The Choir of St John's College, Cambridge

Day 7

After a short ride on the bullet train from Kyoto we arrived in Kobe to sing at Kobe Shoin Women's University, an Anglican university founded by a Cambridge alumnus 120 years ago. The chapel was a bit smaller than some of our other venues but alongside this came a great improvement in acoustics, particularly for the renaissance polyphony; we opened with Byrd's five-part Mass, something which our countertenors were especially pleased about!

On Monday we took the famous bullet train from Kanagawa to Kyoto and finally got a chance to see some Japanese countryside.

The train certainly lived up to its reputation – extremely comfortable, quick and remarkably on time (to the second!). Quite a refreshing change! Another difference was the choice of snacks on board: forget shortbread and jaffa cakes, most of the Gents bought sushi and 'bento boxes' to eat. Healthy, tick. Culture, tick.

This weekend saw our first proper concerts of the tour and a chance for the Choir to get stuck into the rather broad repertoire which we've taken half-way across the world with us – big thanks should go to our Librarian, John Challenger, for lugging it all around and making sure we have the right pieces at the right time, to say nothing about getting ourselves in the right place at the right time!

After a couple of nights in a very comfortable hotel, we're slowly getting to grips with the different time-zone now – indeed a trip to a Buddhist temple and time to walk around Tokyo gave us thought to appreciate how far away from Cambridge we are!