On the railway platform...

I am on the platform in Etterbeek, about to get on my train to the airport. Everything seems to be packed and ready to go, or if it isn't then too bad!

Yesterday I spent almost four hours working on the schubert, and things are in good shape. I'm really looking forward to singing it with Dina again.

Yesterday was another gorgeous day, and we had another bbq on the back terrace in the evening, and then a walk around the neighborhood after dinner. The weather has been nice, but the amount of pollen in the air has been a real problem, so in a way I don't mind that the weather will be cooler in Canada. I know that's no real consolation to Ontario residents who seem to still be locked in the icy - well, chilly- grip of winter, but less sneezing is always a good thing!

I hope everyone has a good first day back after the Easter holiday...

Easter vacation part two: family activities

As you can see, the Belgian weather is considerably further advanced in the direction of summer than Canada's; at this moment, Maggie is marking on the back terrace, with Kiki to keep her company, and it's approaching 30 degrees celsius. The plants are all awake, the trees have already finished flowering, and we are all wondering how bad the weather will be in the summer, to make up for this glorious spring.



Yesterday we braved the traffic and drove up to Blankenberg on the northwest coast, to see the ocean, and visit the Sea Life aquarium. The boys had a good time, especially with the otters and seals, and liked the aquarium very much.



It was warm enough to merit a "brain freeze" aka Slush Puppy... Duncan in particular needed one, as he burned his chin on some hot tea, and a Slush Puppy was just the ticket to cool it down.


And when we got home, the Gallifreian post had delivered their early birthday presents. I will be in Canada during the actual dates of their birthdays, so I put in an advance order for something special. Duncan got a TARDIS and an eleventh Doctor Who and Amy Pond figurine, and Malcolm now is the proud owner of a working sonic screwdriver....


Tonight we are heading out to the Place St. Catherine restaurant called 'SteakFrit'... kids under twelve can dine at half price, and ones under eight are free... can you guess what we'll be having?

Easter vacation part one: Leipzig and Berlin...

Yes, it it obvious that Leipzig was part of the former East Germany, and based on the gallery of photographs that I saw in the foyer of the opera house, the opera's facade was frequently used as a backdrop for East German propaganda. This picture of Stalin shows him looking quite friendly, for example... maybe it's just the 'stache. He looks like someone's grandpa, albeit one who would send you to Siberia without a second thought if you didn't eat your Brussels sprouts...


Leipzig is a really nice town. Apart from the modern Elektra staging that Keith distinguished himself in, we saw part of the rehearsal of the Matthew Passion, including one of the baritone solos, in the Nikolaikirche, which - along with the Thomaskirche - was one of Bach's main churches during his 27 years in Leipzig.


Speaking of the Thomaskirche, I finished my audition in just enough time to make it to the 15h motet service. It was quite the moving experience, as the choir sang a number of accompanied and unaccompanied works, by Bach, Mendelssohn, Bruckner and others. I even sang along with the congregation, and recited the Lord's Prayer as part of the Lutheran service, which reminded me strongly of my late Grandfather, who remained an enthusiastic Lutheran all his life.


Keith lives right around the corner from the Schiller house, so that necessitated a visit, of course. Although I haven't yet done the Beethoven Choral Symphony, I've been told that his setting of Schiller's An die Freude has a baritone solo part that isn't too bad... who knows? Maybe you've heard of it?

It really was a trip filled with German culture. One of my audition arias is from the Gounod opera on Goethe's Faust, and Keith and I happened upon this pub, called Auerbachs Keller, after the scene of the same name in Goethe's play. There was no Valentin statue, but we tried to look suitably Faustian and Mephistophelian, respectively...


A visit to the Bach museum rounded out a great weekend in Leipzig; that and a delicious meal of spicy chicken wings chez Keith. The next morning I took the train to Berlin, and checked out a number of its famous places on foot. The Brandenburg gate was interesting, with lots of oddly costumed people offering photographs of themselves with tourists for a mere 2 Euros each. These characters included, but were not limited to: "soldiers" of different nationalities, a chicken, a strange commedia dell'arte figure, and of course, a North American Indian, apparently Sioux, if his head-dress was any reliable indicator.


As I walked from the Brandenburg Gate in the direction of Checkpoint Charlie, I saw quite a few large and imposing buildings, including the Federal Ministry of Finance, which was originally the Aviation Ministry of the Third Reich, built in 1933-35. It was also the site of the founding of the German Democratic Republic in 1949, which is celebrated by Max Lingner’s 1950 Meissen tile mural featured in the reception area of the building.


Checkpoint Charlie was particularly moving, with its monuments to the people killed trying to cross the barrier. I was 19 years old the year the Berlin Wall fell, and was reminded again of how astonishing the event of its fall was, when anything seemed possible. It was like the whole world was holding its breath, but not in fear, but in excitement and anticipation...


After Checkpoint Charlie I continued south to the Jewish Museum, which should look familiar to those of you who live in or who have visited Toronto recently. It's the same angular titanium geometrical structure, somewhat counter-intuitively arranged, full of strangely-shaped empty spaces (described as "voids"), and grafted, almost like a mineral excrescence, onto a neoclassical building, that Daniel Liebeskind designed for the Royal Ontario Museum. Obviously these are two pieces in a series for this architect.


The museum had a lot of medieval and late neo-classical artifacts, plus a lot of the history of pre-20th century Jewish life in Europe and Germany. There was also a sparing selection of displays about the Holocaust of the 19302/40s. It was sobering to follow the line of European Jewish history through the centuries, to see the contributions made by Jewish Europeans, and to know what was coming up as I walked through the museum in chronological order. This museum celebrates the arc of European Jewish culture, and puts its history into context within European history, side by side with Islam and Christianity. Definitely worth visiting if you are in Berlin...

... coming up... Easter vacation, part two...

Two down, one to go.

Last night we gave our second Messiah performance in a beautiful abbey in Bornem, to a standing-room-only crowd. As on the previous evening in Sint-Niklaas, we performed the entire work without intermission, and the response from the audience when the the choir finished the final "amen" was really overwhelming. We had three curtain calls and then encored "Hallelujah", this time with the soloists.

I always enjoy hearing the Messiah, especially the choral parts, and as we soloists were seated in the front row of the audience, we were in a perfect position to listen, and let ourselves be carried away by the choir and orchestra's performance. There are some unbelievable harmonies happening in the choruses, and I was goose-bumped many times last night, especially at one place near the end of "Behold the Lamb of God"... unbelievable. If you have a recording of Messiah, listen to the last line sung by the choir, "... that taketh away the sins of the world." I dare you to not get the shivers!

Now we have one more performance this evening, and then the Easter holiday begins. Maggie and the boys are now off for two weeks, but unfortunately for me, I have to keep working this week, as I have an audition in Leipzig next Saturday, and then after that I will need to do some further preparations for Schubert, fast approaching in Canada. That is a reality for performers: frequently you are busiest when everyone else is on holiday!

Generale

The Messiah general rehearsal took place on Sunday evening, and I am really starting to get excited about this run of performances. While I've done this work quite a few times, this is my first time with baroque instruments. The conductor is approaching this work in ways that I hadn't considered before, and I'm hearing all sorts of new things in the orchestral and choral parts that change my view of the piece. What a great opportunity, to discover new things about a work you think you know... I feel extremely fortunate to have the opportunity to continue to work on this glorious music, and to do so with such a talented ensemble.

Today I performed a little bit of Bach, as part of a concert organized by the European Parliament. Naomi Takagi is the organist at our church, and being Japanese, and having family and friends in Japan, she was asked to participate in a concert as a tribute to the trials of the Japanese people. A number of people volunteered their time and talents for the concert, including several members of our congregation, and a number of EU officials and the Japanese ambassador attended. The funds given by the European Parliament and those donations given by attendees will be sent to an elementary school in the affected area to assist with the rebuilding efforts.

This is an issue that is close to our heart, since we have good friends who are Japanese, and we've been very concerned about recent events in Japan. Here in Brussels, we are friends with Hanae and Jun and their son Kanta, whom Duncan befriended at school; they supported us very strongly during Maggie's period of illness last year, and we are glad to return in a very small way some support to them. As well, our good friends Darren and Yoshimi DeGenova have family living within the affected zone of the failed nuclear reactor; while her mother and brother are not in immediate danger, they are affected daily by food, electricity and water shortages while the battle to repair the damage of the tsunami continues. David and Greta both lived for some years in Japan, and have many Japanese students and friends, so they are understandably concerned.

If there are possibilities for you to do something to help the Japanese people, please consider making a contribution of your own, in some way.

Poisson D'avril

I really have no idea why it's not "Le fou d'avril" or "L'idiot d'avril", but it's April Fish day here. I haven't any pranks to play on you, but I'm sure that I'll hear something later on from the boys or Maggie about today's school shenanigans...

Speaking of school, this morning I stopped by the office of the directrice to try to get a copy of Malcolm's report card. I needed it as a reference document for another meeting this morning, with the principal of the secondary school that we hope to be sending Malcolm to next year. I don't think I've written much about this yet, but there is a complicated procedure involved in getting into a secondary school here. One has to choose which schools you would prefer, in order of preference, fill in two forms to that effect and submit them to the school of first choice between March 15th and April 1st. Simple, right?

Things are never administratively simple in Belgium, as I discovered again yesterday when I went to our "first choice" school to drop off the paperwork; it was recommended that I have a personal meeting with the principal (le préfet) to go over the details. We had that meeting this morning, and I must say that I was impressed with him.

The principal took almost 40 minutes to explain things with me, including a breakdown of the different school administrations, and the curriculum at their school. We also reviewed Malcolm's completed paperwork, and he asked a lot of questions about Malcolm; what were his interests, his strengths, his likes and dislikes; whether he had siblings and how he got along with them, etc. He told me a little about what to expect September 1st; when the 200 new students arrive, they are to bring, along with their standard supplies, a copy of the previous year's report card, and a letter they have written introducing themselves to the principal. Monsieur le préfet takes time to meet with them in small groups of a half a dozen students, and get to know each of them personally. That kind of knowledge of your students as individuals from day one is hard to imagine in a secondary school of over 1000 students in Canada, at least as I remember it.

A complicated set of values helps determine whether a child gets into a certain school. The good news is that we are in the "less than 4km" range limit from the target secondary school; it's maybe 20 minutes by streetcar from here. As well, it is the 2nd closest communauté française school to us. Lastly, the address we had when we first registered our children in primary school is a factor in our favour; our first home here was less than half a kilometer from the boys' school, so that confers an additional advantage. Now it's just a matter of waiting; we'll know sometime in May how it all shakes out.


To chance the subject completely, I had a roll of black and white film developed recently, and here's an older shot of Duncan. I know that digital is more convenient, but film is one of those mediums that I really enjoy using; before digital, how many times did you open up your developed prints, and had a lovely surprise? "I forgot those were on the roll of film!" Sometimes the surprise wasn't so lovely, as in "I opened the back of the camera and that carefully composed shot is ruined!" All in all, it's not a bad thing at all to have to wait, sometimes.


Each day, I try to walk a different way home from dropping the boys off at school, just so that I get a chance to explore the different pathways and streets of the neighborhood, and get some good exercise. The spring is continuing to emerge here, with the daffodils giving way to tulips. There's lots of construction going on all around the commune, from repaving of sidewalks, to the refurbishing of older buildings, to the construction of a set of new apartments. But there are also lots of very interesting old houses in our quarter.


Just around the corner from us, tucked away on a side street are two or three really gorgeous fin de siècle ones that have sadly fallen into disrepair. Perhaps they burned in fires, or perhaps there are, as I've been told, insurance benefits to leaving them as ruins, but it's a shame. Old houses sitting ruined have always tugged at my heart, and I will always dream of restoring them to their former glory. This one pictured, the Villa Mathias I believe, from 1905, is particularly interesting, with unusual window shapes.


Duncan is reading very well in English, and he's self-taught too; I am amazed that he doesn't confuse the pronounciation rules for the two languages, but is perfectly comfortable in either. He seems to be able to do it effortlessly; he picked up the National Geographic yesterday and started rhyming off all sorts of sophisticated descriptions of the Egyptian mummification process and the anatomy of eels, and he does the same in french.

This weekend will be a busy one; I have my first Messiah rehearsal tomorrow and I'm really psyched. I also received a bit of good news this week; two more Messiah performances this year, these ones in October in the beautiful Grand Salle of the Brussels Conservatoire (see below). Five Messiahs in one year is a pretty good number for me, and to have them all in Belgium is even better!


Just a last comment, before I bid you bon weekend. I want to remind those who are eligible to vote in the Canadian federal election on May 2nd to make sure that they cast their vote. I voted today, and have mailed off my ballot. Just doing my part to make sure that Stephen Harper gets reelected....


Poisson d'Avril!!!!!