A Holiday from Reality?  The ESOC Chorus Summer Vacation

What does your holiday mean to you?  Are you heading south for sun, sea and sand during the school holidays?  Or are you too busy to have a real holiday and spend your time imagining you’re in a different world, different situation, or a different time?  Indeed, is a holiday a cultural or spiritual journey of importance to your intellectual and emotional health?  We have all the travel advice you’ll need for an excursion into your imagination.  In fact, we can even help you have a holiday from reality.

We have all the advice you will need  for your upcoming summer vacation, in English Partsongs, Italian and French Madrigals and American Spirituals.  As the school holidays in Hessen are coming up very soon, we decided we could help you enjoy your vacation by giving you a guide to the holidays in four parts: I:  Anticipation of Departure;  II:  Weather, Landscape and Nature;  III:  Other Romantic Destinations;  and IV:  Holiday Activities.

Our repertoire this summer tells us everything we need to know about where to go and what to do on our vacation.  We’ve included a choral song by the great English modern composer, Gerald Finzi, on a text of the English Poet Laureate, Robert Bridges.  This song reflects our happy anticipation:  “My spirit sang all day”.  We have pieces regarding the climate by the eminent Victorian composers, John Goss: “List! for the breeze”, and Charles Villiers Standford: “The blue bird”,  Op. 119, No. 3.  And by the almost unknown Georgian composer Richard John Samuel Stevens we have one of our favourite compositions, “Ye spotted snakes”, which mentions every sort of creepy-crawly we need to watch out for when visiting foreign climes.

Besides the famous holiday destinations of France and Italy, we also visit the Czech Republic (“Až já pojedu”) and Mexico (“La cucaracha”).  Our activities include dancing (“Chi la gagliarda, donna, vo imparare”), drinking (“Merrily push round the glass”, and flirting (“Au joli jeu du pousse avant”).

And, since the Euro is so good against the dollar just now, we’re visiting the United States in three American Spirituals:  “Way over in Beulah-land”, “Lily of the Valley”, and, just in case we get into a bit of trouble on our holiday, “Fix Me, Jesus”.

Bon voyage!