NORWICH – After spending a year preparing and fundraising for a trip to the musical mecca of Prague and its annual Choral Festival, a group of eight Norwich High School students and members of the Madrigals Singers and Choir have returned home.

The approximately 10,000-mile round trip was a huge success, according to NHS Music Director Mary Mayo, who said her students – as well as she, herself – have been forever changed by the experience.

“It’s hard to put into words,” said Mayo. “As an educator, this two week experience was extremely valuable. As a human being, the energy I gathered from those two weeks is going to stay with me for a lifetime. Music touches you in a place that you can’t always explain in words; it takes you to a place that no other activity can take you. It was electrifying, just electrifying.”

The group of students – which included Amanda Caulfield, Josh Mahannah, Megan Reynolds, Sean Sheldon, Tambria Schroeder, Dillon Smith, Joshua Seeley and Brooke Bonney – spent two weeks in the “City of a Hundred Spires,” performing side-by-side with professional choirs from Siberia, Russia and the Czech Republic, as well as American high school, college and community choirs. All told, there were 280 vocalists – hailing from seven different countries from across the globe – involved in the choir, reported Mayo.