Brasil—July 13 2006

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July 13, 2006—Thursday
to Rio!

The hardest day of the tour, but we knew it would be ahead of time.

4:30 wakeup (we got some sleep on the bus last night, but we did get in at 1am)

5:00 depart for airport

checkin at Gol (same place where we waited 3.5 hours earlier in the tour)

fly to Rio

drive to Niteroi. If Sao Paolo is the board room of Brasil, Rio is the reception area. Or maybe the company spa.

this is winter? In SP, nobody wears shorts, only pants. Here, nobody wears shirts; everybody is walking around in their swimwear.

rehearse Mozart with National Symphony Orchestra at UFF. The orchestra is excellent. It's going to be a good couple of concerts.

back to hotel to rest finally

As an aside, it's clear there is a lot of security around. We haven't felt unsafe I don't think. There are security guards everywhere, and so just for fun, we're taking photos to give a sense of the security of the day. This photo is from a couple days ago. The guy behind Daniel was the guard for our storage room at the Banco in SP:

to church in Ipanema to rehearse. Nice acoustics. We had a low-energy rehearsal, no surprise there.

rest period in multi-purpose room, guys were out, and we had to peel some guys off the floor to get them up. Can we sing a good concert?

We played a little hackeysack upstairs to wake up a little more. Still groggy. Can we sing a good concert?

We printed programs ahead of time for this concert. I think we made 250. Ten minutes before the concert was to start, Page told me we were out of programs. Considering Brazilians tend to be late for concerts, it sounded like it would be a good audience.

We went into the church (we were in the next door building), and it was absolutely packed. About 500 people we were told. All the seats were filled, people were standing along the sides. We started with Mountain Nights, where we place the Troubadors all around the space. Then we do Hail, Gladdening Light (double choir) from both sides of the church. After that we do A Hymn to the Virgin (on the Britten CD) with the quartet in the balcony. In other words, we use every space of the church, and the audience gets cool effects and surround sound.

Somewhere in this first set, I noticed a TV crew moving their lights and equipment around to pick us up in the parts of the church. Then, as the concert went on, the TV crew was everywhere. They had their big light in front of the choir, the camera in my face, in the boys' faces. They weren't subtle, and they were there for the whole concert.

So can we sing a good concert with a long, tiring day? It was a great concert, and it's beginning to become clear this choir is peaking. Chances of note disasters are slim, and now it's like we're juts toying with the audience, to see how or when we win them over. We haven't not gotten a standing ovation yet. The group is starting to see/believe how good this choir has become. Form Linz to Levallois to Campos, we can now do a completely a cappella concert, which we couldn't do a couple years ago. Not only that, on this tour we also know a program to sing with piano, and one that we're singing with orchestra. I feel like, now that audiences are beating us over the head with it, that we now act like a team, and not like a bunch of people that sing in the same place at the same time. It has helped having our guest singers along, who have dozens of ABS tours experience, to help get the moys motivated and excited about singing and getting better. The audience is very appreciative of the music, and then go absolutely nuts for the spirituals and gospel songs. Hampton is signing a lot of CDs.

After the concert, the TV crew interviewed me, Nick F, and American Adam.

While packing the bus, the priest at the church (very ncie guy) was on the sidewalk and someone I guess dares him to thank me, give me a hug, and pick me up off the ground, which is exactly what he did. That's never happened before. Hilarious. He was a big guy.

After the concert, we were treated to a feast at Churascaria (sp?), where they have an elaborate salad buffet, but are known for bringing different meat to your table on a skewer, and slicing a piece off.

A long day, but a good one. We negotiate for a late wakeup, though there is lots to see and do tomorrow.

--Mr. Fox