Hello Hello Everyone, 

I'm home! Save and sound in the U.S. I'm writing this from my bed in Chelmsford. I arrived in Boston at about 7:30 pm on Thursday May 14th (sorry for the delay in post) after a very long day of traveling. But it was all worth it to see my family and boyfriend again. 

I believe I put up my last post just before singing in my friend Jeff's recital on Tuesday night, which went very well. It helped that I had a surprise practice performance Monday night- since I didn't have any exams on Tuesday, I went with a few friends to a jazz bar to see another friend, Michael, play in an open jam with the host band. While talking, I mentioned that I was singing Misty the next night, so Michael took it upon himself to tell the band and I was coerced onto stage. Haha, it wasn't exactly my best sing- I was really nervous- but it was very fun and Michael talked me through the solos and stuff like that. So now I can say that I sang in a jazz club in Vienna!

Then our performance on Tuesday night went very well. Possibly the best the three of us had played/ sung the song and Jeff sounded great on his other pieces. Greta is also Jeff's accompanist so after the recital, the three of us went out for pizza and it was awesome. We sat for over two hours talking about all kinds of things. I'm not sure exactly what it is, but the three of us share a very unique connection regarding our outlooks on music and life, so spending that time together was really special. 

Wednesday, being my last day there is still a bit of a blur, but I think I remember the basic outline. In the morning, I got breakfast with my friend Xenia from church. She is the same age as me and leads the choir and we're both so sad that we didn't meet sooner. Xenia is from Russia, but is studying church music in Vienna at the University. So I showed her IES and she showed me her building which is beautiful. We definitely plan to keep in touch even though I've left. 

Then... I took my Lied final... which wasn't really an enjoyable experience for anyone in the room. It was really hard! We had to identify  and analyze 3 pieces of music, answer a few other questions and write an essay in 2 hours. It was a general consensus that we all wanted to cry after turning in our tests. But... such is life. While I may not have gotten every answer right on the test, I know that I've done well in the class otherwise and I knew it was more important to get as much of the city and my friends as possible in the last of my time there- which meant sacrificing some study time and I have no regrets about that. 

After my exam I met up with my friend Ugo from church to visit one more time before I left and then went with the other students to Dr. Solvik's house for a pot-luck. I can't remember how much I've told you about him, but Dr. Solvik is my Lied professor, the head of the music department and was recently made director of IES Vienna. Outside of IES he is a musicologist who basically discovered a Schubert song cycle, translates musicological publications in 6 languages and is THE foremost Mahler scholar... in the world. He is quite easily one of the most brilliant people I've ever talked to in my life and scared the living daylights out of me for the first 2 months of school. It turns out that he is actually a really cool, and normal, person and is really fun to talk to outside of the class room. His two kids are adorable, while at his house, his daughter Sophie invited us to play with her and her Barbies. It was awesome. 

After returning from his house I finished up the last of my packing and we all decided to go out. It turns out the club we decided on was pretty lame, but we made the best of it. And on the way home, I bought and ate my last Kabab :-( I then proceeded to get a whole four hours of sleep before getting up at 7 the next morning. I finished up the very last packing and ran some errands down town in the morning. Then Danielle, Brian, Angie, Christa and I went to breakfast at Aida, the cafe under our apartment like old times. 

What followed the rest of that day is something of a saga and is deserving of its own post, but I promise it is entertaining. I'll try to have that up shortly. In the meantime- here are some pictures from my last few days in Vienna. Talk to you again soon.

Love,

Caitlin

1. My fabulous German teacher, Monika, who we had to say goodbye to. It was so sad.

2. Me and Jalka at her apartment.

3. Neuwaldegg Park where I went walking.

4. Anna Netrebko in La Traviata

5. Me, Danielle, Brendan, Joey, Christa and Angie at the Farewell Picnic. 

Final Days

Well Folks… we’re in the home stretch!  Another week under my belt and 3 days left in Vienna. It is all a bit hard to believe. However, I have no regrets. I’ve taken advantage of every moment while here and this past week was no exception.

As I mentioned, on Monday night, I went to see soprano, Anna Netrebko, in Verdi’s opera La Traviata. Netrebko is  one of the biggest names in opera right now and I have one of her albums so seeing her live was kind of surreal. I was in line at 3:30 for standing room tickets to the show at 7:30, but it was totally worth it. Netrebko’s voice is stunning, her acting was great and she is a gorgeous woman. Also, the tenor that sang the role of her lover, Alfredo, was phenomenal. His was easily the most glorious male voice I’ve ever laid ears upon. Additionally, the sets and costumes were great as they always are at the Staatsoper. I kind of feel like an opera snob now that I’ve seen La Traviata 3 times! Haha.

Tuesday, I got in from the spirituality workshop at church and had a really great conversation with my sister. We talked for over an hour, which was great. I can’t wait to see her, along with the rest of my family when I get home. 

Last week, a friend of mine who plays trumpet asked me to sing the jazz song “Misty” in his recital with him and another friend of ours on piano. I am really excited to sing it because "Misty" is one of my tunes and I love singing jazz even though I’m not very good at it. We’ve had a lot of fun working on it so I’ll be sure to let you know how that goes. The recital is tonight, Tuesday.

Wednesday was a busy day, but full of good things. Do you remember me talking about Carolyn Hague, who came to IES to give a master class that I sang in? She gave another master class at the conservatory that I observed and it was great. All of the singers were WONDERFUL and Carolyn is both a phenomenal musician and a delightful person to be around so I really enjoyed it.

On Thursday, IES had their last big student concert for the performance workshop. I sang a song with clarinet, flute and piano that was a setting of Chaucer’s Canterbury Tales.  My piece was about a young squire who is rather fond of the ladies. It was very difficult to learn and practice, but turned out very well for everyone.

Afterward, all of the students in performance workshop, as well as the faculty, went out for drinks at a local place called Flannigan’s. It was so much fun! I kind of wish we had been able to see the fun side of our faculty sooner in the semester, maybe they wouldn’t have scared me so much.  It was one of those nights that was kind of surreal in it’s fun and perfection. A truly wonderful memory.

Saturday was a really great day too. We had German finals in the morning which went well. Then we all went out to a restaurant in the middle of the Vienna Woods for a final cook out. We spent the afternoon eating, talking, hiking, and throwing frisbees. Then that night, the 3 musketeers (Me, Angie, and Christa) all went to see Tosca at the Staatsoper. OH MY GOSH! It was amaaaaaazing. I know I keep saying that about operas, but really, it was easily my favorite of all those I’ve seen. The story line and music are incredible and all the performers executed their roles perfectly. I think it is safe to say that opera is now a part of me. “Why is that?” you ask? Well… I cried. And it was wonderful.

On Sunday, I went to church at the English speaking church that I’ve mentioned. I sang with the choir and the director asked me to sing a couple of solos. I was so flattered that she trusted me so much when she had never even heard me sing before. However, the best part was, at the end of Mass, the priest asked me to stand at the foot of the alter so that he and the congregation could say a blessing over me before I left. It was so kind and moving. I’m really going to miss them.

After church, I went out to a park near my house and just walked around for a bit, thinking about the last four months, where I was when I arrived and where I am now. It has been a pretty incredible journey.

That night, I went over to Jalka’s apartment for dinner. She kind of ran out of work that I could do for her last week, but wanted to see me again so she invited me over for dinner and we just sat and ate and talked for over two hours. It was wonderful to talk for so long with such an inspiring woman.

Monday morning I had my exam for Austrian Art and Architecture, which went well.  I felt good about the test when I came out of it. Then I came home and started packing! I was getting really worried that I wouldn’t be able to fit everything, but I think it is all okay.  I still have to sort through some papers and class materials, but the bulk of my stuff is in my 3 big red suitcases and ready to go.

Tomorrow, I have a lunch date with Greta and Jeff’s recital in the evening. The rest of they day I’ll finish up the packing, run a few errands and study for my Lied exam on Wednesday.  After that exam I plan to spend the rest of the day with friends and having a great time in the city. I’m not sure what that will entail yet, but I’m looking forward to it. Then on Thursday, I’ll do that last minute packing, head to the airport and come home, where my parents, sister, and Aaron will all be awaiting my arrival.

It is hard to say what these next few days will be like. No doubt that an emotional roller coaster will ensue, but I’d be a little worried if it didn’t. And let’s face it, a good cry is needed from time to time. 

After being here for four months, it is almost hard to imagine being home and what it will be like to be back in the states again, but I know that I have all kinds of wonderful people and things waiting for me there. Don’t worry, this won’t be my last blog. I’ll be sure to post again when I get home to tell you about my last few days and my flight home. So… no “goodbye’s” here.

Have a wonderful few days and I'll talk to (and see some of you) soon :-)

Love,

Caitlin

1. The Gold and Gem gilded cross that held the relics on either side of it.

2. The Lance that pierced His side.

3. A piece of the True Cross

4. Someone's crown and scepter (I forget who)

5. In case you were ever wondering what the opera house looked like after it was bombed in the war... this picture hangs in the lobby.

6. Everybody (almost- left to right- Beethoven, Mozart Memorial, Schubert)

7. Me and Brahms (I took this one for my music history professor- he is a Brahms scholar)

8. Me and Beethoven

9. Me and Schubert (we each got flowers for one and then did Mozart together)

Winding Down

Hello Everyone!

I’m back again with only a week and a half left! Which means… trying to do as much as possible before I leave.  So, what has happened in this last week for me? I think I left off the last blog talking about how I was going to see Mahler’s 6^th Symphony Monday night, which was… AMAZING. There were probably almost 20 IES students there, all squished together in the standing room area. The music, as beautiful as it is on recording, was even better live. There is one chord at the end that is really loud and comes out of no where… I literally jumped it surprised me so much.  I’m so glad I had the opportunity to experience it.

Nothing else this week was too out of the ordinary. I went to church again on Tuesday night for the spirituality night and met with Jalka again on Wednesday. She has asked me to translate her survey into English so that it can be used more places.

Friday was really fun though. May 1^st is Austria’s Labor Day, so we didn’t have school and Angie, Christa and I took full advantage of that. First, we went over to our friend Sarah’s apartment. She had invited us and several of the other vocalists over for breakfast. So we had a lot of fun there.  Then, we went to see the graves of … Beethoven, Schubert, Brahms, J. Strauss and Mozart’s Memorial and… they are all within 20 yards of each other. Basically, Beethoven was buried there and then the rest of them said “Hey, I want to be buried with that guy.” But Mozart was somewhere else in a pauper’s grave so the city decided, “let’s make a statue for him there too.” It was pretty surreal.

So as if that wasn’t enough, we made an entire Beethoven day out of it and went to see his only opera Fidelio at the Staatsopera. It was certainly worth going to see, but let’s just say… there is a reason it isn’t performed very often. Fidelio is pretty much only performed because it is Beethoven, as operas go, it is not the greatest. The storyline is very cool. Fidelio is actually a woman, Leonora, in disguise. She spends 2 years getting the daughter of the jailor fall in love with “Fidelio” so that she can set her wrongfully imprisoned husband free. The only problem was that the plot moved very slowly, and arias went on way longer than they needed to, so it didn’t exactly keep you on the edge of your seat. But the performers all sang wonderfully and the staging was very well-done too. Although, it is still strange to think of Beethoven as a “flawed” composer.

I continued to make the most of my day off into the evening when I talked to Aaron for a couple of hours and then went back to Christa and Angie’s apartment to watch Slumdog Millionaire. If you have not seen this movie yet, I highly recommend it.

Saturday was also eventful. I got up early and took a tour of the imperial treasury in the Hofburg Palace. I was required to go for my Art and Architecture class and had been meaning to get there for a couple of weeks. The exhibit displayed crowns, scepters, cloaks, religious objects and more… covered in gold, velvet, embroidery and precious gems… of course! It was pretty unbelievable.  But perhaps the most unbelievable thing I saw- the treasury contains what is believed to be a relic of Jesus’ true cross and the lance that pierced Jesus’ side. The piece of the cross was found in the third century by Charlemagne’s mother in Jerusalem. This piece is especially valuable and rare because it contains a hole from one of the nails, which means that this piece of wood was probably soaked with his blood. The lance, after much research was determined to be that which pierced Jesus’ side because of an inscription which says just that. I know that we were supposed to go to the treasury to talk about the elaborate works of art that we saw there, but these two items are the only things that stick out in my mind.

After I did that, I finished up some final souvenir shopping and went to the IES center. Two of my friends (one singing, one playing piano) performed the whole of Schubert’s Die Schöne Müllerin. This is a song cycle of twenty individual songs that tell the story of a miller pining after a miller maid and eventually goes crazy that is over an hour in length.  Additionally, my friend Nate, who was singing, did it all memorized. They did a wonderful job.

This week should be fun. There is a lot going on and lots of work to do before finals, but hopefully it won’t get too crazy. I’m going to see Anna Netrebko sing in the opera La Traviata on Monday and we have our last IES concert on Thursday. I’ll be sure to let you know how all of it goes. Have a great week everyone!

Love,

Caitlin

1 and 2. A cute cottage, inside and out. 

3. Me and the homestead

4. Me and my friend Steve... completely by accident

5. There was an Obama Bar! It existed way before Obama was president, but the guy  at the door was very excited that Americans were there. But it was kind of lame so we left. Oh well... at least we went!

6. Overhead view of Graz

7. Me and Graz

Styria

Hello Friends!

How are you all? I’m doing well. I just got in from a school trip to Styria. This is one of the other provinces in Austria. Graz is the capitol (Arnold Schwarzenegger worked out there). The school subsidized many of the expenses so we got to see a lot things for not a lot of money out our own pockets. We left early Saturday morning and drove for a couple of hours to an open air museum, where we saw period houses from all different provinces of Austria. It reminded me of the Farmers Museum in Westminster for you Marylanders who are reading. The cottages were so cute, I kind of wanted one for myself. 

Then we drove to our hostel to check in and had a short walking tour of Graz. Graz is the second largest city in Austria, but still pretty small. That was good though because we could walk everywhere and it felt very relaxed. We saw a couple of churches, one of which had a double spiral staircase. The only one in Europe… very cool. Then we went back to our hostel and had dinner. Many of us were pretty tired so we just relaxed for a couple hours before going to an Irish pub for drinks later that night.

On Sunday we got to sleep in for a while and then we went to a “spa”… or so we were told it was when we signed up. Turns out that by “spa” they really meant waterpark (lost in translation?) haha. But it was still really fun. It was kind of a family fun resort so there were about 7 pools and 5 hot tubs all with different features (one of the pools was windy with a current like a river!). There were also water slides and saunas. So it wasn’t what we expected but still very fun.

Then we got back on the bus and got back to Vienna around 5. Not many people went, only about 20 out of 150 in the program, but it was nice that way. I got the opportunity to hang out with people that I hadn’t really gotten to spend time with before that, and it never got “clicky” like Berlin did at times.  It was a great way to get away from the stress of the end of the semester.

Okay, now I’ll back up a bit to the week after my parents left. Tuesday night was a really nice night for me. The English speaking church that I’ve been going to is hosting a series of evenings in the weeks leading up to Pentecost on the Holy Spirit. So I joined the woman leading the evening, the deacon and his wife and a few other parishioners for a night of prayer, discussion and reflection. It was so exciting and fulfilling for me to share prayer in a community again. It is something that I’ve really missed while being here. I know that I already grew from this past Tuesday and I’m looking forward to going in the coming weeks.

Other big news this week… I’ve discovered Mahler! Okay so I had heard Gustav Mahler’s music in bits and pieces before but never really delved into any of his pieces. We studied him this week in my Lied class and talked about how he incorporated song into his 10 symphonies.  I’ve always had a hard time connecting to purely instrumental music, but I borrowed a recording of all 10 symphonies from our library at school and was hooked. Not only is the music itself gorgeous, but he asks his audiences important philosophical questions about life, death, love, and faith in a way that is nothing short of brilliant. It is truly incredible. This discovery was perfectly timed because it turns out that his sixth symphony is being performed in Vienna at the Musikverein on Monday night. I found out in enough time to get a standing room ticket and I can’t wait.

On Friday afternoon, IES had another student concert. I sang two songs by Gustav Holst for Voice and Violin. They are based on medieval sacred texts and are beautiful pieces, but deceptively challenging. The concert was long, but the program was really interesting and everyone performed beautifully as always.  

Oh, I registered for my classes next semester and my schedule is SWEET! I have no classes on Fridays and only one class on Mondays and Wednesdays that starts at 5 PM! I feel like it is too good to be true, but then I remember how crazy my last 6 semesters have been (especially the 5 at UNH) and I think I deserve it. But I’m also really excited because the classes themselves are really interesting to me. Outside of my music classes, I’m taking “Social Welfare Policy “and “Technology, Crime and Society” to fulfill my science gen ed. I’m excited because I can learn about things in these classes that can apply to my service work. I’m also taking, opera workshop, my voice lesson, and “Music of the Classical Period”. All of this will allow me to devote more time to Oxfam, Catholic Student Organization, having a job, applying for post-grad stuff, spending time people, with any luck NOT BEING SUPER STRESSED! If you couldn’t tell… I’m pretty pumped.  It will be a great senior year!

Well folks…I think that is all for now. I hear you are having beautiful weather over there, at least in New England. I hope you are finding time in the craziness of life to enjoy the sunshine.  Talk to you again soon.

Love,

Caitlin