Uppsala Cathedral Boys' Choir Concert

Yesterday afternoon we went to a National Day of Sweden concert at Uppsala Cathedral featuring the Uppsala Cathedral Boys' Choir.

The program cover

The program

The setting for the concert

The Boys

Recessional at the end of the concert as they sing their way out.

 This, I think, was the first time I have attended a boys' choir concert. The choir has a mixture of ages, as it must, with the younger boys singing soprano and presumably alto, while their post-pubescent peers sing in the lower registers. We were quite impressed, especially with the little guys, who not only sang competently but had memorized all the music including pieces in Swedish, Latin, English, and German.

They boys were accompanied by the cathedral's organ usually playing at a low volume so as not to drown out the singers. However, one piece (one of Alfén's) was for organ alone and we got a taste of what the instrument could really do. Starting out softly, there was a gradual crescendo culminating in a few booming chords you could actually feel in your body. So satisfying.

It was a nice concert but I do have a few quibbles, mostly with the final piece, the Halleluja from Handel's Messiah.  For one thing the organ and the choir were not together. Also, and I know they can't help it, but little boys singing soprano do not have the power and depth of sound of a trained, grown woman. Being something of a soprano fan, the Halleluja left me feeling unfulfilled.

On our walk back to our apartment, we discovered a series of runestones behind the cathedral.

One of the runestones behind the Cathedral

Back home, we decided to document our table in its usual somewhat squalid state. Note the wine bottles on the counter. The newspaper is, of course, in Swedish but we can usually puzzle out certain things like concert announcements and other upcoming events.

Our humble abode