Czech Republic Tour

8th to 12th June 2005

After 21 years, The France Prešeren Academy Choir Kranj, went on a tour to Czech Republic again. Out of regard for the truth, in 1984 we were touring The Republic of Czechoslovakia and were mainly singing in Prague. It was one of the tours that still bring memories alive when we start discussing the tours. You can find details (in Slovene) in a book Vendar peti on ne jenja (pages 174-175, 400-404) or on a website http://www.krapz.com

When the organization of the events (concerts, tours, bringing in the sponsorships …) is in hands of our first tenor Zlatko, we like to say that he has pulled some dog's strings. It was so this time again. His colleague veterinarians arranged everything about the first part of our tour. After a hearty welcome that came along with the welcome food and drink, they organized our first concert to be in Saint Marketa Church in Jaromerice nad (upon) Rokytnou. The audience was wonderful and we sang some Slovenian songs and some gospels. The audience claimed the addition and our conductor Primož Kerštanj was merciful.

After the concert and a delicious dinner we hopped on the bus towards Trebič, a nice and well kept town by the river Jihlava. We were placed there on three different locations but enjoyed the breakfast in a cosy little pub Rachela. We took a sightseeing tour, visited a Saint Prokop basilica and visited a Jewish quarter which has been protected by UNESCO.
We tasted the local food and the local liquor Becherovka.

The evening concert was in an old synagogue which has been open for cultural events and not for the service anymore. It is beautifully refurbished with ornaments and Hebrew inscriptions and highly acoustical as well.

On the second part of our tour we moved to Olomouc where 33th choral festival “Svatky pisni” was taking place from July 8-12. Olomouc is quite a big town by the river Morava. The town has got a University founded in 1573 or, as the other source claims even in 1556.

We settled down in a Hotel Sigma, which reflected the big contrasts of the countries in so called transition. One part of the hotel has been refurbished and contained a big congress hall, a Czech restaurant, a Chinese restaurant and a pub. The part that has not been refurbished provided a deep insight into socrealistic solutions of the local interior architects. The toilets reminded a lot of those found on the trains and the bathrooms contained the lovely movable washbasins. Some members of the choir were stuck in the hotel lift and our performance on the competitions was at risk. Luckily, they were saved before our departure to the competitions site. In the meantime, they were trying to keep the spirits high by singing the Titanic soundtrack songs.

There were 120 choirs competing, mostly children’s and youth from The Czech Republic, Estonia, Lithuania, Serbia and Montenegro, Hungary, Poland, Russia, Singapore, Slovakia, Turkey and Slovenia.
The choirs from Slovenia were: Children’s Choir from IV Primary School from Celje with a conductor Jolanda Ipšek Ulrych, Youth Choir from Koper with a conductor Maja Cilenšek, Children’s Choir of Slivnica Primary School with a conductor Mira Prel, Children’s Choir From Šmartno pri Litiji with a conductor Selma Gradišek, Mixed Choir Vocalis from Maribor with a conductor Alenka Korpar and The France Prešeren Academy Choir Kranj with a conductor Primož Kerštanj.

The jury consisted of 31 mostly Czech and Slovak musicians including Jiri Štrunc who in 1968 visited Kranj with his Girl’s Choir from Karlovy Vary.

The competitions took places on various locations and there was a wide range of categories as well.
The particularity of these competitions was that all the choirs performed in front of the jury only, while the concert halls were completely empty. Our choir was competing in two categories: Gospel and Spiritual and Superior.
In Gospel and Spiritual category we performed four gospels, arranged by Moses Hogan. One member of the jury came after the performance to show us that he was deeply touched with it, in fact touched to tears. We were pretty much satisfied with the performance as well.

The second part of our competitions was in a beautiful Reduta Hall. We performed an obligatory Ivan Hrušovski piece Rytmus, K.Nysted’s Veni and two Slovenian folklore songs  Jnjen čeua jti gna and A.Čopi’s San se šetao.
It was quite a good performance again.

In the afternoon we were wandering around the city with many beautiful spots, squares, churches, chapels, fountains and monuments. We treated ourselves in restaurants while waiting for the results announcement which took place in a beautiful town square.

Our choir had a reason to celebrate. In the Superior category we earned ourselves a golden medal with more than 90 points, while in the category Gospel and spiritual we won a golden medal with 100 points.
The Slovenian flag fluttered high, the cheering and kissing were long and all of us picked up our cell phones to inform those at home about our joy.
The conductor Primož was basking in gold on our hands.

Afterwards we went to a local pub to celebrate. One of the photos will always remain in the history of this choir - our member Bojan got a lovely lipstick inscription on his forehead: 100 points.