South Denmark Female Choir performing at the Opening Concert in Lucca © INTERKULTUR

Vox Lucensis 2022: Enjoying sweet choral sounds in beautiful Italy

International choir competition and festival in Lucca brings people and nations together

Vox Lucensis - Concorso Corale Internazionale

Finally, after two postponements due to the pandemic, choirs from six nations are now coming together, getting to know each other and competing in Lucca at the “Vox Lucensis – Concorso Corale Internazionale”, the international choir competition.

The Opening Ceremony on Saturday evening (April 9) in the Chiesa di San Paolino has been a great event, with really great choirs singing!

The Fortissimo Vocal Ensemble from Bulgaria, the Vokalensemble Incantanti from Switzerland, the Jugendchor Zürich (Switzerland) and the South Denmark Female Choir (Denmark) presented their wonderful singing skills and gave a nice foretaste of what to expect in the upcoming days of competitions and Friendship Concerts.

The welcome speech to all participants by the Artistic Director Giovanni Acciai was particularly intense, pointing out that INTERKULTUR's work is centered around bringing nations together through music in peace:

“Our aim is ‘create bridges’: A mission that we try to accomplish every day with our work, openly, and with all our commitment, offering its results to our supporters, with gratitude, to repay them for trusting us every time. The meaning of the INTERKULTUR message wants to be a contribution to consolidate the importance of understanding between people, today as yesterday, to this goal. We have chosen the only universal language capable of overcoming all barriers, the only one that goes beyond all borders, in opposition to the language of weapons: The choral singing.”

The idea of music as the universal language of all people was also brought to life during the concert with two pieces sung by four international choirs together, under the direction of the local artistic director Sara Matteucci. One of them, "VOX LUCENSIS", was performed for the very first time, which is the official anthem of this event, composed by Saverio Rapezzi, a local musician and composer especially for this occasion.

The second piece that was sung together by all choirs was the world-famous anthem for peace “DONA NOBIS PACEM”, which strongly emphasized the concert's purpose of dedicating this concert to the people in the Ukraine and all those who are suffering the cruelties of war in every part of the world.

On Sunday (April 10) the first choirs competed in front of the jury or enjoyed the sunny day in Lucca and its surrounding cities in beautiful Tuscany. More choirs will perform their competition program today, before the best of them – selected by the international jury – will sing once again for the Grand Prize on April 12 in the Conservatorio Luigi Boccherini.

Stay tuned for the winners and follow us on Facebook and Instagram for regular up-to-date stories, pictures and videos live from Lucca!

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