Great to be back in Houston so soon after we were last here - just over a year ago in December 2016. This time we're singing at a beautiful church, rather than our usual spot at Rice University, so I'm looking forward to discovering the new (to me, anyway!) space tomorrow, and to collaborating with two local choirs tomorrow as part of the concert programme.I have a certain (and slightly curious) fondness for Texas. Firstly, I celebrated my 21st birthday in Austin TX when I was on tour with St John's College Choir, Cambridge, back in 2011, and we had the most amazing time for a whole variety of reasons... not least because all our American hosts from UT seemed to be as excited (if not more!) as(/than) me about it being my milestone birthday! All a bit of a haze now, of course... Second, I have two sets of different musician friends who live here and it is always a joy to see them when we're in town, meet up and of course invite them to our concert. My links with them are through music, in particular to happy times I have spent in NYC and to the period of my life when I was giving opera-singing a go and working in Aix-en-Provence (south of France), so there's a lovely feeling of positive nostalgia that I encounter when visiting Houston... even though the feelings don't necessarily correspond directly with the city itself. Hence, a somewhat curious fondness.I'm very glad to see that any damage from the Houston mass-floods that were all over the news a few months ago seem to have been cleared up swiftly and successfully. Makes me appreciate being all the way up on the 20th floor in tonight's downtown hotel room!
Great to be back in Houston so soon after we were last here - just over a year ago in December 2016. This time we're singing at a beautiful church, rather than our usual spot at Rice University, so I'm looking forward to discovering the new (to me, anyway!) space tomorrow, and to collaborating with two local choirs tomorrow as part of the concert programme.I have a certain (and slightly curious) fondness for Texas. Firstly, I celebrated my 21st birthday in Austin TX when I was on tour with St John's College Choir, Cambridge, back in 2011, and we had the most amazing time for a whole variety of reasons... not least because all our American hosts from UT seemed to be as excited (if not more!) as(/than) me about it being my milestone birthday! All a bit of a haze now, of course... Second, I have two sets of different musician friends who live here and it is always a joy to see them when we're in town, meet up and of course invite them to our concert. My links with them are through music, in particular to happy times I have spent in NYC and to the period of my life when I was giving opera-singing a go and working in Aix-en-Provence (south of France), so there's a lovely feeling of positive nostalgia that I encounter when visiting Houston... even though the feelings don't necessarily correspond directly with the city itself. Hence, a somewhat curious fondness.I'm very glad to see that any damage from the Houston mass-floods that were all over the news a few months ago seem to have been cleared up swiftly and successfully. Makes me appreciate being all the way up on the 20th floor in tonight's downtown hotel room!
Great to be back in Houston so soon after we were last here - just over a year ago in December 2016. This time we're singing at a beautiful church, rather than our usual spot at Rice University, so I'm looking forward to discovering the new (to me, anyway!) space tomorrow, and to collaborating with two local choirs tomorrow as part of the concert programme.I have a certain (and slightly curious) fondness for Texas. Firstly, I celebrated my 21st birthday in Austin TX when I was on tour with St John's College Choir, Cambridge, back in 2011, and we had the most amazing time for a whole variety of reasons... not least because all our American hosts from UT seemed to be as excited (if not more!) as(/than) me about it being my milestone birthday! All a bit of a haze now, of course... Second, I have two sets of different musician friends who live here and it is always a joy to see them when we're in town, meet up and of course invite them to our concert. My links with them are through music, in particular to happy times I have spent in NYC and to the period of my life when I was giving opera-singing a go and working in Aix-en-Provence (south of France), so there's a lovely feeling of positive nostalgia that I encounter when visiting Houston... even though the feelings don't necessarily correspond directly with the city itself. Hence, a somewhat curious fondness.I'm very glad to see that any damage from the Houston mass-floods that were all over the news a few months ago seem to have been cleared up swiftly and successfully. Makes me appreciate being all the way up on the 20th floor in tonight's downtown hotel room!
Great to be back in Houston so soon after we were last here - just over a year ago in December 2016. This time we're singing at a beautiful church, rather than our usual spot at Rice University, so I'm looking forward to discovering the new (to me, anyway!) space tomorrow, and to collaborating with two local choirs tomorrow as part of the concert programme.I have a certain (and slightly curious) fondness for Texas. Firstly, I celebrated my 21st birthday in Austin TX when I was on tour with St John's College Choir, Cambridge, back in 2011, and we had the most amazing time for a whole variety of reasons... not least because all our American hosts from UT seemed to be as excited (if not more!) as(/than) me about it being my milestone birthday! All a bit of a haze now, of course... Second, I have two sets of different musician friends who live here and it is always a joy to see them when we're in town, meet up and of course invite them to our concert. My links with them are through music, in particular to happy times I have spent in NYC and to the period of my life when I was giving opera-singing a go and working in Aix-en-Provence (south of France), so there's a lovely feeling of positive nostalgia that I encounter when visiting Houston... even though the feelings don't necessarily correspond directly with the city itself. Hence, a somewhat curious fondness.I'm very glad to see that any damage from the Houston mass-floods that were all over the news a few months ago seem to have been cleared up swiftly and successfully. Makes me appreciate being all the way up on the 20th floor in tonight's downtown hotel room!
Great to be back in Houston so soon after we were last here - just over a year ago in December 2016. This time we're singing at a beautiful church, rather than our usual spot at Rice University, so I'm looking forward to discovering the new (to me, anyway!) space tomorrow, and to collaborating with two local choirs tomorrow as part of the concert programme.I have a certain (and slightly curious) fondness for Texas. Firstly, I celebrated my 21st birthday in Austin TX when I was on tour with St John's College Choir, Cambridge, back in 2011, and we had the most amazing time for a whole variety of reasons... not least because all our American hosts from UT seemed to be as excited (if not more!) as(/than) me about it being my milestone birthday! All a bit of a haze now, of course... Second, I have two sets of different musician friends who live here and it is always a joy to see them when we're in town, meet up and of course invite them to our concert. My links with them are through music, in particular to happy times I have spent in NYC and to the period of my life when I was giving opera-singing a go and working in Aix-en-Provence (south of France), so there's a lovely feeling of positive nostalgia that I encounter when visiting Houston... even though the feelings don't necessarily correspond directly with the city itself. Hence, a somewhat curious fondness.I'm very glad to see that any damage from the Houston mass-floods that were all over the news a few months ago seem to have been cleared up swiftly and successfully. Makes me appreciate being all the way up on the 20th floor in tonight's downtown hotel room!
Great to be back in Houston so soon after we were last here - just over a year ago in December 2016. This time we're singing at a beautiful church, rather than our usual spot at Rice University, so I'm looking forward to discovering the new (to me, anyway!) space tomorrow, and to collaborating with two local choirs tomorrow as part of the concert programme.I have a certain (and slightly curious) fondness for Texas. Firstly, I celebrated my 21st birthday in Austin TX when I was on tour with St John's College Choir, Cambridge, back in 2011, and we had the most amazing time for a whole variety of reasons... not least because all our American hosts from UT seemed to be as excited (if not more!) as(/than) me about it being my milestone birthday! All a bit of a haze now, of course... Second, I have two sets of different musician friends who live here and it is always a joy to see them when we're in town, meet up and of course invite them to our concert. My links with them are through music, in particular to happy times I have spent in NYC and to the period of my life when I was giving opera-singing a go and working in Aix-en-Provence (south of France), so there's a lovely feeling of positive nostalgia that I encounter when visiting Houston... even though the feelings don't necessarily correspond directly with the city itself. Hence, a somewhat curious fondness.I'm very glad to see that any damage from the Houston mass-floods that were all over the news a few months ago seem to have been cleared up swiftly and successfully. Makes me appreciate being all the way up on the 20th floor in tonight's downtown hotel room!
Great to be back in Houston so soon after we were last here - just over a year ago in December 2016. This time we're singing at a beautiful church, rather than our usual spot at Rice University, so I'm looking forward to discovering the new (to me, anyway!) space tomorrow, and to collaborating with two local choirs tomorrow as part of the concert programme.I have a certain (and slightly curious) fondness for Texas. Firstly, I celebrated my 21st birthday in Austin TX when I was on tour with St John's College Choir, Cambridge, back in 2011, and we had the most amazing time for a whole variety of reasons... not least because all our American hosts from UT seemed to be as excited (if not more!) as(/than) me about it being my milestone birthday! All a bit of a haze now, of course... Second, I have two sets of different musician friends who live here and it is always a joy to see them when we're in town, meet up and of course invite them to our concert. My links with them are through music, in particular to happy times I have spent in NYC and to the period of my life when I was giving opera-singing a go and working in Aix-en-Provence (south of France), so there's a lovely feeling of positive nostalgia that I encounter when visiting Houston... even though the feelings don't necessarily correspond directly with the city itself. Hence, a somewhat curious fondness.I'm very glad to see that any damage from the Houston mass-floods that were all over the news a few months ago seem to have been cleared up swiftly and successfully. Makes me appreciate being all the way up on the 20th floor in tonight's downtown hotel room!
