International Choral Festival, 2008

Pocatello seems like an odd place for an international anything, but it also seems an odd place to find one of the country's best acoustical theaters (at Stephen's Performing Art Center). Anyway, I went to the opening event with my mom. A bit too much talking and glad-handing from the sponsors at the beginning, but otherwise I quite liked it. There were four choirs performing.

The Brazilian choir was very good. They attempted to have the audience sing along with the chorus of a Portuguese song. That sort of worked. They had good energy and voices, and a very enthusiastic director.

The Lithuanian choir was awesome. If you only have time to go to one of the events, make it one where they're performing. Awesome voices. Spectacular energy. Their last song was the only one in English, and it was a compilation of Andrew Lloyd Webber bits. I recognized all but the very last bit. Oh, their luggage got lost, so they were performing in Festival T-shirts instead of in their native costumery. As my mom commented when they were done: "With voices like that, they don't need costumes."

The Taiwan children's choir was good, but a bit heavy on the pageantry and gadgets. Some of them had very good voices; some needed a bit of work. It was...cute, but it ran on a bit long.

Last was a choir from New Jersey. Good voices and diction; horrible facial expressions. They also needed a bit more expressiveness in their singing. I'm not sure why they only performed three songs. The other choirs all did maybe four or five. *shrugs*

I'm going to one more of the events tomorrow night. I no longer remember why I picked that night over Friday or Saturday, but I agreed to go to two of them with my mom. I think she's planning to go all four nights, but I know I'd be burned out on choirs if I tried that.