As I have written before, the vocal a cappella ensemble, Karol’s Karolers has joined the Hawaii Masterworks Chorus in its tour of Eastern Europe. They have also been invited to sing a piece separate from the larger group, and because their repertoire has not been widely publicized, it’s always a delightful surprise when they break into song.

At today’s concert at St. Michael’s in Mondsee, Austria, the site of the wedding between Capt. von Trapp and Maria in The Sound of Music movie, I knew after the second note of the piece what the Karolers were singing—it was Carl Crosier’s arrangement of The Queen’s Prayer. The larger group has been singing Alec Schumacker’s arrangement of this beloved Hawaiian hymn in other concerts, so I was pleasantly surprised to hear Carl’s arrangement for a change. You may click here to see the video.

Ohhhhh, Carl!! Not a day goes by without my thinking about him and especially on this tour—he would have absolutely loved singing in all these fabulous churches with their fabulous acoustics. Hearing his arrangement of Queen Liliuokalani’s composition was unexpected and oh so bittersweet. We all miss him so much!

I’m afraid I wasn’t fast enough on the trigger to start recording the first verse, so the video begins with Naomi Castro in her lovely solo on the second verse.

When we first arrived at St. Michael’s, I was greeted by the church organist/music director, Prof. Gottfried Holzer-Graf, who demonstrated the instrument for me by improvising in French, German and Italian styles. He explained that the instrument has characteristics of German, French and Italian organs in their tonal voicing. (Organists think that organs sound like the language of the country—French organs sound nasal, for example.)

He told me that some of the pipework was three hundred years old, and other pipes were over four hundred years old! It all sounded so beautifully voiced and well-blended. The console dates from 1993, though.

Unfortunately I didn’t get a chance to play it since Prof. Holzer-Graf was called away unexpectedly. There was a small continuo down in the chancel area which I played for the choir’s performance of Mozart “Ave verum corpus.”

What was absolutely delightful and pure fun was that the two directors, Tim Carney and Scott Fikse, and the two accompanists, Eric Schank and myself, got not flowers or lei like in Hawaii at the end of the concert—we were each given a brown shopping bag with a bottle of local red wine, a piece of cake and a piece of chocolate! A wonderful tradition!

While en route back to Salzburg, my new friend Christel and I disembarked to ride the funicular up to the ancient fortress on top of the city. There we had dinner in a restaurant with a spectacular panoramic view of the town below.

After dinner we walked round to the music room where we heard a chamber music concert of music by Mozart, Haydn and Strauss. I really was impressed with the quartet’s ensemble especially when they played a piece completely pizzicato, and with lots of rubato, staying absolutely in sync.

What a day! Tomorrow it will take us seven hours to drive to Prague.