I love choral music!!

Cory left early Friday morning for a choir tour to San Francisco to compete at the Festival of Gold! They were invited to this when they achieved the Gold level of performance at the Heritage Festival in Hawaii last year.

"This one-of-a-kind festival is designed for the most accomplished choral programs, and intended to provide choirs with the most relevant, meaningful and powerful choral festival experience ever. Nineteen of the nation's finest choirs were invited to perform in this exclusive event. In addition to individual festival performances, all the choirs performed together in a gala encore concert." (from their website...)

Saturday night the phone rang at 11:30, and it was Cory telling us that Troubadours won FIRST PLACE at this NATIONAL festival! Not only that, but Concert Choir won second place!! They didn’t even have the large groups in a separate category, so Concert Choir was competing against the likes of Troubadours!! How 'bout them apples????

The Troubadours flew back from San Francisco early Monday morning, not to get some rest, but to check in at the Orange County Performing Arts Center Segerstrom Hall for the Pacific Chorale American Masterpieces Choral Festival where they were one of only three featured performing groups. It also included performances by the John Alexander Singers and by the Festival Choir, composed of 200 voices from 20 high schools.

The Troubadours had the opportunity to work with the renowned composer Eric Whitacre. They performed his piece, "With a Lily in Your Hand," and Mr. Whitacre himself conducted the combined Festival Chorus singing his composition, "Lux Aurumque." The man is a genius!! (He looks like "Sawyer" on Lost!) The girls were all in love, and they were all immensely impressed with his talent.