Mastersingers USA in Central Europe – 2007

Monday, July 2, 2007
Concert in Trnava

The city of Trnava is about an hour's drive from Bratislava.  It is a bustling Slovakian town of some 70,000 with a rich history and an economic base provided primarily by the nearby auto plant of the French carmaker, PSA.  We were scheduled to be greeted by the mayor on our arrival, but were so late that he had to go on to other appointments.  Still, we were escorted into the Town Hall where we signed a guest register and were given souvenir booklets.  Then we entered the high-tech room where the city council meets, and we were greeted by a senior official, who spoke to us for about 20 minutes through an interpreter.  Along with a lengthy description of the town and its economic activity, history, culture, religion, he gave us to understand that our visit had only been arranged by the American embassy 3 weeks previous or there would have been more publicity for our concert.  This was fairly frustrating for us because, according to Bruce, the concert had been firmly scheduled back in October.  This "welcoming" speech was followed by a 15-minute video that covered much of the same ground as the speech, and we began to understand that there was a great deal of civic pride in this little town.

We were told it was a 30-minute drive (turned out to be an hour).	Trnava town square (Town Hall is center white building in the row)

After the speech, we made our way to the Cathedral of St. John the Baptist (Katedrálny chrám sv. Jána Krstitel'a), identified by at least one guide book as "the most beautiful Baroque cathedral in Central Europe, if not all of Europe."  Originally, we had been scheduled to perform in the town square.  Nice as that would have been, the church was a much better venue for us.  When we entered the church we were stunned by the richness of the decor:  the elaborate, dark artwork on the wall behind the altar, the paintings and other decorations on the ceiling, etc.

External and internal views of Cathedral of St. John the Baptist - Trnava (source for center & right pictures: John Harpold)

Despite the relative absence of publicity, we had a substantial audience for our concert, which began at 7 p.m.  We started with 5 pieces from our sacred repertoire, and were met with sustained applause.  One can understand this better from a little pre-concert interchange between Helen Castle and a young woman, who was apparently some kind of assistant to the priest.  Throughout this visit to countries that were all communist satellites of the Soviet Union less than 20 years ago, we were all curious about the communist legacy — what was it like, what lasting impact has it had, how have things changed?  Helen asked this young woman what things were like during the communist regime.  Her response?  "We call those the 'bad times,' and we try not to remember them."  About our concert, she added, "It's wonderful to have back the music that was meant for this place."  Indeed.  During the communist era, this beautiful church was used only as a college lecture hall.

Between our sacred set and the spirituals, Peter Stoltzfus-Berton gave a virtuoso performance of J.S. Bach's "Fugue in E-flat Major" ("St. Anne") on the cathedral's impressive organ.  On entering the church and noting the organ case, he observed that it "looks like it could pack some serious noise."  He let out some of that noise, modestly sharing the applause afterwards with a gesture toward the organ itself.

The audience warmed even further to our spirituals, then in a flash of inspiration, Bruce said, "Let's do 'Aj, Lúčka, Lúčka.'"  This hadn't been on our planned program, and we weren't sure how this Czech folk song would play in Slovakia.  We needn't have worried.  Many in the audience were seen to be singing along with us, and when we finished, most of the audience jumped to their feet as they applauded.  Then we sang one of the new folk songs in our repertoire, "Tancuj, Tancuj, Tancuj."  This, too, led to cheers and smiles, and on that high note, we marched out.

Thus ended what was arguably one of the high points in our Central European adventure.  After a shaky start in which it seemed that nothing was going right, we delivered to a large group of local people exactly what we had come to give them, and a bridge was built across a cultural divide.