Tongerlo Abbey - Da Vinci - Forest run - guitar lesson - Maggie Switzerland

a replica of the Last Supper hanging above the abbey church doors

Well that's a wrap on the Currende concert in Tongerlo.  Our programme was part of a larger festival called, in Flemish, "Divine Music: the sound of DaVinci", and it was organised as part of the Festival of Flanders Kempen, and held in the Tongerlo Abbey.  ("Kempen" refers to a region of the north-eastern part of Belgium and the south-eastern part of the Netherlands.)

I have written about the Tongerlo Abbey on facebook at least, perhaps because the monks have licensed their name to a commercial brewer to make several varieties of the beer Tongerlo, but what made the news recently was an allegation made about a painting in the abbey: a large copy of DaVinci's The Last Supper.  This is undoubtedly why the theme of this year's festival had DaVinci's name in the subtitle.  Here are some photos of the abbey...

the square inside the walls of Tongerlo abbey

The copy of the Last Supper normally hangs above the entrance doors of the abbey church, and it is in remarkably good condition, for having been painted around the turn of the 16th century.  The story is that King Louis XII of France admired the original Last Supper so much when he saw it on the wall of the Santa Maria della Grazie convent in Milan that he commanded a copy be made, and it is this copy from around 1506 attributed to DaVinci's student Andrea Solari that eventually made its way to Tongerlo in 1545.

It stayed safely above the doors of the Abbey church for centuries.  During the French revolution the abbey was confiscated, and so the painting was hidden for decades a time in a granary, until the monastery was reestablished in 1840, and then again it was rescued from a fire in 1929.  Since 1960 it has been housed away from the main abbey.  But the real surprise is the allegation made by an American art historian, Jean-Pierre Isbouts.  Isbouts alleges based on close examination of the canvas that several aspects of the painting show the unmistakable hand not of a student, but of DaVinci himself: in particular, the face of Jesus, and the face of the apostle John.

This is a remarkable discovery; should it prove to be true, it will be a tremendous bit of publicity for the abbey.  The original Milanese version was painted directly onto the plaster wall of the convent, and so has not remained stable over the centuries.  Da Vinci was experimenting with the techniques required to paint on canvas at this time, and it seems that this copy of the Last Supper has fared much better than the original.  Here is more on the story here, and here.

I drove to the abbey well in advance of our rehearsal and so had a chance to go in and have a look at the copy in the small museum building, tucked away behind a large neo-classical facade.  Unlike Orval Abbey which was rebuilt beginning in the 1920s, Tongerlo is a mixture of many different styles of buildings, all joined together.  The building that houses the painting currently is unsuitable for its conservation, so according to a conversation I had with Brother Ivo Clieren, the curator of the museum, their plans are to complete a cleaning of the painting and to return it to its original place in the abbey itself, where the climate is more or less stable and controlled.

the viola organista

While we were looking at the painting we also had a chance to meet Sławomir Zubrzycki, a Polish musician and musical instrument builder who was preparing for an afternoon concert in the museum.  He had brought an intriguing instrument of his own construction to play, something that he called a viola organista, after drawings and designs by Leonardo himself, and also informed by instrument makers of the 16th century.  This instrument is essentially a harpsichord-like construction with a single keyboard and a box with a "harp" of strings of various pitches.  The instrument has rotating bow wheels that are turned by a foot pedal, and these contact the strings when the operator depresses keys on the keyboard.

the five bowing wheels

To contrast, a harpsichord has little quills which pluck the strings, and a piano has hammers which strike them.  Sławomir was fascinated with stories of DaVinci's design of this instrument, and while he is a pianist and not primarily an instrument maker, he built this one himself, and regularly tours with it.  Here's more on the viola organista here.

Our rehearsal was not terribly long, but it was good to get used to the space in the abbey, to review some trouble spots in the programme that emerged during the general rehearsal on Thursday, and to review also our movements: the entire concert unfolded in unbroken succession, and many of the pieces required us to sing from different places in the space, which created a variety of special acoustical effects.

some of the singers from Currende rehearsing before the concert

After our brief rehearsal we had quite a long break to relax and to walk around and explore the abbey itself.

doves, chickens, roosters, chicks and rabbits at the abbey

a runaway white peacock

The concert was a lot of fun, and the abbey was absolutely packed... there were many ovations and an encore, and then there was a film projection outside onto the abbey buildings, with recorded music.  Then we attended the reception in the chapter house across the square.

a Tongerlo beer with Brother Ivo, the curator of the DaVinci Museum

This building that housed this reception was very nearly an identical copy of the one that Bryan and I visited in Rochefort many years ago, and we had a chance to enjoy our choice of the three different Tongerlo beers with the concertgoers, and of course conversations with the monks themselves.  I was happy to wish good health to Brother Ivo, but also sad that I could only have one beer as I had to drive back home.

It was a very short sleep, as I had to get up at 5:15 to drive Maggie to St. John's to meet the bus for her school trip to Switzerland.  She and her class will be there for a week, and as a matter of fact I just received an SMS from her moments ago that said that they made the trip safely and are well installed... but I should stop myself from using a franglicisme: "ils sont biens installés"; I realise now it should be "they are well established", in their living quarters.

Meanwhile I came home and slept another hour and a half before getting up and heading off with Duncan and Yoshi to Bousval, where Bryan and Kiana and the dogs and I had an 11km run.  That was followed by a good hour of guitar lesson for Bryan and India, and then a nice lunch all together.  The two of them are progressing nicely at their practice and we made some advances today, learning some new chords, and also new sections of the songs that we are working on.  After lunch as it was warm they headed next door for a swim, but we didn't stay; Duncan has to study and I do also... last night I received an urgent message from a conductor friend to inquire if I could replace someone at a high-profile funeral tomorrow morning at the Abbey Bois-de-la-Cambre in Brussels, and so I needed to see if my voice would cooperate.  Fingers crossed, I think it will, so I am heading to bed early to get a good night's sleep.

Happy weekend!

From the tone world of the Renaissance to Broadway

This past weekend was indeed very busy socially!  The "meet the new parents and new teachers" evening at the School was nice, although my voice was tired from talking in a very noisy room.  I've written before about this problem of overly live acoustics: it really is a major problem that architects and designers should take into account when they are building spaces for socialising.  I could sing in a rehearsal for several hours without getting tired, but put me in a noisy party atmosphere for half an hour and my voice is at the limit.

I'm also a bit tired from singing falsetto with the high voices in the Dolly rehearsals... Saturday was a long rehearsal from around 10:00 until 14:00, and then I went to Bryan and Kiana's for a guitar lesson.  Bryan and India are taking the lessons together, and it went very well... They learned four chords and practiced changing between them, and by the end of the 45 minutes lesson they were starting to change hand positions quickly enough that we could slowly play through the first section of Sam Cooke's What a Wonderful World.

I have been going though my own repertoire of three and four-chord songs to try to find things that will be relatively easy to play and have come up with a few, but also want India to choose some pieces that she wants to learn.  Bryan's tastes lean toward the blues-rock genre so I have lots of songs to show him in that repertoire.

Saturday evening we went across the street to our Polish neighbours' home, and were welcomed by Eva and Tomas, and their son Kuba, who is 18 years old.  Their daughter is 24 and is living away from home for her studies... lots of other neighbours from our street attended, and there were many great dishes that Eva and Tomas had put together for the evening.  As well they had borrowed a huge charcoal bbq from a neighbour, and I was put to service at grilling the meat.  Maggie has been recovering from a tooth extraction, so she had to stick to the softer foods, and as she is on some painkillers she stayed away from the wine, and I took it easy myself.  But I did try some of Tomas' home made Polish slivovitz, which was excellent, if very strong.  Our elderly neighbour Maurice had a little too much so Christophe and I "helped" him get home safely after the party.  Everyone seemed to have a good time.

In the morning I went and had a quick 10k run, and managed to shave a couple of seconds off my last run time, getting down to a pace of around 5:43 per kilometre.  Then we had another bbq, with Lucy and Ben and their family.

Lucy is from Australia, and Ben is from France, but they are here in Belgium because of Ben's work for Glaxo Smith Kline, the pharmaceutical company that has a huge complex near Wavre.  Duncan babysits the three kids regularly, and the two youngest boys particularly really are attached to him.  They came with Newton, their young Australian Shepherd dog, and he and Yoshi played a lot in the garden while we were dining outside.  Then Maggie set out to drive Malcolm up to his apartment in Boom, along with his records, his record player, and some guitars.  Now that he's taken his turntable I guess that I need to shop for one?

Monday was another long day of review of the many pieces for the polyphonic concert that happens this weekend.  I spend most of the morning singing through the material, which is a bit challenging to get into one's head.  Here's an example: Josquin de Prez's Ave maris stella:

After several hours of that I scooted over to St. John's to work through Hello Dolly!.  Then it was the same thing again on Tuesday.  The challenging thing with teaching these young singers the harmonies is that they can't pick out their particular notes... so I end up repeating and repeating their lines many times.  I think next week I will simply sit down at the piano with a recorder and sing their individual lines, and then send them the tracks so they can listen at home and get their harmonies down.  There are only really three big pieces in the work that require sophisticated vocal harmonies, but there has not been much of a tradition of choral singing at the school for several years now, since a particularly good music teacher retired, and so many of these young singers are not really experienced in carrying an independent vocal line when other people are singing.  That's something that I find strange, but then not every family sings together.  I'm lucky that mine did when I was a kid! 

Fortunately for the rest of this week I can forget about Dolly and just focus on the Renaissance and Gregorian Chant music that we will rehearse today and tomorrow, and perform on Saturday!

Hard at it

Production team meeting for Hello Dolly!

Just a quick note as I have too much to do to write anything extensive.  There are a lot of things happening all at once.... today I have to continue my work on learning the music for the Currende polyphony concert that is coming up next weekend.  There is a lot to sing and most of it is in a very old style, which I'm not so experienced in.  I am particularly thankful that I did that madrigals concert with my friend Rita last year at this time, as the harmonical style is somewhat similar.  It isn't terribly challenging music from a singing technique point of view, but it is important to get the "sound world" into your ears so that you know what to expect.

I also have to do some listening and playing through of the Hello Dolly! music, as the harmonies there are totally different, and quite challenging, and I need to be very solid in my teaching; the kids really don't hear them very easily, and there is a ton of repetition.  I wish that my piano skills were better!

We also have some social events that are all taking place at once this weekend.  This evening there will be a welcome soiree at the school for new staff members, which should be nice, mostly because we don't have to do anything but show up.  Then tomorrow I have rehearsal from 10-14h, which will be a challenging one as Marie-Pierre won't be there.  Afterwards I will head over to the Hammers' to give a guitar lesson to India, her first.  So I have to do some thinking today to figure out what I'll teach her as a beginning.  Probably just the preliminaries of how to hold the guitar, some chords, and a simple song.  All of my guitar music is in Canada, I think, so I'll have to see what else I can scrounge up that happens to be lying around.

Saturday evening we have a neighbourhood bbq at a house across the street that should bring in quite a large number of people.  Our only responsibility is to make a fruit salad, so that is not a major chore, and it will be nice to socialise a little with other people on the street apart from the ones that we see every day, on either side of our house.

Sunday will also be quite a busy day as we are having Lucy and Ben and their kids over for a mid-afternoon lunch, and if the weather is nice we'll likely bbq again...  Undoubtedly the morning will be a frenzy of cleaning and tidying up!

Happy Friday to you all and bon weekend...

Chimay Trail - Hello Dolly - Clyde finds a mouse

Before...

...and after the trail run

Just as we were finishing up our holiday in Les Contamines Bryan and Kiana mentioned that they hadn't run a single organised trail race this whole year, and we realised that we hadn't either.  So we all decided to sign up for the Chimay trail, which Maggie and I ran last year.  Lawrence was already registered in another race the day before, but he showed up to cheer us on.

After some of the informal runs/hikes that we've been involved with since then, we realised that the Chimay trail is not terribly challenging.  So rather than try for some sort of speed record or personal best race we opted instead to just have a nice day out and enjoy ourselves.

Despite some worries about one of her knees Maggie was fine, and was only a few minutes off her pace from last year for the 11km.  Kiana and I ran the 21km together, and kept up a conversation most of the time.  It is said that if you are running with so much exertion that you can't keep up a normal conversation, then you are training too hard.

We had the last casting meetings for Hello Dolly last week, and put up the cast lists.  Most people seem to be okay with the roles that they have been assigned, and we had rehearsals on Saturday, and then this past Monday and Tuesday after school.  I'm already learning how to manage the groups more effectively, and we are splitting up the rehearsals so that Thom has one group, usually with Marie-Pierre the choreographer, and I take the singers in alternating sections.  The middle and high school kids are all quite motivated, and it's fun to work with them, but some of them are taking a long time to hear the harmonies, and I'm doing an awful lot of note-bashing to teach them the lines.  Hello Dolly has some pretty exciting vocal textures, and there are a few places where there are very high soprano voices: in the finale of "Put on your Sunday clothes" there are some high d-flats!  I am not sure at this point if I will be able to use all of the notes in some of the more rich textures, but we will see.  Certainly I think I'll be able to manage four parts.  I took some time yesterday to put the ladies through their paces to test out their ranges, and we do have some people who can make noises at the top, which is good news.

I was happy this week to not have to teach any supply classes: Thursday and Friday last week were more than enough for me for the short term.  It was quite an exhausting experience: covering five classes per day at short notice, with little or no lesson plan means that you have to be very attentive and creative.  The kids have no relationship with you, and they don't really know what is expected, and neither do you.  But we managed to get through the classes and the regular music teacher is now back on the job.  It was a mixed bag: I had some grade 10s, and some grade 7s, and for these I had a functioning lesson plan.

But with the grade 8s it was a class that was largely improvised based on what they were interested in, and what the last supply teacher was able to invent.  She had given them an exercise in groups, to write a musical theatre piece.  I tweaked the task a little bit and gave them the following criteria:

1. Write a song lyric (or poem) about some sort of emotional situation that you are interested in and then set it to music, or alternatively choose an existing song and write a parody of it.

2. Imagine the kind of situation that someone would sing the song, and then write a dramatic spoken word scene that would set it up so that the audience will understand why someone would start to sing about their feelings.

3. Rehearse and present your scene and song to the class.

It was curious to see what they came up with.  Some had extremely minimal establishing scenes, while others had thought up more elaborate framing dialogue... One group of boys did a parody of "Hard Knock Life", on the theme that a bunch of labourers were sitting around eating lunch, and came to the realisation that pigs are nice, and we should not kill and eat them; they used a karaoke track to sing with, and were surprisingly strong performers.

Another group of girls played a scene where one was heartbroken that her favourite food, an avocado, had been lost, and that she would never have another avocado as nice as that one.  One of the girls played an Adele song on the piano as accompaniment and all of them sang.

A third group decided to make the brave choice of writing their own entirely new piece of music, and then trying to fit words to the melody, with mixed success.  The fact that none spoke English as their mother tongue had something to do with their difficulties, but they received extra points for creativity.

The last group of boys also did a parody using a karaoke track, and wrote a long introductory scene and an extended song, on the theme of two boys who play the video game Minecraft for so long that they fall asleep and then awaken inside the world of Minecraft, where they encounter various creatures.  I was happy that no one was nervous, or frightened to perform in front of their peers, and I was also pleased that I managed to get all of the groups to the point that they could present by the end of class!

Today I am at home rehearsing music of my own, as I have a big concert with lots of new music in about ten days.  I also took the opportunity yesterday to chart out my work for this season.  Not including the Dolly rehearsals which will occupy an increasing amount of time, I am not hurting for things to do this year!

One of the reasons to do the Hello Dolly! job was also to introduce myself to a pool of potential students for private lessons, and that has already started to happen: I received a request yesterday for a private voice lesson, and also have been asked to give a guitar lesson once a week to Bryan and Kiana's daughter India.  As long as these students know that there will be periods when I am not available because of my own performances, and if we can be flexible about rescheduling, then it looks like private teaching is going to be a growth industry for me in 2019-2020.

The animals are doing well, although with my increased activities away from home, I am sure that Yoshi is a bit sad that he's been alone more recently.  I think I'll take him out with me when I run today; that should cheer him up.

The cats are doing well.  Last night Clyde and Bonnie were outside in the twilight for a long time, huddled up on the back lawn... I realised that Clyde had caught a mouse and was playing with it!  No need for mousetraps around our house, I guess... 

recap of August activities; first week as Musical Director; Chimay Trail

As I wrote in my blog of last week, the last half of the summer was a busy one, and it started with our trip to Les Contamines-Montjoie... here's a recap of our time there.  (It's too time-consuming to intersperse the photos so will add them at the end of this blog post).

Bryan and Kiana first discovered this area seven years ago when he ran the Ultra Trail de Mont Blanc for the first time.  Since then they have been going back to the same camp site, Camping le Pontet, every summer, and this year they invited us to come down so they could show us around.

Camping le Pontet is located about a kilometre and a half from the little town of Les Contamines, and is in use in summer for hikers and trail runners, and in the winter for skiers.  The Nature preserve of Les Contamines-Montjoie is the highest altitude nature preserve in France, and the only protected area of the Mont-Blanc mountain range.  The elevation of the village and the campsite is around 1100m, and the mountain ranges nearby reach as high as 3892m.  As you can imagine there are wonderful views, and many micro-climates that can be visited from the campsite.  The area is also famous for its delicious cheeses, crisp white wines, and a schnapps-like liqueur called genepi that is flavoured from local alpine herbs of the same name.

We made four different hikes over the eight days that we stayed there, beginning with a roughly six kilometre hike to the Refuge de Tré la Tête.  To explain the idea of a refuge, there are a series of shelters spread throughout the region, and they been used for many years by travellers who either are making day hikes or for those who are doing longer journeys through the mountains.  These were originally simple huts, but many of them have been turned into cafes and hostels.

The trail to this refuge climbs about 850 metres to an elevation of about 1970m.  We were happy to reach the top, and enjoy the sunshine and the beautiful views.  People live up there during the season, and staff the hostel and restaurant, and we saw lots of cows and sheep, and other livestock on the way up.  We shooed some chickens out of the way so that we could find a seat at the refuge, had a beer and ate our picnic lunches, then headed back down the mountain to the campsite.

The next day was cloudy and rainy, and so we took it easy.  When the weather cleared the next day we did a two-stage hike.  The first stage was about 5km with a climb of 526m to the refuge de La Balme at an elevation of 1706m.  We had lunch there and Maggie stayed with the dogs and her embroidery, and the rest of us continued another 3.5km and a climb of 621m to Col de Bonhomme, at an elevation of 2329m.  This second stage was a pretty strenuous hike, over shale and even some snowpack, and when we got to the top it was quite cold and windy.  We were  happy to huddle in the primitive refuge for a bit, and then head back down the mountain to meet Maggie and return to the campground.

After another day off to rest and recover, our next hike was to le Signal, around 5-6 km distance with a climb of 750m.  Some of us took the cable car for part of the way, while others did the hike.  It was a beautiful day and so we could see the very top of Mont Blanc as it poked its head above the intervening mountains.  We had a great hamburger lunch, and the frites were spectacularly good!

On the way back down we stopped off at the Chalet de l'étape, and had a beer on the patio while Malcolm and I went for a swim in the snowmelt lake nearby.  The water was very cold but not unmanageable, and it felt great after the exertions of our hike.

We relaxed a bit the next day, and Armani, Malcolm, Duncan, Bryan and I went to the nearby driving range and hit some golf balls in the late afternoon.  Then as the evening was clear, we thought we'd take a drive up the mountain to try to find a clear spot to watch the Perseid meteor shower, which was just past its peak.  The night drive up the mountain in the WV camper van was pretty exciting, especially with nine humans and two dogs in the car, and we found a lovely quiet spot near an alpine lake.  Unfortunately the sky was too bright to see many meteors, because the meteor shower coincided with a full moon.  I didn't spot any shooting stars but many of the others did.

Our last hike on the 16th of August was the big one; the first stage was around 5.5 kilometres to the Refuge de Miage, with a climb of around 630m.  We all walked that section of the trail with the dogs, and had a great picnic lunch among the cows and sheep in the alpine meadow formed from the sediments carried by the meltwaters of the glaciers above.  The Refuge de Miage is quite large and has a big terrace bar for hikers.  Maggie, the younger kids and the dogs stayed there for the afternoon, while Bryan, Kiana, Armani, Malcolm and I continued up the mountain to the Refuge Plan Glacier, which is perched on the side of the mountain, just across from the glacier.

That was the toughest climb of all, nearly a kilometer climb in the span of 3,6km distance.  But the views were really gorgeous.  We we thirsty from the climb and wanted some beer and lemonade, but the cafe operators explained that the helicopter had only just delivered the monthly supplies that morning, so they had nothing to offer us.  We offered to help unload the package, at least until we found the beer and sparkling water.  They much appreciated our help, and we appreciated the beer and lemonade.

Then it was a long and very tiring descent that was hard on the knees and thigh muscles.  Malcolm was feeling it most of all, as of the party, he has done the least amount of hiking in the last couple of years.  But he didn't complain, and we all made it down safely to the Refuge de Miage for a short rest, and then resumed our trek back to the campsite.  My hiking tracker read that by the end of the day it had taken us about 7.5 hours to travel over 18km, with a total climb of almost 2000m.  No wonder we were tired!  But not so tired that we didn't celebrate our 22nd wedding anniversary with a bottle of champagne, and a nice meal together.

The next day was our last one in Les Contamines so we relaxed and took it easy.  The kids did some rock climbing with a guide; Maggie did some more embroidery and I read my book, enjoyed a cigar,  threw the ball for the dogs, and then in the afternoon we went to the beach nearby.  The campsite boasts a beautiful sandy lake that is fed from the meltwater of a nearby river, and there was a big inflatable waterslide for the kids to play on.  In the evening we had a bbq together and then turned in fairly early so that we would be up in time to pack up and head back home.

All in all it was a great holiday!   I am sharing a bunch of photos below...

Tre la tete

planning the next stage 

on the old Roman Road near the campsite

snowpack while climbing to col de bonhomme

interesting rock formations

in the hut at col de Bonhomme

at le Signal for lunch

  

stargazing

at Refuge de la Baume

Happy anniversary!

lunch break

the path to the refuge plan glacier

arrived at last

the supply delivery bag, delivered by helicopter

hello to the dog

early morning at camping le pontet

pre-hike photo

cold water swimming at Chalet de l'Etape

de Miage

on our way to Plan Glacier

on our way back down

rock climbing with a funny instructor

  

embroidery

multitasking

savoie sausages and lederhosen

Bruce in Belgium

I see that it has been almost a month since I wrote anything... that tells you that it has been a very busy time!  But now that Maggie, Malcolm, and Duncan have started school I should have some opportunities to write some blog posts again.  I think I will start with recent news and then work backwards...

Malcolm in his new shared apartment / workshop

Today is the first day that I have found myself in the house alone for a long time.  Maggie has been back at school since the 22nd of August, and her students arrived on the 27th; Malcolm moved into his new shared apartment on Sunday and started school on Monday; Duncan had a remedial math examination on Monday, and will start his first full day of classes on Friday; he had his first karate session of the year this afternoon, and then went to his school to find out the results of his math exam: he texted me that he passed it but won't know the actual mark until Friday.  Congratulations Duncan!

I have also started school myself, but I'll say more on that later...

at Bayreuth again

I also haven't really had a moment to write because we've had a visitor: Bruce just departed for Canada yesterday (Monday) morning after a couple of weeks here in Belgium.  It was a bit of a last-minute trip: in mid-July I heard from a friend in Brussels that because of a family illness, he had to cancel his plans to attend the Bayreuth Wagner festival in Bavaria.  He had two tickets to the last three opera performances of the season, so I wrote Bruce and asked if he wanted to go.  Quick airline searches by his travel agent led to an acceptable ticket price, and he bought his tickets to fly here.

He arrived early on August 21st, and after a brief rest to shake off jet lag, we left for Ghent the next day for a little tour.  That included a visit to see the famous Ghent Altarpiece (aka the Adoration of the Mystic Lamb, by the Van Eyck brothers, completed in 1452) in St. Bavo's Cathedral, a stop at the Museum of Fine Art Ghent, a visit to the famous Tierentyn Mustard shop, and lunch in the historical Butcher's Hall.

The big deal was altarpiece: it is one of the earliest surviving oil paintings, is one of the most influential pieces of art of all time, and has the dubious distinction of having been the victim of thirteen crimes during its existence, including seven thefts.  One of the most mysterious thefts happened in 1934 when two of the twelve panels were stolen and held for ransom.  The "John the Baptist" panel was returned as proof that the ransomers had both panels, but before the ransom could be paid in full, it seems that one of the ransomers had a heart attack and died before he could reveal the location of "The Last Judges" panel.  It has never been recovered.

The altarpiece featured in the opening scene of the film The Monuments Men, and was famously photographed during its recovery from the Altaussee salt mine in Austria after the war, where it and more than 6500 other mostly stolen paintings had been hidden by the Nazis.  It is really quite striking and beautiful, and costs only a couple of euro to see.

some of the altarpiece panels in restoration

The altarpiece has been undergoing restoration since 2012, and is only partially complete; we didn't realise that some of the panels that we saw on display in the cathedral were reproductions until we went to the Museum of Fine Art, and saw some of the panels still being worked upon.  As well we also toured much of the extensive collection of painting and sculpture on display at this excellent museum, but ran out of time; I have been there once before many years ago, but really must go again.

Tierentyn mustard is quite famous in Belgium, and is very similar in its zippiness to the mustard that my great-grandmother used to make.  I have bought it before as it is an essential ingredient in vlaamse stoverij met bruin bier en mosterd or carbonade flamandes a la biere brune et a la moutarde or Flemish beef stew with brown beer and mustard.  After the stew has been cooking for a couple of hours, the hot mustard is spread on a couple of slices of ginger spice bread and laid on top of the beef stew for the last half hour of cooking, until they dissolve.  This thickens the sauce and gives it a pleasant kick.

serving up the mustard at Tierentyn

After our day out in Ghent, we stayed home for the next couple of days, and had some social time with Lawrence, neighbours Christophe and Isabelle, and had our friends Raoul and Luisa over for a nice big BBQ.  Then Bruce and I set out for the 650km drive to Bayreuth, Germany on the 25th of August, with a stop-over for one night in Frankfurt.

The bed-and-breakfast that we had selected was very clean if sparsely furnished, and was coincidentally owned by a Belgian artist who was from Liege, and who had lived for a while in Wavre before moving to Germany!  It was located only a short walk from the old Opera house, and so we did a little exploring.  Another heatwave (the third or fourth one this summer) had descended that weekend, and so it was necessary to cool our feet off in the fountain in front of the opera, and then drink a Hefe-Weissbier at a bar nearby.

Die Alte Oper Frankfurt

We had dinner at a little Italian bistro called Da Marietto, just opposite the apartment, and as it was still quite hot out, and we had eaten a substantial packed lunch, we each had just an appetiser, comprised of different types of seafood (tuna, calimari, octopus, scallops) with salads, served with green olives and bread and oil.

The meal was great.  The owner/operators of the place are a little old Italian couple, and they were quite funny to watch as they bustled around the restaurant.  They were really old-school: as I approached the wife to ask where we should sit, she waved me away impatiently as she was busy serving other tables, and the animated discussions between her and her husband as they tried to correct a mistake on a wine order was comical... (Think male and female versions of Edna Mode from the Incredibles and you'll have the right idea). They had no English or French and we had little Italian, and my German was pretty rusty, but we managed.  As we were finishing our delicious food, mamma smiled and gestured to make sure that I ate the last olive.  Definitely a place I would go back to again.

The next day we carried on to Bayreuth, and checked into our apartment in Weidenberg, which is maybe ten kilometres from Bayreuth itself.  We were going to see Parsifal on the 26th, Die Meistersinger on the 27th, and Tristan und Isolde on the 28th.  These were the last three performances of this years' festival and so we were really lucky to get the tickets.

The last time we were in Bayreuth we stayed in Warmentsteinach, maybe 20 km from the town.  Weidenberg is even closer, maybe 12km, and our hosts Steffi and Olaf and their daughter Nadine were amazingly friendly and helpful.

The operas were staged in three very different ways, and each had a different feel.  Operas always start at 16:00 at Bayreuth, and each of these had three acts, with two intermissions of one hour between each act.  The first, Parsifal, ended up running around six and a half hours.  In case you are interested here is a review of the production.  I really liked it very much, although as is the case with many stagings that present older works within an entirely new "skin", the matchup between the text, the original intended subtext, and the new staging director's vision (or what one could call a "supra-text") isn't always seamless.  There were confusing things about it, but I found it quite absorbing.

Like our last visit in 2015, we dressed for the performances in black tie, but unlike 2015, we had much less expensive tickets in the galleries of the non-air-conditioned theatre, and we were attending in the midst of a heatwave.  We toughed it out in our dinner jackets for the first opera, but for the next two shows threw decorum to the wind and dressed in shorts and short-sleeve shirts.  Most of the people in gallery, but not all, did the same.  Most people took folding hand fans with them, but even so it was very hot.

cooling off during intermission

One thing we also discovered during the last performance while having a picnic out of the car during one of the intermissions is that there is a very cold water footbath that one can walk through, just up the hill from the theatre.  So we made use of that and felt much better for it.  I wish that I had known about it for the first two operas!

bows for Die Meistersinger with Michael Volle in front

The second opera was Die Meistersinger, staged by Barry Kosky, and it was magnificent in every way.  Kosky is an Australian musician and stage director who has for some years been the head of the Comische Oper Berlin, where my friend and colleague Peter Tomek has been since he left Brussels.  It starred the amazing Michael Volle as Hans Sachs, the greatest master-singer of them all, the longest part in all of Wagner's operas.  The staging was really inventive and magical, and framed Meistersinger in the context of the Richard and Cosima Wagner extended family.  It also paid attention to the currents of anti-Semitism that pervade much of Wagner's work.  Here's a review.

The last opera was the famous Tristan und Isolde, and its staging was less satisfying for me, although it did grow on me as it progressed.  I did come away feeling like I didn't really "get" what was going on onstage, and so found it a bit of a chore to get through.  Mark Twain attended Bayreuth in 1891, and here's what he wrote about Tristan:

This opera of Tristan and Isolde last night broke the hearts of all witnesses who were of the faith, and I know of some who have heard of many who could not sleep after it, but cried the night away. I feel strongly out of place here. Sometimes I feel like the sane person in a community of the mad; sometimes I feel like the one blind man where all others see; the one groping savage in the college of the learned, and always, during service, I feel like a heretic in heaven.

Here's a more recent review, of the production that we saw...

As you can imagine, seeing three operas with such long running times didn't leave much room for sight-seeing.  But we did manage to do a few things.  During our last visit here the Margravial Opera House in the town centre of Bayreuth was still undergoing renovation, so we had to wait until this year to see it.  It was worth it: what a fantastic theatre!

interior of the Margravial Opera House

It was built between 1745 and 1750 by Princess Wilhelmina, the older sister of Frederick the Great of Prussia, for the wedding of her daughter.  It is gorgeously appointed inside and is one of the few remaining late Baroque opera houses in existence: the interior is perfectly preserved in its original condition.  Here's a New York times article describing the cleaning and restoration.

As well I took the opportunity on one of the days to get in some trail running, and did about an hour of exploring the area around Warmensteinach, where we had stayed in 2015.  Over the 8.5 km run I climbed around 250 metres to the top of the Schanzberg, at an elevation of maybe 730m, and enjoyed the views, before running back down.  It was really quite lovely in the forest, which with its pine trees and granite outcroppings makes me think of Ontario forests.

climbing up the trail

We got up early on the morning of the 29th, and left for Wavre early at around 7:00; we managed to get back home by 14:00, thanks to high speeds on the German autobahns, which "Myrtle", our new VW Golf, seemed to handle without any trouble.  I had enough time to have a cup of espresso, shower and change, and then head off to school!

My first few days at St. John's International School have been very productive.  The first session was a meet and greet for all of the students who wanted to participate in Hello Dolly, and I found myself doing a vocal warm-up and teaching some songs to around 130 students in a large rehearsal hall.  It was a bit daunting for me as I haven't worked with school-aged kids for a long time, but it seemed to go well, and the subsequent rehearsal and audition sessions have been fun.  The kids are super-motivated, and excited to be part of a show.  The boys in particular are very strong, which I wasn't expecting, but that is likely down to the great example that Thom Graham, the head of theatre arts, has been providing for them.

I've never cast a show before, and it is interesting being on a panel with the other members of the creative team.  We have had such an interest by the students in the ten solo roles to be filled that we will plan for two casts for each of the principals - mostly filled by grade 12 students with the odd grade 11 student - as well as preparing younger actors from the middle grades to understudy those roles.

Rehearsals are held on Monday, Tuesday and Thursday from 15:45-18:45, and then there is a longer four-hour rehearsal on Saturday.  We've been using both Myrtle and the scooter to get back and forth; Maggie usually drives the car in the morning, then I scoot to Waterloo in the afternoon; she scoots home after her classes are over, and I drive the car home after rehearsal.  That way no one is riding the scooter early or late in the day, or in the most heavy traffic.

This schedule of around thirteen hours per week of teaching appears to be manageable, and I do still have lots of time to do my own musical work.  In a couple of weeks I have a polyphony concert to sing, and all of the music is quite new to me, so that will prove to be an interesting project.  And then there is the Mozart Requiem and the Haydn Nelson Mass to come in October, some more Requiems by Schubert and Haydn, the B-minor Mass, and the Brahms Requiem in November.  Fortunately most of these later projects are familiar to me, but I still need to work on them.  And there is the Messiah to keep in training, as it follows closely after Dolly closes on the 24th of November...

singing lesson with Malcolm

Bruce and I only managed two short voice lessons during his visit, but they were good to do.  He also did a lesson with Malcolm and one with Duncan; they both really enjoyed it, and seem interested in working on their singing technique, so have asked me if I will continue with them.  It looks like there is no shortage of teaching in my immediate future...

Post Scriptum

Since I wrote this blog I received an email from the school: it seems that the classroom music teacher is off sick until Monday, so they have asked me to also teach a bunch of music classes tomorrow and Friday.  I have no lesson plan yet, so wish me luck!

next... our trip to Les Contamines-Montjoie...