The Franco-Slovenian meeting in Lyon in April 2022: a mini WIC?

From 30 April to 1 May, a Franco-Slovenian meeting between 4 Willems schools took place as planned. 60 young people from Ljubljana and Lyon represented these 4 structures: Glasbeni Center Edgar Willems, Association musicale d’Irigny, Les Petits Chanteurs de Lyon, Ryméa.

The project was initiated by Mateja Tomac Calligaris, founding director of GCEW and also at the origin of the Willems® Movement in Slovenia. It was relayed by the three directors of the Lyon schools: Christophe Voidey for AMI, Thibaut Louppe for the Maîtrise de la cathédrale St-Jean, and Benjamin Lunetta for Ryméa. Tom Varl, conductor of the GCEW choir, accompanied his singers.

All the characteristic elements of the Willems® International Choir, the WIC, were thus united:
the international dimension, a project with a musical scope that exceeds the possibilities of each entity, and a high level of professional supervision.

The quality of the work, the rehearsals and the concert were all in the spirit of the WIC as it has developed every year between 2013 and 2019.
After the two years of interruption due to the pandemic, this resumption of exchange and concert marked the rebirth of the musical activity of the FIW, which had nevertheless maintained all its training activities.

So, a “mini” WIC? Yes, because of the small number of schools involved in this meeting, the length of the stay and the absence of a common place to live apart from the rehearsals.
This is why this project was not a WIC project at the beginning.
However, the quality of the work carried out, the international dimension, even if limited to a bilateral exchange, and the inter-school dynamic which allowed each structure to benefit from the rich experience acquired by the young people, allow this meeting to be qualified as a WIC!
Moreover, the young people only aspire to one thing: to do it again!

This is why we are pleased to present 3 testimonies of this meeting around a programme of sacred music of the 20th and 21st centuries:
a slide show, a teaser, and the complete recording of the concert of April 30th.