Internship in Porto, Portugal (January 2025)
I had the privilege to participate as a singer in a project with the Coro Casa da Música in Porto, Portugal. The choir doesn't currently have its own conductor, but has guest conductors coming in and so this project was conducted by the frenchman Léo Warynski. He had built a program around the theme of "crossroads, nomadism, boheamia and wandering - sometimes without a clear destination" and titled the concert "Bohemian Rhapsody". It was an interesting and versatile program in my opinion, combining traditional Romanticism with 20th century works, folk music influences as well modern day progressive rock music by Queen:) The combination was a great way to appeal to a wider public in my opinion, and in fact our concert was sold-out already at the beginning of the week, which was exciting! The audience was able to participate during our encore (Queen's We will rock you) by clapping the rhythm, we got standing ovations at the end and even afterwards some people came to thank us for the concert at a restaurant.
As a singer I'm quite familiar with popular music as well so it was fun to be able to use different kinds of singing styles and sounds in one concert. I was definitely impressed by the choir's versatility!
I also felt very welcomed and taken into consideration since the first day by the choir members, conductors and the managers of the ensemble and of Casa da Música. I actually didn't make it to the very first rehearsal because my flight got cancelled but was able to get another flight on the next day and catch up.
The first 3 rehearsals were conducted by Pedro Teixeira, a portuguese conductor, who often prepares the choir for the visiting conductor but who also sometimes conducts the concerts himself. Both Pedro Teixeira and Léo Warynski were great at what they do and very friendly to work with. They created a determined, yet positive, collaborative and relaxed atmosphere to work in. As a third conductor, we had a talented German intern, Henri Raeck, who also was great to work with. No wonder Léo granted him quite a lot of responsibility during the rehearsals and gave him the chance to conduct Rautavaara's Lorca-Suite at the concert.
In terms of practical matters, everything was well organized, and we had the opportunity to practice on our free time at Casa da Música. We had a few more rehearsals than what I'm used to with the Helsinki Chamber choir, but that was nice since there was quite a lot of repertoire to prepare. Also, we didn't do a full run-through of the program before the concert, which was new to me. Personally I enjoy doing a full run-through the day before in order to know how to manage my stamina, but in the end everything worked out.
Culturally, there were no huge differences compared to working in a professional choir in Finland. Maybe the time management was a little more relaxed in terms of the length of the breaks in the rehearsals, and the emotional expressiveness was a bit more versatile and "available". I also noted a bit more brightness of vowels in general compared to finnish choirs, which made our german, french and spanish lyrics sound more authentic. The general atmosphere felt very positive, warm and professional and at the same time relaxed enough as well, which was nice.
All in all, it was a wonderful and inspiring experience. I'm very happy to have had the chance to work in a different culture, to have met all these wonderful people and musicians, to have had interesting conversations around this profession, to have learned new repertoire and to have been part of an uplifting concert given to a full house audience!
Emma (mezzosoprano, Finland)