16 choirs performed at the choir festival in the Landhaus Ettenbühl. The spectrum of pieces was wide ranging from pop songs to folklore. A Ukrainian group jumped in spontaneously.
“On such a beautiful summer day, when the sky is so blue, we especially enjoy singing to you.” Margarete Schmid from the Feldberg singing club warmly welcomed the audience in the countryside, and we started with “Today here, tomorrow there” and “Stoht uf em Berg e Linde” by the Müllheim composer Fritz Wolfsberger.
Four years have passed since the last choir festival in the Landhaus Ettenbühl. The corona pandemic silenced the choirs, and for a long time rehearsals were only possible online, and later rehearsals with masks. “We fought our way through,” said Susanne Studer from the Freiburg women’s choir La Courage.
Not all choirs survived this time. Now they have found each other again, the vocal cords are vibrating again, the repertoires have been safely rehearsed and for the first time there were so many participants again that the sixth Ettenbühler Choir Festival made sense. 16 choirs from Freiburg im Breisgau via Lörrach to Bettmaringen near Stühlingen brought the park to music with enjoyment and the audience also accepted the offer in large numbers with its combination of diverse, polyphonic singing, lots of flowers and sunshine. At 2 p.m. the parking spaces were largely full.
“It’s going well, everyone is in a good mood,” said Karin John-Schneider, organizer of the choir festival. When asked, she said it wasn’t difficult to bring enough choirs together: “There are a few new ones and many choirs that always come when you call them.” This time, however, the young talent was poorly represented; only the Kirchhofen children’s and youth choir held the flag high.
What has also changed: While the colors black plus colored accessories used to dominate the appearance of many choirs, this time it was more colorful and brighter. The Freiburg female power choir Femmes Vocales even appeared in light beige and white and provided good entertainment with spirited folklore from the Balkans and feel-good swing.
As always, the spectrum was wide-ranging. Sometimes the Vogelbach-Malsburg men’s choir with choir director Günther Enßle made its audience smile with the setting of the Hebel poem “Der Schwarzwälder im Breisgau” and sing along with Freddy Quinn’s “Homesickness”, sometimes the big Tannenkirchen pop choir presented hits from the charts – and It was always lively.
The human singing voice is ideal for conveying feelings, especially when several voices come together to form harmonies. This was proven by a mixed Ukrainian trio from Bamlach, who spontaneously stepped in for an unusual choir. When the man and the two women sang their first song, which begins in German with “Dear God, I pray for Ukraine,” their compatriots in the front row cried. Moving, expressive and with balanced three-part harmony, the “Choir without a Name” touched the hearts of the listeners, the chairs quickly filled up, and many people stood behind them and listened quietly.
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