Day 8 - Another collaborative effort.

Welcome to the stage Patel, “Berman the German”, Gowers (ma) and PT (ma).Despite Ralph Allwood actually turning up this morning, we still departed from Princeton late thanks to the bus driver. On the journey to Philadelphia, members of B block were treated to a series of bed time stories read by Alex Eager in the huskiest voice he could muster.
All was “ecky thump” according to Phil Highy, as we got off the bus in sunny Philadelphia. Mr Maynard directed the tour into Macy’s department store so that he could buy some underwear, and we were surprised and delighted to find the largest functional organ in the world in the shoe section (Max James even uttered a squeal of delight). Whilst the other members of the choir were trying to find meaning in their pointless existence, the great and mighty organists were led up to said organ for a guided tour of the console. Ed Picton-Turbervill (keeper of organs) will now describe it:
‘It was really big’.
Richard Gowers, who knows far more about the organ (and music in general), will elaborate on Ed’s fatuous comment at a later date.




Looking at the consoles


Richard Gowers writes:

Indeed it was big, Ed. We were lucky to have one of the organists show us around. He let us see, and in some cases touch, the console. I for one managed to play 15 notes while his head was turned. We were also taken to the string chamber, (the world’s largest organ chamber) housing over eighty almost identical ranks of pipes. A lot of the time we had to crouch under jutting pipes, except Jack “I’m the perfect height” Eastwood, who squealed in delight. It was hard to explain the scale of the organ to younger boys downstairs because the only visible part was not much bigger than an average large church organ. To make this worse, we were told that the visible section was not part of the organ and was a fake and empty case. This didn’t stop Alex Tucker being excited by the rolling cymbal stop which echoed from the vast percussion section.



The string chamber

 The organ soon became inaudible for the sound of Charlie Marshall’s stomach rumbling, so we were forced to leave for lunch (though not before Egor had invested in some snazzy Calvin Klein boxers). We’re fully expecting a spate of food poisoning, as some people ate at a very questionable Chinese restaurant and the other boring people ate at McDonald’s. James Harkness, cup of tea in hand, bought a hamburger just so that he could take a photo of it (to try and spice up his otherwise boring collection of pictures of sign posts).
We then took an extremely scenic route to St Thomas’s church, Whitemarsh. After the rehearsal, we were given an hour of free time, during which we were given three balls (“implements of sport” according to Mr Maynard) and told to amuse ourselves. We were then treated to a wonderful supper by the friendly parishioners, one of whom befriended James Harkness in frank conversation. Meanwhile, Tom Norrington (keeper of Mayonnaise)asked a parishioner “is this juice?” and she promptly replied “No, it is orange”. Ed PT managed to find a more socially acceptable conversation topic this time, and Joseph Boorman pretended to be Scottish to his hosts. The bloggers wish him well with maintaining this façade for the next 24 hours.
Hyper from the barbecue bonanza, a group of basses stole Josh Cooter’s trousers and gave them to David Goode, who became extremely flustered with this added responsibility. Josh Cooter spent the next half an hour running around half naked trying to rugby tackle Quintin Beer, along with most of the junior members of the choir.
The concert was relatively successful, with Adam Berman selling enough CDs to fund 3 more days of future Choir Tours. Thanks to Alex Chance and his throat ulcer, the choir is now down to 2 fully functional voices but we’re still going strong…Floreat Etona!
We hope you have enjoyed nourishing yourselves on our highest quality slops. Tomorrow the blather, swill and slops will all be combined into one gloriously messy mountain of refuse.

Rubin Patel, Ed Picton-Turbervill, Adam Berman (the German), John Gowers, Richard Gowers

Day 7 - John

Slops

This morning the choir was set its most important deadline: we had to arrive at the Holy Trinity Church in Princeton by 9:30 so as not to be late for our four-hour free morning in Princeton.  It is with great pride that I can say that every single boy in the choir met this deadline; however, I cannot say the same for some of the staff.  David Goode was mortified after turning up a few minutes late, and Ralph Allwood did not even deign to grace us with his presence.

The choir set out in small groups to explore Princeton.  John Templeton once said that "the best thing about Princeton is that there are no distractions". This certainly made a change from the sights of Chicago. Andrew Maynard certainly took that at its face value, choosing to spend the morning relaxing with a cheap thriller in the grounds of the famous university.  The attractions of the town were different for others.  I for one was rather taken aback to notice that Timothy Khoury was sporting a tiger's tail when he returned for the practice at 1:30 - my surprise was mostly due to the his skill in keeping it hidden from us for so long.  A number of members of our party, including David Goode found solace in Princeton's coffee shops, and some were delighted to discover the Princeton record exchange: Adam Berman left with no fewer than six CDs.  John and Richard Gowers spent the morning down Memory Lane, visiting the apartment building where they had lived for two years, and receiving a particularly warm welcome at their old Elementary School.  Max James and others visited Princeton's delightful art museum.  Several boys enjoyed buying clothes and books in Princeton: One senior member of the choir bought a delightful bound collection of short love stories, and I am sure that they gave him much pleasure.

The boys' plans for the afternoon were, sadly, dashed: Andrew Maynard and the rest of the staff decided that the hour's free time we were promised in the afternoon would have caused problems, so Ralph Allwood deliberately dragged our rehearsal on and on until it was time to be picked up by our host families: I for one have never spent so long on futile discussion about how best to organize the choir so we could find our places in the balcony before the concert began.  After the rehearsal, we headed back for supper, and then met in the crypt to get changed and get ready for our evensong.  Ralph Allwood had told us a few days previously that anyone turning up to a performance without their concert dress or music would not be allowed to sing: today was the first day in which this rule almost came into effect.  Henry Stacey had left his black shoes and smart shirt with his home-stay, but several members of the the choir, under Ralph's direction, were able to provide him with spares, enabling him to sing.  


Ralph told us that we were performing an evensong rather than a concert in order to cut costs: I like to think that this is partly because it costs $2000 dollars to put on a concert in the Princeton University Chapel (as opposed to nothing for a church service) and partly because Ralph didn't have to hire his speech-writer to think up fresh introductions for all the pieces of music.  The concert went well, in spite of a few senior boys who seemed particularly keen to keep their cassocks closed.  We must congratulate Thomas Norrington on remembering which bird is mentioned in Gerald Finzi's Lo, the Full Final Sacrifice in time for the concert: we had 'parakeet' and 'cockatoo' in practices.

O soft self-wounding pelican

After the concert evensong, the choir was looking forward to the ice cream very kindly provided by Samuel Jordan's family.  However, we were slightly taken aback to learn that there was a catch: we had to sing Henry Ley's A Prayer of King Henry VI before we could get our hands on it.  I for one noticed a peculiar yearning quality in the choir's tone as they sang, which I thought was rather effective.  We then helped ourselves to bowls of chopped banana with ice cream and chocolate sauce before launching into a performance of Under the Sea, for which the audience was treated to College Chapel Choir's unique sense of rhythm.  Our slightly depleted group of Incognitos gave us lovely performances of That Lonesome Road and Superman: it was so nice to hear them sing something different for a change.

It has been lovely filling you all with slops tonight; don't forget to keep checking the blog for more posts.

- John Gowers

Day 6 - Richard

At 08:00 a motley crowd gathered in the hotel lobby to go for a morning jog in Central Park. For some people, in particular Sam Jordan, this represented a normal part of the daily routine. For others this was a peaceful walk in an otherwise vibrant city. For Rupert Dower-Tylee this meant running straight into a bin and knocking it over. Similarly a street cleaner was the victim of Julian Hartley's sprinting head start. Joseph Boorman, who was perfectly aware that he couldn't run, discovered that he couldn't even walk and barely lost sight of the starting line. Having had our annual exercise session we trudged to the hotel to relax ourselves with mountains of pancakes.

After checking out, we ploughed our way, baggage in hand, down the streets of New York. Washing unsuspecting pedestrians aside, we reached Saint Thomas’s Church, 5^th Avenue, thanks to Mr Maynard’s usual seamless leadership skills, which were improved by a Statue of Liberty hat. Within minutes a downstairs room was buried in our clobber but it didn’t seem to deserve our attention as an hour of free time began. Some people visited an electrical shop filled with dodgy salesmen, one of whom tried to persuade Rubin Patel to take a photo of his eye while another tried to sell some speakers to Adam Berman’s back.

Upon arrival at Saint Thomas’s Choir School we feasted heartily on spaghetti bolognaise and iced tea, generously provided while the native choristers were on tour in Florida. Mr. Allwood pointed out that it was a 14-floor building whose only purpose was to accommodate and house the boys of the church choir. This was nothing to Daniel Parr who had had a similar experience at Westminster Abbey.

As we entered the church for our afternoon practice we were dazzled by the array of colour. At the west end there was a “batman style” organ (complete with wings, perhaps a contemporary twist on its intended baroque nature), while around the choir stalls we were surrounded by the pipes of another organ, massive and apparently doomed. Most of the church was dark blue, except the east end, which was a lot brighter. Fatigue hindered the efficiency of the practice but we were relieved when told that the service was to be broadcast on the Internet:

http://www.saintthomaschurch.org/calendar/2011/04/05/worship/1731/

Alex Chance should be congratulated for his choir-accompanying debut during the practice. He very skillfully held down the single chord which spanned the whole of Tavener’s anthem “What God is we do not know”, kindly stepping in for Mr Goode who admitted that he hadn’t done enough slow practice.

When more free time was granted, the James Picton-Turbervill/Justin Bieber ordeal was still not over. He was promptly whisked to Times Square where there was a shop offering customers 15 seconds of photographic fame on a huge public screen. The press arrived too late, thanks to a tight schedule. (Luckily the argument between Quintin Beer and Josh Cooter concerning the correct pronunciation of “schedule” has been resolved. Josh, who had been using the word “school” as an example to prove his point, and was quickly combatted by the nine different pronunciations of “ough”, cleverly managed to convince Quintin that he didn’t realise exactly what they were arguing about, and all was peaceful again.)

Despite the obsession with the Royal Wedding, the American responses at evensong included “O Lord, save our state”, rather than “save the Queen”. Numerous attempts to trick the priest into singing our version failed. Mr Allwood must also have been tired, as the second psalm was begun by his “sit down” motion but Edward Picton-Turbervill’s improvised organ voluntary was enjoyed by all.

The next stop was the Old Etonian Association reception, which starred the Incognitos and yet another performance of “Under the Sea”. Evidently the excitement of the coach journey to Princeton was so overwhelming that we all felt a need to sing the latter extremely fast. The high drinking age led to desperate measures in Alex Chance’s second excitement of the day: a huge bottle of alcohol mouthwash in the restroom.

“Unique New York, unique New York, unique New York”; try saying that over and over. We didn’t have to because the point had been made. Leaving the towering concrete jungle came with great sadness for many choir members, but the historic and peaceful town of Princeton promised to be as pleasurable an experience.

Here endeth the swill. Tomorrow we shall indulge on some fresh slops.

Richard Gowers

Day 5 - The Blog Team

Today the choir had its first ever stint on a live early morning TV show, that bastion of middle-aged femininity, the Martha Stewart Show.  Having our own hair and make-up artists was certainly a unique experience for most of the members of the choir: a special mention should go to Quintin Beer for his wonderful hair curlers, and also for the almost frightening changes effected in the appearances of Tom Norrington, James Harkness and Daniel Parr.  Andrew Maynard enjoyed having his bald patch pampered while reading the New York Times, while David Goode looked particularly striking with his wisps of hair arranged to dramatic effect.  Several senior members of the choir evidently felt that a more minimalist approach to sub-cassock clothing was appropriate to the occasion. 

The choir was disconcerted that while we had got up at 6:30 in the morning, Martha Stewart, that flaxen-haired temptress, only rocked up at 9:59:59.  Perhaps this was fitting, though, since the entire show was built on a nest of lies: she is not Laurence Booth-Clibborn’s godmother, but his brother’s, yet this did not stop her from demonstrating his culinary skills to the nation.  We should congratulate Laurence on his performance; however, we were surprised by his assertion that one of the languages the choir regularly sings in is ‘Asian’. The choir performed Henry Ley’s A Prayer of Henry VI.  Ralph Allwood was evidently panicking as Martha Stewart veered wildly away from the prepared script, and made the puzzling claim that the words to this anthem were written when the founder king’s age lay somewhere within the age bracket represented by the choir, meaning that we can narrow it down to somewhere between 13 (Jack Eastwood) and 130 (Andrew Maynard). 

Watch the Eton College Chapel Choir clip here:
http://www.marthastewart.com/show/the-martha-stewart-show/vegetarian-recipes

The choir were delighted to be informed that every member of the studio audience was to be presented with a special 400-hole steam iron and an sophisticated vegetarian cookbook, although Philip Highy was perhaps slightly less enthusiastic about the prospect of navigating customs with forty-five lumps of solid steel in tow.  Sadly, the morning was to be filled with disappointment for the choir; firstly as Martha Stewart welded the figure of a teapot on to the wrong piece of cloth, with a cheerful “Oh well, I can just stitch it up and make a lovely handkerchief”.  Then we were denied not only the irons and the cookbooks, but also a chance to ogle Eva Longoria-Parker after the show. 

The choir split up into groups soon afterwards to go off and explore New York City.  One group set out to visit Ground Zero and take a return trip on the Staten Island Ferry while the others were free to roam around Manhattan.  Visitors to Times Square might perhaps have been shocked at the grotesque sight of Timothy Khoury, Alexander Chance, George Wilders, Alexander Eager, Henry Seabright and Quintin Beer on a massive screen on the side of a building.  Timothy Khoury spent $90 on a Waldorf salad at the Waldorf hotel, thereby emptying his father’s bank account and his lad point account, both of which were on the edge. 

With his new found confidence following a particularly invigorating cup of tea, James Harkness decided to pursue a new path in life.  While Thomas Norrington was traumatizing a six-year-old at F. A. O. Schwartz, James managed to give his group the slip, passed through a tanning parlour and a gymnasium and emerged in his new capacity as a dancer in the hit Broadway show, Chicago, where the choir was surprised and delighted to see him, even if (or perhaps because) his character was killed only two minutes into the show by his jealous lover.  Despite James’s captivating performance, Ralph Allwood still preferred to go back to the hotel and sleep rather than endure the second half.  After the show there were many ejaculations of admiration from members of the choir. 

Thanks to generous donations from members of the choir, particularly James Harkness, we left with two posters signed by all the members of the cast, one of which will take up residence in the song room to remind us all of the tour and, of course, of James’s thespian escapades. 

More swill tomorrow.

 - John Gowers, Richard Gowers, Rubin Patel, Hugo Popplewell, Edward Picton-Turbervill

Special thanks to Joshua Cooter and Quintin Beer for letting us use their room to write this post.  

Day 4 - John

Not much happened today, as five hours of it was spent on a coach to New York, but here is a small cup of swill to whet your appetites:

Today started with the choir's first church service of the tour, which was held in the Memorial Chapel of Harvard University.  The fact that it was a church service rather than a concert meant it was a rare opportunity to hear the choir's sound unadulterated by any of Ralph's 'jokes', which, as he informed us, are much the same as the pieces of music we are performing on the tour: we can expect a number of them to be re-used from concert to concert. After the service, we enjoyed what was perhaps the highlight of our day - an all-you-can-eat brunch in Harvard's exclusive Annenberg Hall.  Among the excitements of the brunch were Powerade and Coca-Cola on tap, steaming bowls of porridge, the company of such erudite inividuals as Sir Eric and Lady Poppy Anderson (Sir Eric is the former Headmaster and Provost of Eton), Ex-KS Asfandayar Nadeem and the distinguished mathematician Noam Elkies and, perhaps most exciting of all, the opportunity to make waffles emblazoned with the Harvard crest.

It is a wonder that after such  hug meal we didn't have any little 'accidents' on the coach trip to New York.  A good way to test the good humour of any group of people is to stick them in a confined space for five hours: the College Chapel Choir passed this test with only a few marks dropped here and there, but it was a relief as well as a huge excitement to reach New York City.  After checking into the hotel, we split into four groups to find restaurants for supper: some members of B and D Block deserve a special mention for managing to fend off a stream of inappropriate one-liners from an Irish waiter called Patrick in one of New York's most expensive steak houses.

 - John Gowers

Day 3 - Rubin

Greetings. Rubin here, for one night only (thanks to Hugo, John and Richard for granting me this honour). Anyway, on with the swill:

Everyone arrived at Roxbury Latin at noon, having rested and recovered from last night's concert and the activities thereafter undertaken with homestays, which ranged from socialising with members of the RL glee club to having a cup of tea and taking an early night in the case of Egor Grigorev and James Harkness. Silver bags in hand, off we went on a coach to Worcester to sing at the All Saints church. After the rehearsal many of us were feeling quite ravenous, but we were informed by the choir master of the church that we shouldn't leave its confines since the surrounding neighbourhood was known to be fairly dodgy. "We had better trust the natives" said Ralph Allwood. However, Phillip and Laura Highy came to the rescue by rushing to the nearest subway and buying us several sandwiches as well as exhausting their supply of cookies (actual cookies, not American cookies...or are they the same thing? What are biscuits? What is the meaning of life?). Phillip and Laura: I salute you.

Whilst many of us were gorging ourselves on the healthiest junk food money can buy, it became apparent that there was a little discrepancy in our collective happiness: Norrington doesn't like mayonnaise. Tom Norrington, as I'm sure you all know, is the coolest character in the choir; but when confronted with a stable emulsion of egg yolk and vinegar the man goes absolutely crazy. You can imagine that this is a bit of a problem when going on a tour to a country where the buildings are practically made of the stuff. Having said that, his dislike of mayonnaise has led to new friendships being forged, such as the one between him and Pablo the first class air steward on our flight over here (let's just say that Tom now knows what Jewish, Hindu, Muslim, Buddhist and Zoroastrian sandwiches taste like).

The concert ran very smoothly and was well received by the audience, despite sustaining heavy casualties. The Incognitos have been dropping like flies: before the concert Alex Chance was taken ill (something to do with his throat feeling tickly), meaning Hamish Mclaren valiantly had to step in - in spite of his abhorrence towards wearing Chance's loutish waistcoat - and halfway through the concert, before the Incogs were due to perform, Alex Eager took a turn for the worst (his throat felt more scratchy than tickly) and so they were another man down. However, Josh Cooter and his band of merry men rose to the challenge and pulled off a jaw-dropping set of performances seemingly without any effort. Excellent. Amongst the other amusing hiccoughs of the evening was Ralph falling asleep whilst conducting 'Hear My Words, Ye People' and forgetting to bring us in. For once the people that don't usually watch him came in at the right place! Good work, Ralph. From now on whenever someone commits a faux pas which results both in general amusement and at the same time an increase in productivity, this shall be known as 'doing a Ralph'. When he was awake he deviated so much in his announcements that when he began describing Walton's Jubilate with an outline of Walton's career at Christ Church, Oxford he managed to end by advising the audience about the approximate walking distance between Eton and Windsor Castle. At the end of the concert we gave our second ever rendition of 'Under the Sea' but Richard Gowers's delightful egg shaking was unapparent this time since I left the egg shaker back in Boston. Sorry about that. I would also like to mention that David Goode played some fiendish Bach on the organ today - he's a very goode organist. If the pun offends you, then please take caution when reading onwards.

After the concert we were graciously treated to a lovely dinner with the choir of All Saints during which Quintin, AKA 'Die Führer', presented them with a framed picture of us as a token of our gratitude (we're quite a vain bunch). The Picton-Turbervill family once again demonstrated their affinity for attracting throngs of inappropriately young girls; this time it was Edward's turn. He dazzled and amazed them with his dinner conversation, the theme of which was mainly to do with medical conditions pertaining to the human body. However, needless to say, James didn't have to try to get the girls' attention, being once again recognised as a lookalike of teen pop sensation Justin Bieber. I am aware that the purpose of this blog - and indeed blogging in general - is to share with you every detail of that which you are missing out on, however I fear that if I went into any more detail that I would be tarnishing the good name of Picton-Turbervill as well as breaking several laws of social conduct. Enough said.

All was quiet on the E/F block front today, although it should be noted that Rupert Scarratt (Keeper of flowers) is doing an excellent job at causing general irritation to Die Führer...keep up the good work. Speaking of the quintessential Keeper of the Choir, the coach ride back from Worcester was a highly entertaining one. Messrs Mclaren and Booth-Clibborn took Quintin hostage and tickled him senseless which resulted in everyone witnessing a rapid decline in Q's demeanour (he started out as a serious, imposing figure, quickly became more and more demented and by the end he looked like a sea anemone). This caused Adam Berman's characteristically hearty chortle to reach new heights. John Gowers also gave a rousing speech to everyone about how unbelievably clean we left the venue. Tom Norrington, still upset about the mayonnaise, started a rant about the correlation between consumption of mayonnaise and death (he does A-level Biology, don't you know). Somebody drew on Mr Maynard's nose with a felt tip pen (Rupert Dower-Tylee??). Hmmmm, all in all an extremely successful day!
That's all for now!

Rubin Patel
P.S. Quintin, please could you buy some pencil sharpeners for the choir pencils? They are becoming very blunt, as is - as Richard Gowers assures me - Mr Maynard's gargantuan intellect.




Richard Gowers writes:
Sorry to interrupt your lovely blog post, Rubin, but I saw that you'd started it and for some reason I thought you gave up so I wrote some myself. I feel that the only part of mine that isn't overshadowed by your fantastic words is a picture comparison between James Picton-Turbervill and Justin Bieber to give a visual aid for less informed readers;
(I hope the P-T family isn't embarrassed. If I were them I would be thrilled and very proud.)

          Justin Bieber             James Picton-Turbervill

                                      James Picton-Turbervill             Justin Bieber

  Rubin Patel writes:

Not at all, Richard, the more said about the P-Ts the better, but let it be known that if you would like James' autograph or if you would like him to perform at your daughter's birthday party then you must book an appointment with his agent, me, if you want to get the ball rolling. He's a busy, busy man.

Day 2 - Richard

Yesterday everyone carefully planned an April Fools Day prank involving every boy separately telling Ralph that he had lost his voice. Today everyone carefully forgot it. The boys of Roxbury Latin School were far more successful, as each boy who was supposed to hand in an article for their school magazine by today individually approached the teacher in charge with an excuse, causing him to boil up in fury and storm off to the head master.

We had a most wonderful two-hour rehearsal in the school, featuring pieces being rehearsed and conducted by boys. Ludo Graham was particularly energetic; those who could actually see him would agree.

During the day we divided into two groups. Those who had ordered tickets listened to the Boston Symphony Orchestra in a concert including Evgeny Kissin playing two piano concertos, Grieg and Chopin 1. The others were taken on an inspiring tour of Harvard which was organised by Mr Jordan. This was preceded by lunch at the best burger joint in Boston, where each burger had its own name, e.g. "The Michelle Obama", (because it's hot and spicy) and "The Facebook" (...?!).

Edward Picton-Turbervill pointed out a section of the wall in the main part of the school, upon which there were attached samples of English landmarks, notably a small slice of Ely Cathedral which an Anglophile teacher had apparently chipped off during the night. The obvious thing to do would be to chip it off their wall and bring it back home to Cambridgeshire but that would just turn the attention on Eton, and we simply can't afford to lose bits of our beloved home, except perhaps Bekynton; that's a historic building they can have as much of as they want.

Dinner at the school gave us a chance to meet some American versions of ourselves. Topics of conversation included the drinking age in Britain and comparing mad teachers. Max James wins the prize for best introduction, with "Hi! I'm Max. What sort of Asian are you?" It was nice to have Ben Nuzzo OE drop in on us while we were changing.

The Glee Club, Roxbury's main choir, opened the concert with a fantastic mix of traditional American songs, close harmony and classics of the choral tradition. Their smaller group, The Latonics, sang very skilfully in an equally varied range of styles.

Our part of the concert was also a great success, owing mainly to the extent of F block's excitement. While Ed Picton-Turbervill after relishing the opportunity to introduce the audience to some of the more idiomatic areas of the English language in his pre-performance talk played Bach's Passacaglia and "stonking great" Fugue in C minor, the rest of the choir was evidently incapable of taking a break from performing. Various pieces of backstage entertainment over the course of the evening included a certain member of the lower blocks destroying a fax machine and Andrew Maynard trying to insert his head into an electric pencil sharpener in order to "sharpen his intellect". In a fit of pique at his omission from the group, Alex Robarts attempted to sabotage the climax of the Incognitos' performance by "accidentally" brushing the touch screen lighting controls for the hall and plunging them into total darkness. At the end the audience rose to their feet: some in glorious ovation and others to make a speedy exit. Those who remained were rewarded with a rendition of Tom Recknell's arrangement of "Under the Sea", accompanied by David Goode on piano and the whole of D block (also known as Richard Gowers) on egg shaker.

Enough blather has been churned. Tomorrow we will start on the swill.

Richard Gowers