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Choir Tour: 1998 France
Overview - Itinerary

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Chartres

Normandy

Monet's Gardens

The 1998 Summer Tour to France will forever leave an impression on the 70 choristers who participated. The Choir spent 5 days exploring Paris before branching out to Normandy. Concert highlights include the Eglise Saint-Séverin in the Latin Quarter, Eglise Saint-Maclou in Rouen (Normandy), and La Cathédrale de Chartres. The music performances were outstanding and were permanently recorded on our 1998 French Tour CD. The views from the Eiffel Tower dazzled the singers, Monet's Gardens at Giverny offered tranquil beauty, the World War II American Cemetery portrayed the sobering costs of war, and the Château de Chenonceau was a virtual fairy tale. Homestays in Rouen and Angers fostered lasting Franco-American friendships.

We feature some articles by choristers who write eloquently of their tour experience.

Chance Hubbard - Homestay Connects WWII Veterans

Megan Caster - Chartres

Marie Marandola - Rouen

Homestay Connects WWII Veterans
By Chance Hubbard

In the summer of 1998 while I was touring France with my choir, a most remarkable revelation came to me. On my second homestay in Angers, after our performance, my host family took us to their eighty year old father's home. We sat in his living room and he began to tell a story about the war. He clearly remembered sitting at lunch with a friend and a faint drumming noise began which was drawing closer. Their country had been occupied by Germans and life as they knew it had come to a stand still. The drumming persisted until they saw the American troops marching into their town. It was then he knew their freedom had been restored. With tears in his eyes and joy in his heart, he was thanking me and Lucas for our country's courage and help. I felt a gratitude that crossed all boundaries and generations.

Upon returning home I relayed the conversation to my grandfather who is seventy-nine years old and had been over there in WWII. It was wonderful to be the link that expressed the Frenchman's feelings even fifty years later to my grandfather. He listened intently as tears welled up in his eyes.

Chartres
By Megan Caster

We stood waiting in the icy wind, staring at one of the most beautiful cathedrals ever built. I hadn't eaten breakfast, and it was so cold I thought my bones would freeze but somehow I felt happy. Gazing up into the mouths of snarling gargoyles, my eyes were caught by the intense green moss that stood boldly against the gray stone and sky. At long last we entered the cathedral, rubbing the numbness from our fingers. So this is Chartres Cathedral.

I thought. A beauty so simple it was almost overwhelming. Hundreds of prayer candles devoured the shadows, soft blue light streamed in through immense stained glass windows, whispers and the sounds of footsteps lingered in the heights of the rafters with the ancient air. I closed my eyes and imagined the girl's songs floating, soaring up to the ceiling, the boy's pieces touching every corner with rich tones. When the concert began, I could barely open my mouth without crying. The first notes of Jesu Rex moved with fluidity and precision. I could feel the tears welling up with every perfect sound. There have been times when I wondered why I was in choir, and I got my answer last summer in Chartres; to be a part of something so astoundingly beautiful.

Rouen
By Marie Marandola

Posted on the walls of the small, overcrowded room we had just entered in the Conservatoire were the lists of choir member's names corresponding with the names of French children whose families we would be staying with. I searched the list and finally saw my name across from "Clement Hurel". My name, and only my name.

Just as I was about to cry, a small, kind-looking woman approached me and asked if I was Marie. She said my name with the correct pronunciation that I so rarely hear; her French accent made my name sound sweet and airy like chocolate mousse. The tall skinny boy next to her was Fabien, 14, and the little boy with huge inquisitive, brown eyes was Clement, 11. Her name was Isabelle.

The ride to my "adoptive" family's small home in Quimcampoix (just outside of Rouen) was a long one, and as we drove, Isabelle talked to me in broken English about her family and the highlights of the city and then translated for Clement and Fabien everything that I told her about Del Mar.

When we got to their little house, Clement asked me if I played Ping-Pong. I told him I tried and with a look of jubilation, he led me out to the backyard. We must have played Ping-Pong for an hour, hitting the balls into the small fishpond and the neighbor's yard. Every time he made a mistake, Clement said, laughing in English, "Oh, I am so bad!" His charisma and incessant energy reminded me of my own little brother and I instantly felt at home.

The next morning we met bright and early to tour downtown Rouen. We saw cathedrals, the place where Jeanne D'Arc was burned and street after street of tiny little shops, including the oldest building in the city which had been turned into a McDonalds. It was raining, and we looked like a swarm of bright blue ducks in our ponchos, but the sky cleared by the time we were free to eat and shop.

The concert that night in Eglise Saint-Maclou was incomparable to any other concert I've sung in my eight years with SDCC. The church, with its heavy stone pillars and high ceiling had the most amazing resonance. After we were done singing, the Conservatoire choir made us all stand on the stage while they performed a song for us. Their director for the piece was a little blonde boy in a bow tie who barely graced three feet tall. Many of the SDCC girls, including myself, were moved to tears.

The next morning, we had to leave Rouen. For some reason, the buses were delayed, and so we sat, grazing out the windows at our families for long, last looks. When we finally departed, I looked back and what I saw broke my heart. Clement was frantically chasing the bus, waving at me and I started to cry. I cried because Clement cared about me enough to run after my bus to say good-bye. I cried because I knew that never again in my life would I encounter a town that I could love as much as Rouen. And I cried because I was leaving a family that I truly loved, a family that I would think about almost every day thereafter, a family that I was first afraid to meet.