"I don’t know how to feel about coming home. Emotions hit me at weird times – unexpected and inconvenient." -Matt Harding (on the last day of his trip, too)
Our last stop on this summer's trip was Munich. It was kind of an odd fit into the itinerary, given that it was the only night spent in Germany at all, and was tacked onto the end of the trip for basically two reasons: one, it meant a shorter trip to the airport the next morning, and two, it meant we could spend our last night at a Biergarten. I was fine with both.
This also means that Munich is, by far, the single most frequently visited place I've been to outside of the US (and excluding places where I or my family have lived, maybe including the US too). That's interesting to me. To become familiar with a foreign town. To rediscover a place where you have only ever been a tourist.
Anyway, we had a long day's drive before the festivities could begin, but happily it was a drive through very scenic Alp-laden landscapes, including this mountain pass gas station somewhere in Austria:
On trips like these, long bus rides are actually quite a welcome event every so often - but not too often - and even moreso toward the end, when everyone is tired and happy to have a chance to nap throughout the day.
We arrived in Munich late afternoon, and if memory serves, went straight to the Biergarten upon arrival. I believe the place we went was the Englischer Garten, or was in the Englischer Garten, which may or may not be one of the largest parks in the world. Man, I should really remember to write down interesting factoids more consistently about the places I visit.
Anyway, this is what it looked like:
And these are just a few examples of what we got:
Not that that's surprising. Those mugs are all but implied by the term "Biergarten".
Toward the end of the night we did our usual thing and raucously sang a handful of works from our repertoire, much to the surprise of the surrounding Garten attendees. But hey, singing while drinking is basically a German national pastime, right? And technically this means my final performance with the Cardinal Singers wasn't Postojna, it was there, in the Biergarten, celebrating our win and our successful trip all at once.
But it was pretty rough. I won't post the recordings - of which there are many (thanks, Snapchat) - here.
The bus carted us back to the hotel and we made our way to our rooms. The next morning I all but crawled to the lobby for breakfast, then back to the room to tidy up, pack up one last time, and shuffle over to the bus.
A number of people, like last year, were staying in Europe for further exploration, so we said goodbye to those of whom wouldn't be accompanying us to the airport. At the airport, we divvied up a few items to ensure no one's baggage was overweight, then made our way through security to the gate. First flight was to Philly, then there was a brief layover and chance for dinner, then the flight to ORD, then - just like the end of China the year before - the bus back to Louisville, arriving sometime after midnight. And believe it or not, someone carried that giant foam check the entire way.
But then it was over. I returned home and became, officially, no longer a member of this fantastic choir. Part of which means that I may not be traveling again any time soon, and almost certainly not to anywhere big and exciting. But as I've said, it was time. I got my years out of this group, but now it's someone else's turn. And I will gladly move on to a life as not a member, but as a fan of the Cardinal Singers.
We crossed the border back into Slovenia sometime that afternoon, this time having to depart the bus and show our passports one by one to the guard before being allowed to pass through.
Originally, our concert in Postojna had been scheduled for 6:00 PM, but somewhere in the couple of days prior, someone realized that was impossible, and changed it to 8:00, which even then we only barely made work. This also meant cancelling the trip into the vaunted cave system nearby, touted to us as the second largest cave system in the world - the first largest, coincidentally, being the one just a few hours south of Louisville back home.
Here is the square where the bus dropped us off:
We met with the woman that had arranged our concert that evening and followed her on foot to the church, just a block or two up the hill:
We took as absolutely much time as we could possibly squeeze to rehearse in the church, then scurried away so that the 7:00 PM mass could take place. Then, at 8:00, we returned, dressed in concert black, to sing once more:
And thus it was that my time singing with this fine choral ensemble came to an end. As tired as I was - as we all were - I was very much glad to have one last full-length concert to go out on, as opposed to the 10-minute set that won us the Grand Prix in Zadar.
After the concert, we went to a pizza place for dinner, accompanied by Andrej Makor, a Slovenian composer who had written one of the works in our repertoire, and who had just finished a piece commissioned from him by Dr. Hatteberg. Now, I'm not sure if this was done to wow Makor, or more for the benefit of the people in the group who wouldn't be a part of the version of Cardinal that would, presumably, premiere the work the following fall, but midway through our dinner Dr. Hatteberg handed out copies of the brand new choral work and had us sightread it for him, right then and there. Whether it was meant to wow Makor or not, it did, causing him to remark in amazement that he's never seen a choir read a new piece right off the page like that. I think we made a good impression.
After another hour or so on the bus, we finally arrived in Ljubljana, a place I'd been wanting to see for several years, ever since my Austria trip back in 2013, the first time I'd heard of Slovenia at all. The downside to finally visiting this capital city was that we were only there for one night and morning, which allowed for precious little time to actually see the city at all.
For this stop, the choir split in two for the night, with half in a hotel and half at a hostel, which was presumably cheaper, but was also terrible. A lot of little annoyances, like no towels provided, plus bigger ones like the rat seen in one person's room, made for a frustrating stay.
The following morning was really the only time we had to see any of the city, after a short journey on foot to the hotel for breakfast - the hostel, of course, didn't provide any, so we'd paid extra (as a group) to accommodate the hostel half for breakfast at the hotel. After breakfast, I walked around for about an hour on my own:
Ljubljana is situated on a river, which made for some scenic touring:
There were some statues:
The latter of which is the dragon supposedly slain by Jason, of Jason and the Argonauts fame, who according to legend founded the Slovenian capital.
Diverting away from the water, I happened upon this silent church:
and sat inside for a few minutes, until it became time to head back to the hostel, acquire my luggage, and board the bus toward our final stop.
Prior to leaving the states, I referred to this year's trip as "The Croatia Trip", and this is why: the main event of our travels this year was this competition, held in sunny Zadar during the final weekend of May.
We loaded the bus out of Koper early the morning of the 23rd and headed across the border, where there was an actual border checkpoint, unlike in much of the rest of the EU. Don't know why - Croatia has a different currency, and apparently stamps passports when crossing the border, but is also definitely a full-fledged EU member. Maybe they're just extra cautious? Still a little gun-shy from their Yugoslavian days? Could be anything.
Speaking of currency, we did make a stop at a convenience store to retrieve some kuna, which runs at about 6-to-1 against the dollar, quite similar to the exchange rate in China. Things didn't end up being much cheaper in Croatia, though, but in the right shops you could get meals for less than $2 US.
Anyway, we reached Zadar by early afternoon, and spread out to find our living spaces. For this stop on the trip, we rented apartments all around the city, rather than stay at a hotel. This was pretty cool, and it meant putting us in the heart of old town within walking distance of everything. This was the view from my group's apartment, just one block or so from the coast:
And the apartment itself:
And this was a street nearby:
It reminded me a lot of Venice, just without the canals. Very much the classic old-town European city by the sea.
We got lunch at a place just outside our apartment:
Where for some reason the waiter seemed to have a grudge against Phill.
That was about all the time we had before we were on to our next thing - a concert in a completely different town. We set this up to give us more performance opportunities and to make sure we were ready to compete, but it really made the evening feel rushed. We loaded up the bus and headed to Šibenik, which was about an hour away.
We had a warm-up time in the church:
Before being let free for a bit more than an hour break. A few of us headed across the street to a coffee/dessert place, which we reached just as a torrential downpour broke outside:
Luckily, I had my rain jacket, and we hadn't yet changed into concert black.
We headed back to the church, changed, and performed the concert. Then, the...priest, or maybe monk, took us all into the back room and gave us beer, wine, and various snacks to eat, which was great, as well as unexpected.
Getting back to Zadar, we all realized that this would be the one real chance we'd have to go out, since most of the rest of the Zadar leg of the trip had something competition-related going on, and as much fun as the trip was, it had to be remembered that the true purpose of our being here was this set of performances. So despite it already being fairly late, off into the night we went.
My first stop was at this very blue bar:
Where the beer was like, 17kn, or near $3 per bottle. Which is not a bad price.
Walking around some more, we accidentally (I think) stumbled upon the Sea Organ and the Greeting to the Sun.
The former you may have heard of; it's essentially a staircase that goes into the water, but with openings that let the water in and push air out through holes, making sounds essentially the same way a pipe organ does. It kind of sounded like whales singing.
Here is a video of it made by someone other than me: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n86pF-wQKrw
The Greeting to the Sun is a colorful solar panel. Despite its name, it is way cooler to see at night, so I'm glad that's when we happened upon it. We did some more walking around, but bars began to close up and the town began to deaden, so eventually we went back to the apartment.
The next morning, I enjoyed an espresso with milk in a picturesque setting:
And then took a morning stroll down the waterfront to the Sea Organ again:
Along the way, I passed some Cardinals on their way to the beach and told them I'd be joining them soon. I returned to the apartment, rallied my roommates, and set out for the beach, grabbing a cheap sandwich at our nearby grocery/convenience store first. I didn't take my phone to the water, so no pictures, but it was a pebble beach, which I'm not sure I've ever been to before. This meant no sand everywhere, which was nice, but also that walking around, including in the water, was very painful without shoes.
We spent most of the morning and afternoon on the beach, occasionally grabbing a drink from the stand just up the hill, and despite applying and re-applying sunscreen like a madman, I did end up very burnt at the end of the day - but only in specific areas. Let's just say I have a very clear idea of how far my arm can reach down my back now.
After the beach, I got lunch at, of all things, a burger stand near the apartment. I got one called the "Oh My Sweet Cheesus" burger, and it was as good as it sounds. A brief late afternoon nap then followed before heading to our one obligation for the day, the opening concert of the competition, given by the Slovenian Philharmonic Choir at the St. Anastasia church just a block or two over.
Before attending the concert, however, we met our guide, Martina, and then press-ganged her into being our diction coach on the one Croatian piece we were singing in the competition. Dr. Hatteberg had her read the text over and over, then listen to us sing and give us pointers. Singing that piece for Croatian audiences later on during the week was always a trip; you'd see eyebrows raise and faces light up as they realized this American choir was singing something in their native tongue, and I guess Martina did a good job as our coach, because everyone seemed to think our pronunciation was at least up to par.
Then, the concert, which was very well done. You could tell this was a professional group.
After that was back to the apartment and off to bed. The next day was the big day. We needed rest.
After a breakfast at one of the street restaurants on our block, we returned to the church to then set out to find a usable rehearsal space - the church itself was unavailable, as were apparently any rooms around town. The competition had set up for us a classroom later in the afternoon to sing, but nowhere that morning. So we eventually settled on a nice shady grove by the water:
Which, as it usually does, garnered us an ad-hoc audience that clapped every time we stopped.
After the morning rehearsal, we had a break until the afternoon, so I decided to walk around on my own to see as much of Zadar as I could. While I initially planned to just circumnavigate the peninsula, I took a different route once I reached this big bridge:
Which, if we were in Old Town, led to what I have to assume is New Town.
I didn't take any photos in the quick block I circled in New Town before re-crossing the bridge. It looked fairly unremarkable compared to Old. The disparity between the two made me think of Florida, whose touristy areas have a rustic beauty to them, but once one departs from the beachfront, the town proper is discovered, which isn't as dressed up.
After crossing back into Old Town, I did my circling as planned:
Toward the center:
Then back toward the sea:
Where I once again saw the Greeting to the Sun and Sea Organ:
...before returning to the apartment.
Another rehearsal followed just a few hours later. We first ducked into the competition space to get a feel for it, then journeyed to our classroom. Another break followed, then it was time for the competition at last.
This year's competition was much different than Harmonie Festival had been the summer before. In Zadar, there was really just one performance set of about 20 minutes. That was all. We would later find out that the top 3 choirs had to perform about 10 minutes more at the final round, but I don't know that that was explicitly clear to us that Friday night.
Outside the competition venue, spectators were watching the competing choir on a video monitor:
As the hall itself was too small to fit everyone in. Inside, waiting in line, we saw a familiar sight:
Our old Kentucky home, as it were, right here with us as we prepared to go in.
The competition room was surprisingly small; more like an elementary school auditorium or smaller than a concert hall. We barely fit in left-to-right, and as for front-to-back, we stretched almost to the judges' table halfway back in the room. Still, we made it work, singing through our set: Mendelssohn's Richte mich, Gott; Monteverdi's Sanctus; Matsushita's O Lux Beata Trinitas; Brahms's Nachwache I; the Croatian piece whose title and composer I still don't know, and rounding out with the spiritual, Moses Hogan's My Soul's Been Anchored in the Lord.
There was no time to relax once the competition set was sung, however, since we had less than 30 minutes to get to the seaside Promenade concert, which seemed to be an effort on the part of the Zadarians to promote this festival a bit more to the public. They just had each of the participating choirs do a more informal, outdoor set flash mob-style, and tonight's venue was that good ol' Sea Organ. An iconic spot to be sure, but as the only place in the city guaranteed to have some musical sounds going on at all times, it seems like maybe they could have chosen more wisely. Still, I got to take part in a performance of, among other things, my Shall We Gather setting while watching the sun set over the Adriatic Sea.
Saturday morning we had a second outdoor Promenade concert (in a different location), which this time had to compete briefly with an electric guitarist across the Square. This concert was attended by our new biggest fan, a small baby child who threw his hands in the air on the final chord of Ezekiel Saw de Wheel. That may also qualify him to be our new mascot - I'll have to double check.
In the afternoon a few of us climbed the big tower adjoined to the church where the opening concert had been:
Looking down, we saw another choir taking their spot in the Promenade rotation:
And an overhead view of the church:
The climb down:
A round of afternoon naps and dinner followed before the big finale: the closing ceremony where the top 3, and subsequently the winner, would be announced. We sat in the auditorium along with the other choirs and, I assume, an audience of Zadarian citizens:
The way they structured it was to announce each group from last place to first, as scored by round 1. It was made slightly confusing by the fact that anyone between certain score ranges got a certain medal - e.g. 70-80 points was "bronze medal" regardless of where you placed in the rankings overall - so it was tough to tell in real time how many more groups there were and, thus, if we were in the top 3 or not. With each group announced it ratcheted up the tension and anxiety that much more.
But finally, they got to the end, and when second place was announced as a choir other than us, we excitedly realized we'd gotten first. But! The catch was that the top 3 had to re-compete, meaning the other choirs had a chance to overtake us as the actual grand prize winner. Obviously we couldn't let that happen, and - as the stage announced a brief intermission before the final round - we scurried outside to put together our 10-minute final set.
In the end, we opened with Salvation is Created - not one we'd competed with in round 1 - and repeated Matsushita's O Lux and Hogan's My Soul's Been Anchored, the latter of which, predictably, really wowed the crowd.
Then we returned to the lobby to await the judges' final deliberation, and - as many of you already know - it matched the round 1 rankings, meaning we took home first.
This was a big deal, as not only was it a prestigious award, but it came with a monetary prize as well, in the form of one of those giant cardboard checks:
We passed it around and took pictures with it, in various groups, one of which consisted of people whose last year in Cardinal this was, and so included me.
But the celebrating had only just begun. All of the participating choirs made their way through the city to an outdoor bar, where a party was being thrown in our honor, with one free drink apiece. It had to have been the coolest locale in all of Zadar:
In the middle of this sprawling venue was a mountain with a winding spiral pathway to the top, which gave the best view:
We commingled with a German choir, who knew many of the same works by Mendelssohn that we did, so we had an impromptu inebriated hilltop concert with them. One of those moments.
The next morning, Sunday, we had one last activity in Zadar before leaving: a church service, back at the St. Anastasia church where the opening concert had been, just a few nights earlier. That morning, nothing was open for breakfast early enough to accommodate us, so I grabbed a sandwich from the little convenience store once again, and had yet another seaside coffee to go with it.
And then, with the church service over and the last of our kuna spent, we, the Cardinal Singers, the 2018 winners of the Zadar Choir Competition, loaded up the bus that we hadn't seen since Wednesday, and headed off.
