Gaulitanus Choir returns from Latvian tour

Gozo´s Gaulitanus Choir has just returned from its 18th artistic venture abroad. Indeed, the choir was on a concert tour in Latvia between 25 and 29 August following the invitation of Riga’s Blagovest Orthodox Chamber Choir, a top Latvian choir which early this year had featured in Gaulitana: A Festival of Music which is organized by the Gaulitanus Choir.

The Gozitan choir’s first artistic commitment was right after its arrival, when it gave an afternoon concert at the National Botanic Gardens of Latvia in Salaspils. The concert, held in this atypical and wonderful venue in collaboration with the Elpa choir, was very well-received. The choir was under the direction of of Colin Attard, as also for the other concerts.

The second artistic commitment was an early evening concert in St. Catherine Church in Kuldīga, held in collaboration with the Rāte choir. The event in this state-protected Evangelical Lutheran church, which is the oldest place of worship in this charming medieval west Latvian town, was attended by an extremely warm audience led by Pastor Viesturs Pirro, which thoroughly enjoyed the concert. Besides conceding to an encore, after the concert Mro Colin Attard presented the pastor with a CD of the choir. Coincidentally, the choir members wore the choir’s new scarves and ties for the first time during this concert.

The Gaulitanus Choir ended its artistic commitments with a grand concert at Riga’s iconic St Peter’s Church in the very heart of the old town, held in collaboration with the Association of Culture Institutions of Riga City Council. The very big and attentive audience which attended the concert reacted very positively to the programme of Maltese music presented by the Gozitan choir, just as much as it greatly appreciated two classical sacred works from the Orthodox liturgy by Sergey Rachmaninoff performed jointly with the Blagovest Chamber Orthodox Choir. Teaming up with Blagovest, after having already done so in Gozo in March, was another very notable feat for Gaulitanus and added to the huge success of the concert. Truly, the final Latvian number Riga Dimd performed jointly had to be encored following the audience’s insistent applause. Towards the end of the concert Gaulitanus’s musical director Colin Attard presented a memento to Blagovest’s musical director Alexandrs Brandavs - who also guest conducted one of the Russian excerpts and the encore -, auguring more potential future collaborations between the two choirs who next year will both be celebrating their 30th anniversary. The friendship between the two choirs was further remonstrated by a joint postconcert dinner.

Notably, the Gaulitanus Choir’s repertoire for this concert tour consisted of a mixture of Maltese secular and sacred music, including various compositions by the choir’s founderdirector Colin Attard, who also directed the choir in Latvia, as well as works by Carmelo Pace, Charles Camilleri and Giuseppe Caruana. It is very significant that these works, most in the Maltese language, were extremely well-liked during all three concerts. These compositions also afforded some limelight to some of the choir’s soloists, namely sopranos Anna Bonello, Patricia Buttigieg, Stephanie Portelli, Annabelle Zammit, mezzo-soprano Joanna Pullicino, tenor Joseph Calleja and bass Pierre Louis Attard.

The full programme of the concert tour, which was fully co-ordinated by Blagovest and the Sing Latvia organisation, also offered various highly-enriching cultural tours to the choir members, which thoroughly enhanced the Latvian experience by giving insights into the country’s culture, heritage and natural landscaping.

This umpteenth foray on foreign soil was the Gaulitanus Choir’s second for 2019, coming back-to-back with another very successful concert tour of Italy (Assisi and Rome) this June, and was supported by the Project Support Grant, Malta Arts Fund – Arts Council Malta.

Photo: Malcolm Borg