I Sang for the Pope in Rome.

Sienna Cathedral

Ok, so I really didn't sing for the Pope, but that's what was circulating around the office when I went on choir tour to Italy with the Utah Baroque Ensemble in 2009.

I went to see the ensemble perform last night at Temple square. Does it make me really white to love music from the 1500s? Well I am, and I've missed singing it since leaving the choir in 2010.

Looking down at the side chapel where we sang mass. "Tibi Dabo Claves - To thee I give the keys"

My favorite experience of the trip was to sing mass in St. Peter's Basilica in Rome. How sublime was it to sing  Palestrina's Agnus Dei, The Lamb of God, in one of the spaces he envisioned for his music to be performed?  

I snuck a photo just before mass. This was my view. 

View of Il Duomo from the Boboli Gardens - Florence

 We sang an impromptu song under Brunelleschi's dome. 

And gave a concert in the chapel through this door. As the choir's volume increased, so did the volume of the swallows nesting in the eaves above the narrow streets. 

The Coliseum has surprisingly-good acoustics. 

This Church, Santa Maria in Travestere, dates back to 340 CE. The church's nave is flanked by a mix of Doric, Ionic, and Corinthian columns harvested from other Roman buildings. While singing, I though more than once, "If only these columns could talk. . . "

The ensemble last night at Temple Square.