Sacramento State and Rocklin High School choirs came together for “Choralfest 2010” Saturday evening in the Sacred Heart church in Midtown Sacramento with roughly 400 people in attendance.

“Choralfest 2010” is a festival of Choral music that incorporates languages from the Philippines, Bulgaria, the Soviet Union, France and Ireland.

Donald Kendrick, music director, said it was the first time many of the students of “Choralfest” have been in a choir but said they were ready to sing.

“Many people do not realize how much work these students put into practicing for a performance,” he said. “They nailed the pieces down tonight.”

While the melody brought about a certain satisfaction, it was difficult to follow the translated words on the pamphlet because all of the words sung were heavily blended together.

A piece called “Doluri,” by Alex Matchavariani, performed by the Sac State choir, did not sound like a language but more like beats or a musical instrument.

This makes it difficult to distinguish without the background experience of hearing songs from another language.

Tony Sciscio, Rocklin High School bass singer, said he was glad he participated in “Choralfest” this evening.

“By being here, I was witnessing what I could be featuring in coming to Sac State” he said.

The majority of Rocklin High School’s performance was sung in Latin.

Meredith Hawkins, choir director at Rocklin High School, said Latin is a good language because it’s a lot more satisfying to the ear.

“English is not always beautiful in every song,” she said. “Latin provides pure beautiful vows and is one of the easier foreign languages to sing in.”

Almost every performance was diversified with different music that implemented themes from melancholy and sad pieces to joyful and uplifting ones.

Sharing a variety of music with the crowd was a beneficial strategy because one person may enjoy hearing desolate music all evening long, while someone else may not.

There were too many dreary pieces that almost seemed worse hearing them at night.

Many of the sad sounds were made with the soprano voices that start off at a low key and develop to a higher note that drags on for a number of seconds, all with a soft ever so soothing voice. The bass singers barely made an impression because the sound they carried out was very low key that suited the chorus parts as opposed to the high pitches from the sopranos.

The joyful uplifting pieces were the most memorable ones because the sounds were bright, loud, and the melody was faster than the songs before it.

Sac State’s chorus performed a song called “Tides of Ocean” that seemed in competition with one another as they sang back and forth.

The piece seemed to be very pitchy and so loud that it almost blew the church doors open.

Carolyn Davis, audience member, said “Tides of Ocean” was her favorite piece because she could almost hear the ocean from voices of the choir.

The woman blew away the performance for the most part from their powerful soprano voices that filled the church in every choir.

The ending piece by the combined choirs “Blessing” was remarkable where singers stood in center stage and both sides of the church to blow the audience away.

The women sang with their beautiful soft voices and the men complimented it by adding in the chorus with them.

The sound was clear and vibrant to the ears.

Hawkins said this night was special because they were invited by the Sac State choir to join them.

“This is the first time the kids have sung at a church,” she said.

“They usually sing in a classroom or theater not made for live vocal music. It was a privilege to perform tonight.”

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