Greetings!
I hope this email finds you all very well and enjoying an autumn filled with crisp mornings and sunshine. It has been a little over a month since my last Cambridge update (which was really just a “we’re leaving tomorrow” update) so there is much to tell. I’m sure that many of you have seen loads of pictures and comments regarding our life here on Facebook but I’d like to give a bit more background to what we’ve been up to the past month. Remember that you can check out another great perspective at Krista’s blog.
We made it! After a two hour delay at YVR, a mad dash through Heathrow to the coach line, a 2.5 hour ride through the English countryside, a kind new friend’s lift and a cab ride down eclectic Mill Road, we arrived at the front doorstep of 37 Vinery Road, Cambridge. A plain and unassuming place in a row of attached houses built in the early 20th century for a multitude of rail workers. Inside we met our landlords and were given the tour. Not having seen it we were trusting that it would be suitable and it was. Newly renovated, 3 bedrooms, a decently sized kitchen and a long backyard where Jakob and Ella have been playing. Everything here is closer together, from the roads to the houses to the city structure and so we live being able to meet all neighbours very easily. A British couple to the right and a Spanish family to the left. The first month has been spent getting settled and exploring Cambridge. It’s still surreal to walk and bike past the places we do, a blend of old and new, huge trees swaying over beautiful green spaces while centuries old buildings dot the skyline. One of those places that I think will be etched in my memory is cycling through Parker’s Pieces (a park) on the way downtown and seeing the spire of Our Lady and the English Martyrs Church (OLEM for short) stretching skyward through the trees. Of course you find your places: the best place to grab a pastry, a coffee, groceries, etc. Biking is the main mode of transport for many here and I found that it has been the best way to get to know Cambridge. You see many things when you aren’t getting somewhere as fast as you can. Many mornings are spent, before class, having coffee with Krista and Ella in Market Square watching the world go by. It’s been great to take Jakob to school most mornings and see him off though usually Mommy takes him in and now he doesn’t even want that. Krista does most of the work as the kid trailer is attached to her bike. Her motivation, as we climb the bike bridge over the train tracks, is “coffee, coffee”. These mornings have been a balm after many months crammed full of various events.
Cambridge is quite unique in that it operates on a collegiate system, a system that has evolved over 800 years (the other university that does this is regularly referred to around here as “the one that shall not be named”) and is made up of 31 colleges within the university. In this system each new student is placed with a college in which they generally live, are taught (if an undergrad) and interact with many students from countless other disciplines. Graduate students are taught through their faculty. I’m beginning to discover that it is an extraordinary gift of learning and exchanging of ideas as I meet Masters and Doctoral students in nanotechnology, history, business, political science, classics, and many more. I believe, however, that I am the only one taking a music degree in the college I am in. St. Edmund’s has over 60 countries represented within it’s halls and to see all of them chatting away over dinner brings a smile to your face. Confusing? Well, it is a rule that only English be spoken in the dining hall along with no newspapers or mobiles. Formal dinners are by candlelight, a prayer is said in Latin before and after the meal, academic gowns are worn and you’ll have an irate steward coming after you if you try to leave the hall before the meal is over (announced by the ringing of a gong). You must have the permission of the Master of St. Edmund’s if you would like to leave for anything, including visiting the loo. It may seem a bit formal for North American taste but it’s not only for tradition and respect, it actually does preserve and foster community, slowing the pace of a hectic world. St. Edmund’s is actually one of the less formal colleges as their Master and Fellows eat in the same room as the students.
Early in the summer I was excited to receive notice of a conducting opportunity that went out to all the MMus students. Getting any conducting experience that I could while I’m here has and continues to be a high priority. I emailed in my interest and relevant experience right away and have gotten a bit of a job conducting the chapel choir at Churchill College, one of the newer Cambridge colleges (c.1960), every Sunday during term time. This will basically take the form of singing the hymns, an anthem and Psalm during the evening service which follows the Anglican tradition. This has also led to an opportunity to jointly conduct the Churchill College choir in a concert with Trinity College, Oxford in a performance of Vivaldi’s Gloria. How does that work? Well, I will take the first 6 movements and Trinity’s organ scholar will take the rest. Interpretational issues? Yeah, but it’ll be fun. The chance to rehearse and know that this is exactly what you are studying for is something I’m very grateful for.
This city is absolutely bursting with musical events. It’s hard to explain but you could very easily find yourself having to choose between 2 or 3 excellent concerts every day of the week. Symphonies, concertos, multiple evensongs every night, recitals, operas, plays, musicals, some free and all at very low costs to students. Seriously, if you want to experience England and you are remotely interested in choral music you have to come to Cambridge and spend a few days just going to chapel services. This community is unlike anything I’ve ever experienced or possibly ever will to be perfectly honest. The trick is weighing what will complement studies and broaden musical horizons for the future. As a conductor though, there are no shortage of rehearsals that you could sit in on and learn from extremely talented musicians. All part of the education.
Even before the term started there have been chances to get involved. I joined a couple of “Come and Sing” events, one at Great Saint Mary’s Church and one at King’s College Chapel: both an excellent way to observe talented conductors and how they interacted with choir and instrumentalists. As part of the connection to Churchill College I had the opportunity to join several singers at the funeral for Sir William Hawthorne, the second Master at Churchill and co-inventor of jet engine technology. A rare glance past a far-reaching accomplishment into the life of a very human man. As part of the MMus in Choral Studies program we will be observing and working with a variety of colleges, including some big name choirs at St. John’s, King’s, Trinity, Clare and Jesus College which I’m incredibly excited about. The other day Shao-wen (a fellow student from Singapore) and I took in an evensong service at King’s College Chapel and then ran down St. John’s Street to St. John’s College Chapel for another one. Two very different chapels and sounds but both extremely vibrant. Some other extra-curricular education includes a trip to London this weekend to see the LSO put on a clinic and then performance of music by Steve Reich, with the man himself performing Clapping Music. I had entered a contest for tickets a while back and then completely forgot until they emailed me and told me I had won! Another event that I’m very much looking forward to is a BBC Orchestra Sibelius rehearsal that’s been opened up to music grad students at their studios in London.
The lectures have been extremely interesting, with our first core lecture beginning tomorrow with Dr. Jeremy Begbie, a Christian theologian/pianist whose writings I encountered at Trinity Western. Other lectures on a variety of topics are open for us to attend and I am taking a subsidized “German for reading” course with a lovely, blunt German woman who brought apples to her first class with us. On Tuesday our first conducting sessions began, a confirmation of why I love this art. We conducted a piece for each other in the beautiful Trinity College Chapel under the unblinking eyes of Francis Bacon, Isaac Newton, Alfred Tennyson and others. Then the five of us sat in Stephen Layton’s office and discussed each other’s initial style and choice of gesture. He told us that he’s not there to dictate the exact way to conduct and yet over 3 hours he brought our minds to bear on why we do this or that, on what would help convey the most with the least distraction. It’s funny when you submit yourself to that all of your habits, the things you knew in the back of your mind needed to be polished, jump out under a gracious but glaring scrutiny! Though this man has conducted excellent musicians, made exquisite recordings with top composers and lives amongst such “musical” riches, yet he’s very accessible, saying that he wished he’d had someone to hold him accountable early in his schooling. After he’d gotten started professionally a friend came up to him after a concert and handed him a 6 page, double-sided essay on all the things he’d done wrong!
Well that’s quite a bit to chew on! If it all sounds a bit introverted I apologize! I just want to get it out before I forget anything and it’s all very exciting. Tomorrow Krista and I will leave the kids with a babysitter from a local church and head off for a University formal beginning of year dinner. According to some students living in residence, they bring out the professionals for these meals and I look forward to sharing some of the traditional experiences with Krista.
I want to express thanks for all your support in prayers and other ways that are helping us on this journey. God has been watching over us and opening up doors to new friends and new experiences. We are thankful for that. We hope you are enjoying your fall weather and I take comfort in the news I just heard on CBC that Western Canada may have it’s coldest winter on record….I should say I take comfort in the fact that I’m not there!
Best wishes,
Ben
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