After a successful performance of Sir James MacMillan's St Luke Passion (conducted by Sir James MacMillan himself) in the DR Concert Hall on Maundy Thursday, we're off on a quick trip to Brussels on Good Friday. The concert will be repeated in the Henry le Boeuf Zaal in the BOZAR cultural centre, located in the heart of the city.
We are invited by the Klara Festival, which has been running since 9 March.
Our performance of Sir James MacMillan's St Luke Passion is the finale of the festival.
The concert will be recorded for Belgian radio and EBU.
In this work, the DRSO is reduced to a smaller orchestra of around 45 musicians, but on the other hand, 65 junior choir singers and 60 concert choir singers participate.
All in all, we have 184 people travelling, as our delegation includes not only musicians and singers, but also the Junior Choir's volunteer parent helpers, production crew, stage crew and members of management.
In Henry le Boeuf Zaal there are no choir seats, so all performers must be on stage. To avoid having two different setups and soundscapes, we also played in DR Koncerthuset with everyone on stage.
BOZAR is a highly reputable cultural centre in Brussels, but also an older one. It was inaugurated in 1928.
The building contains a museum, cinema halls, cafe and several concert halls. The Henry le Boeuf Zaal is the largest of the halls and can hold 2200 people. We had been told in advance that the backstage conditions are quite modest, and the corridors are long and narrow and the dressing rooms few and small.
All participants have been sent an itinerary prior to the trip. According to this, the tight schedule on the day looks like this:
"We will fly together on Friday after noon in a chartered flight to Brussels. Upon arrival at BOZAR, located in the heart of Brussels just 8-10’ walk from the Grand Place, there will be a warm-up and rehearsal, after which a communal meal will be organised. After dinner there will be changing and warming up and the concert will begin at 20.00 (or rather 20.03 due to live broadcast and hourly news). Immediately after the concert, buses will depart back to the airport.”
In reality, the tour starts as early as Thursday evening with the packing of instruments and concert clothes. Our stage crew set off for Brussels immediately after packing. They left at 23:15. They will be travelling all night. If everything goes according to plan, they will arrive about 3 hours before the rest of us arrive. They need to unpack and get the stage set-up completely ready so that rehearsals can begin immediately.
On the plane on the way down, I had a nice chat with several of the participants about what is so special about the composer himself conducting. Here are some of the conclusions:
”This can be both an advantage and a disadvantage. Sometimes we find that a conducting composer can be very demanding and, in our opinion, unnecessarily fixated on details. When it's such a large work, there can be a lot of waiting time that feels like wasted time for the orchestra, for example, when rehearsing difficult choral passages and vice versa. However, this is not at all the case with Sir James MacMillan, who throughout the rehearsal process has had a very ”rounded” and in a way pragmatic approach to the rehearsal work. In this process, we have really felt that he has an overview of which passages in the great work are the most important and that he goes for the overall idea right away. It's been a gift for us contributors. We have experienced it very effectively and we love that!
Sir James MacMillan has seemed super happy with the choirs and orchestra. He has probably realised that we have all enjoyed performing this great, melodic and very beautiful work of his.
We were also pleased that we didn't just have to do it once.
In general, it's nice to repeat concerts, but it's with a special sense of pride that we travel out into the world with just such a concert. Here we really show what we, DR's ensembles, can muster, as everything - orchestra, large concert choir and a highly professional and impressively well-singing children's choir is - so to speak - ”of our own breeding”. It's big, and that's what we can do!”
It's always exciting, sometimes ”a little too” exciting, to come to a foreign hall and in this case with very, very little time to settle into the hall, which acoustically is completely different from the one we are used to at home. We only have 45 minutes of sound check (17:45 - 18:30) as all the performers also have to eat dinner before the concert.
There are 45 minutes from the end of the rehearsal to a communal meal for all participants, and I have to say that feeding so many people in such a short time can be a bit of an exercise. A hectic experience! Fortunately, we managed it all and at 19:55, a few minutes before the concert started, all 170 musicians and singers were dressed and ready on stage in a well-attended hall with about 1200 expectant audience members.
The concert is underway and the backstage area is briefly quiet.
A junior choir girl has taken ill, but luckily several of the choir's caring fellow travelling parent helpers are present in the backstage area.
A small delegation from our production team goes to the airport in advance to organise a joint check-in.
The stage crew, Bo and Andreas, show up and start planning the clearing and packing.
Bo says ”We hope to be packed and ready by midnight. The plan is to leave at 8:00 am tomorrow. While we're ”in the area”, we'll drive past Bremen with a couple of timpani that need to be restored there.”
After the concert, we have to get on the buses and head to the airport very quickly.
I line up a small bar with pre-poured cold water in paper cups, otherwise there is no time to rehydrate after the demanding performance.
The end time of the concert is later than expected due to the five great calls with a standing ovation from the enthusiastic audience. It feels amazing. The choir and orchestra are on a high as they walk off stage.
After a quick change of clothes, everyone runs to the buses.
At the airport, the well-prepared check-in went smoothly. On the other hand, they have chosen to keep only one gate open in security, knowing that a lot of people were going through at this odd time - Good Friday at 22:30. This caused a lot of frustration, but what do singers and musicians typically do in such a situation?
Tune in with Niels W. Gade's 6-part ”Morgensang af Elverskud”, of course!
The lady at the counter turned out to be impressionable. She was very impressed and deeply moved, shed a tear, and it wasn't long before they figured out how to open another airlock.
Yes, music can really open doors and hearts - even in an airport security area....
At 23:47 we are all on board and the plane is ready to take off. On the journey home, I talk to Susanne Wendt, head of the DR Choir School:
”The trip has been a great experience for the girls! The anticipation has been building for a long time, and we have spent many choir rehearsals rehearsing this difficult work, where the girls sing almost everything and in no way have a supporting role.
Touring is not unfamiliar to them.
We have a regular annual summer tour where we have sung on Ærø, Samsø and Bornholm, but flying abroad and holding a concert with ”the adults”, ”the real” professional musicians and singers in a big beautiful concert hall is really something special. It has been a hectic day for all of us and it is definitely a challenge to get used to a completely new hall with a different seating arrangement, placement and acoustics in such a short time. But it has been exciting and they sang non-stop on the bus on the way to the airport. I actually felt sorry for the couple of musicians who had mistakenly strayed into the Junior bus.”
Head of Ensemble, Kim Bohr, gives a short acceptance speech on the plane. He thanks everyone for their efforts and talks about his favourable experience of the concert. A special thank you goes to the DR Junior Choir and they receive a loud and very warm applause from all of us ”adults”.
At 01:03 we have landed in Copenhagen.