Day 3: The Luck of Greyfriars Bobby

14 January 2018

After a good night’s sleep, we headed to Greyfriars Kirk to sing in the 11am church service. Before the service itself, we sang three songs, “Make a Joyful Noise,” “Come Trav’ler, Haste Away,” and “Light.” When the service itself began, we joined the church’s choir in singing “If Ye Love Me.” Some hymns and responses were sung throughout, and then we as the College choir sang “Wondrous Love.”

The choir did a great job of adjusting to the environment. The acoustics were very good in this church, which was set up so that the College choir faced the congregation while the church choir sat in the balcony high above the congregation in the back facing us. The congregation was a mix of families and older couples, who were all very welcoming to us at the reception after the service. The choirs were in different robes; the College choir wore a black robe with a white robe on top, while the church choir wore fancier grey robes. 

This performance was particularly memorable to me because of the way the choir was able to adapt quickly to changes. In addition to the positive acoustic changes, I had to switch to alto on the second piece because the acoustics made the tenor part too heavy and the alto part, the melody, too light. For “Wondrous Love,” I switched back to tenor midway through the piece because the different soprano, alto, and bass harmonies were overpowering the tenor melody. 

After the service, we had some free time to look around the city of Edinburgh, which has shops galore. On the way to the city, we passed a statue called Greyfriars Bobby, which was placed in memory of a dog who guarded its master’s grave for many years after he died. It is said that those who touch its nose will have good luck; one will notice that the nose is brassy because of all the people who have touched it. The good luck must have worked because I was able to catch a rare European Pokémon, Minun, in the restaurant that we ate in for lunch (yes, I’ll admit that a few choir members and I still play Pokémon Go; it’s hard to believe that I was able to catch all of the European ones so early in my trip!). I’m hopeful that more luck is to come in the future! The shops themselves were not much different than those in America; you have the typical novelty stores and the souvenir shops. Lunch was also good at Zuzu’s, where I ordered a mild chicken burger which was actually really spicy, so I can’t imagine how spicy the actual “spicy chicken” was! 

After free time and lunch, we headed to the City of Edinburgh Methodist Church. This visit was interesting because we learned more about the beginnings of the Methodist denomination in Scotland through an exhibit made by the church. It was also interesting because the sanctuary was different than what I’ve seen before; the chairs were all in a circle and they emphasized that no one person is more important than another. This sense of community was a very welcoming one in contrast to the period of divisiveness that we seem to live in. The church also gave a Methodist Handbook to those who wanted to donate one pound to the church (that’s the currency in the UK, it’s equivalent to about $1.36 as of this writing). 

The end of our church tour made way for a little more free time where I took the time to buy a Scotland souvenir shirt and a plaid scarf. We then headed to St. Giles Cathedral for a performance by Alexandre Prévert. Unfortunately, I was unable to take pictures of the breathtaking architecture inside, but it was as beautiful inside as it was outside. 

The concert itself was part of a concert series entitled “St. Giles at 6” and it was very interesting and different. He began the concert by telling us that he would introduce each song with context and how it involved the theme of romance. Each piece played in “Prévert, Piano, and Poetry” was simply beautiful; piano pieces composed by Robert Schumann, Franz Liszt, Frederic Chopin, Claude Debussy, and Georges Bizet were performed. The audience was a mix of different age groups and the performer was dressed in formal clothing.

While I enjoyed the pieces performed, I sometimes found it hard to pay attention to the spoken portions of the program due to his thick French accent. Because of this, I feel like I did not get the full experience with some of the connections to the pieces, but the parts I understood made a lot of sense. Another quick complaint I had was with the length of some of the pieces and how they seemed to repeat themselves, but I do not blame the musician for this as he did not write any of the pieces. 

The last paragraph might make one think that I did not enjoy the program, but they would be wrong. Even though I had my grievances, I seriously enjoyed this concert and I was thoroughly impressed with his musical abilities at such a young age (he’s only 21!). I also appreciated his professionalism and how he was able to perform such complicated pieces with such perfection. It was definitely worth the time to witness an Edinburgh tradition such as this one. 

I am writing this blog post as we are on a bus leaving Scotland and headed to England where the majority of my trip will be spent. Scotland has been a blast, and I cannot wait to see where we go next! 

- Jacob Stech