July 24 Concert Features Choeur d’Enfants d’Ile de France
The 2025 Summer Concert Series begins on Thursday evening, July 24, at 7:30 with a special choral concert with organ featuring the Choeur d’Enfants d’Ile de France, a children’s choir from Levallois, France, founded by Prof. Francis Bardot and presently directed by Raphaëlle Boutillier. They will be performing Sacred Choral Works from the 17th-20th Centuries.
Francis Bardot created his children’s choir in 1970. Since that year, the name has changed alongside the several institutions which hosted the choir; but it remained, in the musical world and for the audience, Francis Bardot’s children choir, famous for its vocal color, round and powerful tone, high level of its repertoire and quality of its performances.
The Children’s choir was for about a quarter century the Children’s choir of the Paris Opéra and Orchestra. Under the direction of Francis Bardot, the choir has enjoyed high praise from the press.
The choir sang with top-notch maestros including Mehta, Ozawa, Barenboïm, Collins, Abbado, Kübelik, Maazel, and with soloists including Pavarotti, Domingo, Ghiaurov, Berganza and Caballe.
Subsidised and supported by the city of Levallois, the Children’s Choir of Greater Paris has, since 2004, been affiliated with its music, dance and drama Conservatory. The hundreds of boys and girls acting within the choir receive a very individualized vocal and musical education.
The Children’s Choir and Youth Choir together constitute the Académie Chorale d’Ile-de-France (Choir Academy of Greater Paris), of which Francis Bardot is the Founder and Artistic Director.
In September 2018, Bardot entrusted the direction of the children’s choir to Raphaëlle Boutillier. Their recent tours have taken them to the USA (East and West), Canada, Malta, Greece, and Saudi Arabia.
We are delighted to welcome them back to St. John’s Catholic Church in Bangor, Maine!
Francis Bardot, Raphaëlle Boutillier, Choeur d’Enfants d’Ile de France
St. John’s Organ Society is pleased to host the 32nd Summer Recital Series on Maine’s largest 19th-Century mechanical-action pipe organ, E. & G. G. Hook’s magnificent Opus 288, at St. John’s Roman Catholic Church in Bangor. These hour-long recitals occur on Thursday evenings at 7:30. St. John’s Catholic Church is located at 207 York Street in Bangor. Admission is free, but donations are appreciated.