Forty-eight students from the College of St. Rose in Albany, New York, came to Le Puy for the weekend of March 3-5 to perform a concert at our local parish: Paroisse des Carmes. The International Centre was among the sponsors for the event.
Dressed in formal black concert attire, the students sang a cappella selections from the Renaissance, Scottish folk music, American folk songs, African-American spirituals, Billy Joel, and some songs in in French.
The choir added several special features including student soloists and conductors. Paul Evoskevich, a saxophonist and professor at the College, played an improvised jazz piece to the choir's accompaniment. 
Aiken Drum, a Scottish folk song, provided a snare drum accompaniment that delighted the audience.
Women vocalists sang a piece called Four Short Epitaphs, while the men sang The Mermaid, a British maritime song.
One of the choir's more moving pieces was Abide with Me. The Christian hymn started out as a poem written by Scottish Anglican priest, Henry Francis Lyte in 1847. He set it to music as he lay dying from tuberculosis. The hymn is a prayer for God to remain present to us throughout our lives and trials and even through death. Its more familiar melody was written by English composer William Henry Monk in a piece entitled Eventide (1861).
The concert ended with the Shaker song, The Gift to Be Simple. However, the vocalists performed it not in the front of the church, but in long lines on the two side aisles. The effect came off as an "embracing" of the audience. The choir also sang their various parts to the song in sign language. It was a stunning display of showmanship, and the audience loved it and clapped for an encore. The choir obliged with the piece, The Drinking Gourd.
Before the concert, Monsieur Bernard of the Paroisse des Carmes who helped make arrangements for the choir's visit, thanked the students for coming. He also reminded them that they were on "precious land both historically and religiously." The pilgrimages of the Middles Ages and the visits of French kings took place here as well as the founding of the Sisters of St. Joseph in 1650.
"It is this congregation which gave birth to the College of Saint Rose," he said.
Le Puy has another connection with the United States through the Marquis of Lafayette, said Monsieur Bernard. The Marquis lived near here in a village called Chavaniac. President George Washington gave Lafayette an American flag in 1781 in thanks for his help in the American Revolution. The city keeps the flag in the regional Prefecture.
Sunday Afternoon at the Nursing Homes
Small groups of students performed an informal 45-minute "mini-concert" for nursing home residents in Le Puy. The men sang some jazz tunes and were later joined by four women. All the pieces were sung a cappella.
In the morning, some students went to the Cathedral du Puy of Notre Dame.
Friday Night Arrival in Le Puy
The choir arrived on Friday after a long journey of 12 hours that included a snowy trek from Albany to the Newark airport, a lost passport, and a 300-truck traffic jam in the Alps due to the snowstorms and a cold wave that had pounded France over the week. However, everyone was very excited to be in France for the next 9 days and showed no signs of weariness.
The leaders of the Paroisse des Carmes held a reception of welcome for the choir in a 12th century building that was originally a stable for spiritual pilgrims' horses. (Le Puy has long been one of the starting points for the Camino de Santiago Compostela pilgrimage that ends in Spain.) The choir obliged their hosts by singing two songs from their repertory.
Michael Levi, professor of music at the College since 1998 has taken the choir on international singing trips in Austria and Ireland as well as France. He is the choir's conductor as well as a pianist, composer, and arranger. The choir goes on to Lyon and Geneva to perform for audiences in those cities before they head back to New York.
The students are mostly music majors pursuing careers in teaching, performance, or the business side of the music industry. The blending of their sweet voices in the Medieval buildings of Le Puy connected them to their French audiences in time, space, and language.
The College of Saint Rose is a private, independent, co-educational, not-for-profit college in Albany, New York, United States, founded in 1920 by the Sisters of Saint Joseph of Carondelet. It is one of six colleges in the United States sponsored by the Sisters of Saint Joseph. The College enrolls a total of 4,863 students from 34 states and 51 countries. It offers 45 undergraduate programs, 29 master’s degree programs, and 19 advanced certificates available to new students (2,931 undergraduates and 1,932 postgraduates).
Promotion of the Saturday night free concert at Paroisse des Carmes was extensive in Le Puy, and townspeople responded well with a near-capacity crowd. Posters were up in storefronts all over the city as radio stations announced the event. Fr. Paul Chamaly, pastor at the parish, also encouraged parishioners from the pulpit to attend the concert, which was held after the parish's Saturday night Mass.
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