Vienna Boys Choir

You can hear the Vienna Boys’ Choir sing at Sunday Mass in the Imperial Chapel at the Hofburg (Hofburgkapelle) in Austria’s capital. You are actually attending Mass, but I would recommend that you buy tickets. They do allow people to attend on a first-come, first-served basis, but you must stand through the entire service. If you buy tickets, you are seated.

Tickets run €5-€29 (near $6-$36). You can order them online (www.hofburgkapelle.at/index.php?id=2 or www.wien.info/wtv/eventdatenbank-e.html) and then pick them up the day before. I e-mailed my reservation directly and then paid for and picked up the ticket the day before the Mass. There is no option to pay online unless you book through a ticketing agency, and the agency will add on a fee.

The chapel is small, but they do get quite a number of people in. You don’t get to see the choir, as they are singing from the choir loft, but the choir does come down to the altar for one or two hymns.

I attended in March ’07. It was a very moving experience and I highly recommend it.

ROSEANNE SHERMAN

Melbourne, FL