. What a wonderful way to start off our France concert series!

One standing ovation later, we were on the bus headed to Chateaudun for dinner and then our last night in Orleans.

Many of us agree that the places we’ve seen in the last two days – Orleans, Giverny, Chartres – seem straight out of a picture book. Can’t wait to see the pictures the rest of this tour will bring!