Tales from London # 35-37

Friday

Holiday arrived here from France today! She is visiting until the middle of next week, so we are showing her around to all the awesome stuff in London while she is here. I worked on a lot of stuff for my internship during the day, and then we went out to dinner at the Hare and Tortoise (again) to celebrate Holiday's arrival. We are pretty much addicted to that place...
Afterwards, we went out for gelato in South Kensington. I got Banana sorbet and Milk chocolate hazelnut flavored gelato, which was amazing.

Saturday

We woke up early this morning and walked over to the Portabello Road market, which is a huge, outdoors and indoors market, with food stands, antique stores, and lots of people. We got quite a bit of amazing food to eat then and in the future (we got chorizo sausage sandwiches for lunch, which were awesome), and then headed back to Metrogate. We then commenced to cook a big pot of gumbo, with the same sausage from the market, for several hours. We had tea, and chatted as it cooked, and when it came out, it was amazing!
Afterwards, we all split up, and Holiday and I went over to the Southbank Centre to see the London Philharmonic Orchestra and Choir perform. They were pretty good, especially on the Poulenc mass. It was great to hear a choral performance, since I have mostly been going to orchestral music lately!

Sunday

Today, we woke up early and went out for coffee, and then over to St. Paul's cathedral for a church service.

Part of the service was Mozart's Mass in C major, which was beautifully performed, although we were sitting a little too far away from the choir. The inside of the cathedral was enormous, classical, and very ornate, with many statues and gold plated regions. It was a very fun experience.
Afterwards, we went out for lunch and got fish and chips, so Holly could try some typical English food. We then went over to the West End and walked through the theater district and China Town. Next, we went back to Metrogate to make burritos for dinner, which once again were amazing. Finally, we watched 2 movies, "Speed" and "Jurassic Park: The Lost World" in an epic cheesy action movie night.

Tales #31-34

Monday
Today, I worked for my internship all day, typing up memos, contacting soloists, and other professional sorts of things. It was surprisingly tiring...I think I am getting too used to going to concerts and the like!
After that, I got some Japanese fast food (Onigiri and edamame, so not unhealthy like Amurrican fast food), and went to choir rehearsal. The Beethoven piece we are doing is really dramatic and fun to sing, although it is still killing my voice while I haven't quite recovered from my illness...

Tuesday
Today, I went to class all day, in a weird schedule switch up so that tomorrow we could go to Cirque du Soleil! We learned about Cosi fan Tutte, the Mozart opera that we are going to next week, and I am really excited for. After that, we made homemade fried chicken and mashed potatoes with sauteed mushrooms in them, which was amazing.
In the evening, we made some tortellini, and then went to the Oscar Wilde play "Lord Arthur Saville's Crime" at the Richmond Theatre. The play was funny (it is Oscar Wilde), but definitely not his or the actors' best work... There was really strange (read:out of key) musical accompaniment, which made the play unnecessarily cheesy. The set was pretty cool, and overall I was certainly entertained by the play, but not blown away.

Wednesday

Today, we woke up late, and went off to the Royal Opera House for our Back Stage Tour!!! We got to see the main hall while they were setting up for one of the ballets, as well as a practice room for ballet, the prop loft, the back stage area (which is measured in acres), and bunches of other really cool places around the building. It was very exciting.
Next, we went off to Cirque du Soleil: Varekai at the Royal Albert Hall. It was incredible, and nerve racking, to watch. Many of the artists were doing incredibly dangerous stunts, which was scary. They basically flew around the room, unsupported by harness or other safety equipment, doing acrobatic stunts all along. The story was not comprehensible at all (apparently due to changes in the act), but the incredibleness of the stunts made up for the lack of a plot.
After that, I went to a performance by the London Philharmonic Orchestra of French Impressionist music by Ravel, Poulenc, and Debussy. Although it was a little bit difficult to get into the music near the end due to the splendor of the day so far, I was still very impressed by the orchestra and conductor, and loved hearing more Ravel. Debussy's "La Mer" was also a very beautiful piece.

Thursday

Today, we held a huge debate on the abolition of the monarchy in British society, in which the people in favor of maintaining the monarchy (including me) surprisingly, though narrowly, won the vote of conscience at the end of the class.
For dinner, we went to an Italian restaurant for cheap pizza. Little did we know, however, the cheap pizza came at the price of having to listen to Celine Dion, Shakira, and an Italian cover of "House of the Rising Sun" throughout dinner! It was a little scary, but we made it out alive.
After that, we split ways, and I went to the Southbank Centre to see the Philharmonia Orchestra do Mahler's 2nd symphony. It was absolute enormous, with a 170 member choir on top of the already sizable orchestra (which had a separate brass and percussion section playing entirely off stage, out of sight). This piece, like the other I saw at the beginning of the trip, was a hugely emotional piece, with many ups and downs, and interesting movements. I have come to the conclusion that I have really underestimated Mahler to this point in my life, and will have to continue to remedy my lack of exposure to his music.
Cheers

Tales #26-30

Wednesday

Today, our only class consisted of going to Tate Modern! The museum was way more interesting than I thought it was going to be. The first exhibit we went into was basically just a giant dark, black box that you walk in to. It was absolutely surreal to walk into the darkness, not knowing what to expect, and just explore. Surprisingly, I really enjoyed a lot of the artwork in the museum as well. I was expecting it to be mostly ridiculously abstract (as in a completely red canvas), but much of the artwork was really insightful. I loved many of the early 20th century artists especially.
For dinner, we went to Hare and Tortoise (the amazing Japanese restaurant) again; I had Yaki Udon, which was 6 pounds of amazingness.
This evening, I went to see the New York Philharmonic (the first time of 2). They played Lindberg, Prokofiev, and Sibelius, which were all very polished, but not mind blowing. The pianist for the Prokofiev was very, very good though.

Thursday

Today, we had class all day. British culture was pretty good; we talked about the structure of British politics, which was very interesting.
After dinner, we went to the second New York Philharmonic concert. They played a Haydn symphony, which was pretty dull, Schubert's Unfinished Symphony, which was beautiful, Adams' "The Wound Dresser", which was beautiful (and sung by Thomas Hampson!), and a piece by Alban Berg. The concert was once again good, but not amazing. Certainly several of the concerts I've been to of London orchestras have been better, and many have had better song choice!

Friday

Today, I was going to work for my internship, but found out that I couldn't today, so I decided to go on an adventure instead. First, I went to the British library, where I totally dorked out in the rare music section of the museum. Among the pieces on display were the original manuscript of Handel's Messiah!!!! aaaannd Ravel's original scoring of Bolero for 2 pianos, which I got way too excited about. There were also pieces by Mozart, Beethoven, Elgar, and just about everybody.
After that, I went and got an onigiri (a Japanese rice ball with seaweed) and edamame from a Japanese fast food restaurant for really cheap, which was awesome. Then, I went over to Regent's park, which is another huge, open park in the middle of London. I walked around, looking at the birds and trees, and reflecting on the trip so far.
In the evening, I went down to the Southbank Centre to see the London Philharmonic Orchestra for the first time. They played Sibelius' 6th and 7th symphonies, which were very beautiful. The orchestra was very good. The conductor was a funny man, who kept grunting, which was a bit strange...

Saturday

Today, we woke up early and made way on an 8:30 train for York.
When we got there, we walked over to the hostel and checked in, and then went over to the park, where, since it is the anniversary of Queen Elizabeth II's ascension, a band was playing, and then they fired off a 21 gun salute with giant canons. It was very exciting and British, and extremely lucky that we got to see it!






After that, we had lunch at Pizza Express, where I got a pizza with artichoke and asparagus! It was really, really good.
Next, we went on a walking tour of the city. Some of the highlights:

The Shambles:

A cramped, medieval style street in downtown York, with authentic architecture still in many of the buildings. There were a lot of really neat shops, including one where we went back for hot chocolate later.

The Wall:

There is an old, medieval wall that spans York. We walked around on the top of the wall, and it felt like we were medieval soldiers!

The York Minster:

The York Minster is an enormous cathedral, which is on the site of where a church has been for about 2000 years. The current version dates from 1250-1400, and is enormous, gothic, and medieval. It is stunningly beautiful on inside and out, with giant arches, gorgeous stained glass, huge towers, and intricate carvings throughout.

Later in the evening, we went back to the York Minster for the choral evensong, which is a choral church service. It was sung by a Men's choir and a children's choir, and was wonderful. The singing was so pure, and it echoed throughout the halls of the cathedral. It was probably my favorite experience in England so far.

For dinner, we found a really cheap restaurant where I got steak and prawns for 6.99! They were absolutely delicious. We went back to the hostel, getting to bed early since we were really tired!

Sunday

This morning, we woke up early again and walked around York for a bit before catching the train to Birmingham. We walked over to the Tower, which was cool but we couldn't go in.

In Birmingham, we saw the Black Dyke Band (the current best brass band in the world (they won a contest)), which is a really old British tradition. The band was amazingly talented, playing way faster than I thought was possible on tubas, cornets, horns, and trombones. The music wasn't extremely inspiring for the most part, but it was entertaining, loud, and epic throughout. It was certainly an awesome concert.

And, now I'm back

Cheers