Fete de Musique in TOURS

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The Fete de Musique is an annual event all over France. In Tours it started about 4pm and went on through the night. I rode my bike downtown to the Grand Theatre where there was supposed to be a concert of classical music at 8.30. One hour of standing around was fruitless--no concert, no notice despite there having been publicity about it in the papers.
Oh well, with my bike, it was easy to zoom over to the Cathedral St Gatien where there was an excellent organ and choir concert in progress. Sitting in this fabulous Gothic cathedral (built starting from about 900 AD onward), the music really sounded marvellous. The program centred on French composers. There were 2 pipe organs (grand et petit). The organist ran back and forth between the 2 (grand orgue up several flights of stairs!) I heard works from Bach (not French of course!), Rameau, Gounod, Faure, as well as a few modern composers whom I didn't know.
Then I walked or rode my bike through the crowds all over town. There was live music happening on every corner, sometimes a cacaphony between more than one band. I heard bits of all kinds of music: drums, digereedoo, dixieland, heavy metal, rock, blues, pop, choral. The weather was hot, so very pleasant for riding and walking. I returned home about midnight in time to meet my fellow students just setting out for the "evening". Of course today, they are all sleeping it off...so I get to use the computers and washing machine!

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