Lucca has a well-preserved Renaissance wall encircling its historic city center and its cobblestone streets. The streets are lined with lovely shops and restaurants which offer regional specialties such as boar stew with polenta, deep fried cow’s brains and salted cod or pork with potatoes. A highlight of my day was touring Casa di Puccini, …
Continue reading “Lucca, Puccini’s home, 2 concerts, it takes a team effort”
Florence is the birth place of the Renaissance art and architecture. One of its most iconic sights is the Duomo, a cathedral with a terracotta-tiled dome which took 6 centuries to build. The 1 hr. lines and the 38C temp🥵 prevented me from going inside.😔 Today was Gallery Day and I visited both the Galleria …
Cartona is well situated on a hilltop and so I thought I’d share some of the stairs I climbed with you. 🍨🍨🍨🍨🍨🍨🍨🍨🍨🍨🍨🍨🍨🍨 14 flavours down 136 left:)
Today’s concert was held in the Basilica of the town’s saint, Margherita. Her mummified body was on full view in a glass coffin. This is my first ever concert where a dead person was situated directly behind the choir, next to the altar. There was 6 second echo which meant we had to look at …
We arrived in Arezzo just as the heat wave began and temperatures soared to 3O+C. Thankfully the Romanesque church, Santa Maria della Pieve, we sang in was lovely and cool. I was so surprised how high the dome was in this all stone structure. We delivered our concert from the balcony right next to the …
Perched high on a rocky hill sits Orvieto over looking the lush hillside and vineyards. They call Umbria the “Green Heart” of Italy. Our conductor, Lars, took us to the ramparts to show us the great view of the countryside. The Duomo di Orvieto is a spectacular 13th century Catholic Church which has one of …
It was fitting to get one last glimpse of the Colosseum on our way to enjoying a delicious dinner and wine. Georgie is our wonderful and extremely capable tour director. He deals with everything from medical emergencies, room assignments, missing persons, public transportation inquiries, location of toilets and much more. He is on faculty at …
To reach the Basilica di Santa Maria in Aracoeli you first climb 124 steps unless you find a back entrance with about 30 steps. 😉 In this “chandelier” church we sang 6 pieces acapella for the mass. There was a Sunday wedding just before our performance which is most unusual. There were 20 clergy plus …
Continue reading “124 steps to chandelier heaven and a standing room only concert.”
Our first concert in Chiesa di Sant’ Ignazio di Loyola was a challenge due to the 5+ second sound delay and reverberation. Our organist, Margaret, played brilliantly and the organ sounded magnificent. This Baroque style church was a great showcase for Vivaldi’s Magnificat and Handel’s Dixit Dominus. Emile’s lovely composition, Laudate Dominus, had it’s international …
Margaret and I were packed in like sardines riding the metro to tour Villa Borghese. The walk through the park was a good 45 mins. The collection of works (paintings & sculptures) by two renaissance art giants; Caravaggio and Bellini, took my breath away!! Returning from the Villa we watched 1,000’s of workers stage a …
Diane’s Trips 