The chamber singers tour experience
Annually, USD’s Chamber Singers go on a tour during spring break around specific parts in the U.S. or around the world. This year, they travelled around South Dakota, North Dakota and Minnesota. This was my first ever year with the Chamber Singers, hence my first ever tour.
The entire week was incredibly busy and very eventful, traveling to schools or colleges to sing to their choirs and introduce them to USD. We went to a different town and sang dozens of different songs, with a 10 minute break within the concert, in the evenings.
Our program, “Americana,” had 22 songs, each ranging in intensity and emotion, which were all performed each and every single day.
Like mentioned before, we only had one 10 minute break in the middle of our concert. Typically, we would drink water and rest our voices before getting in choir formation and walking out to sing the second half. It was difficult, and hard on your voice, but it was incredible and would make you emotionally and physically spent at the end of the day.
It wouldn’t be a trip without some hiccups, however. On Sunday, there were supposed to be blizzards hitting the central and northeast region of the midwest. That same day was supposed to be a concert in Aberdeen, which was eventually cancelled due to all of the highways and interstates being closed off due to weather.
We accidentally got a second free day to rest our voices and do whatever we wanted to in the town of Pierre. The only catch was the 6:30 a.m. call time the next morning to a small town in the far north point of North Dakota.
Even though all the cities and towns we visited were amazing, St. Peter, home to Gustavus Adolphus College, had a beautiful church with fantastic acoustics that made every chord we sang ring. The class we sang for was incredibly attentive and some even showed up at our concert later in the day.
Overall, the entire tour and trip can only be described as memorable. Since I was travelling and staying with the same people, I got to know them better and overall was allowed to get to know most of the choir. There were plenty of inside jokes made and plenty of things to laugh and look back fondly on. It is something that I will not forget for a long time.
