Galleries, Friends and Arsenal

Wednesday, November 12th

Today I gave my euphonium a bath (don’t judge me) and tried to do a lot of research for my BAA paper. I made it to the National Art Library at the Victoria and Albert Museum, and spent an hour and a half looking for print material pertaining to Rubens’ ‘Winter.’ The one book I found that might have had that piece in it took another hour and a half to get to me. This is due to their process of filling out a sheet, putting it in the box, having the sheets collected once an hour, having their staff find the book for you and bring it to you. By the time I got the book, it was 20 minutes before closing time. I got some information out of it, but it was frustrating nonetheless.
After this, I went back to the ICLC to play a little bit of euphonium and meet up with other members of our Brit Pop class to head to Billy Elliot at Victoria’s Palace Theatre. It was a really great musical (never seen the movie), and the young kid who played Billy had a good voice and was a phenomenal dancer. It was a really fun, entertaining musical with its touching moments. I love going to performances like these for homework. Why can’t all of college be like this?


Tuesday, November 11th

Our British Art & Architecture class met at the Banqueting House by Parliament. The house was designed by Inigo Jones and commissioned by Charles I for his dad, James I. The ceiling was full of beautiful religious and mythological depictions of James I by Rubens (what a bad-ass). After this, we went to the National Gallery to look at a few portraits.
After that, I went back to the ICLC to warm-up for my lesson at 3pm. The lesson went fairly well, and was focused on playing all the way through pieces, something I don’t do nearly enough of. At one point, he asked me to “play something” so I noodled around for a few minutes, trying to make logical, cohesive ideas. It was really bizarre to just improvise for my teacher. That’s how I usually warm-up so I guess it isn’t such a strange thing to do, but it was weird to do that in front of a teacher.
That night we went to an Arsenal football match and it was amazing. The stadium was nearly maxed out at 60,000 fans, all wearing red and black, all chanting their crazy Arsenal chants. It was very different than American sports events where they pump up the music to get the fans into it. Here, no music was played because the energy everywhere in the crowd was electric. Arsenal won 3-0 against Wigam (terrible Premiere League team). It was rather crazy leaving the stadium and trying to get home, but we managed it in about 45 minutes. What a great experience.


Monday, November 10th

It poured all day today, which made it truly exciting to get around the city. Our Shakespeare class met at the Globe theatre for a ‘tour’ (short talk about the history of the Globe) and a discussion about how plays were prepared and performed back in Shakespeare’s day. Apparently the actors would only get scrolls of their own parts with 2-3 word cues, have a week or two to learn them, and they would rehearse the play at 10am the day of the performance. They would rehearse until 1pm (3 hours), take 1 hour for lunch, then the performance at 2pm. Nowadays, plays are rehearsed for about 4 1/2 to 6 weeks. The actors back then must have been amazing, or the crowd just didn’t care.
After that, I got to hang out with Maggie. We had lunch at the Wargrave Arms (pub around the corner from my flat) and hit up platform 9 3/4 at Kings Cross (it apparently ruined her childhood because it wasn’t as cool as she had hoped… oh well). It was great to finally hang out with one of my good friends from back home and catch up.


Sunday, November 9th

I felt like crap today, but I still made myself practice and do some homework. I also went to the Queen’s Gallery at Buckingham Palace to look at their exhibit “Bruegels to Rubens: Masters of Flemish Painting” for my British Art & Architecture paper. It was a really awesome exhibit: 3 rooms, blue walls and amazing art. I’m finally starting to develop a much better appreciation for the artwork that we’ve been studying. I chose Rubens’ ‘Winter’ landscape painting, a giant oil on canvas depicting a beggar family around a fire under an open barn, taken in by a farming family with the dead of winter in the background. The skill Rubens had to create these landscape paintings is just phenomenal. Even though I felt terrible, I still really enjoyed myself for an hour and a half.