Opening doors and watching musicians our age

inside St. Nicholas' church

Before leaving on the trip Dr. Powell told us that he suggests, and even encourages us to try opening doors. He said to open every unlocked door we find, because he said that some of the neatest things he’s found while traveling have been found behind closed doors. So for the past two weeks we’ve been trying to open nearly every door we pass (that isn’t on a house or residential building). From doors in churches, to doors in castles, to doors in museums, to doors in church spires, we’ve tried them all and have found them locked every time, until a few days ago. In Leipzig we finally found three that were unlocked.

On the morning of our first full day in Leipzig we went on a walking tour of the city which ended at St. Nicholas’ church. We all went inside the church and after stopping to stare at the beautiful interior of the church we looked around us and to our pleasure found that this church had

The view of the street across from our hostel

a lot of doors in it. We went into a small room off to the side of the front of the church and tried all of the doors in the room, and were thrilled when three of them opened. However, we were once again disappointed when we realized that one of the doors let to a closet size room with only a furnace or heater of some sort in it, and the other two lead to empty closets. Determined to find a door that leads to something worth seeing we went out of the small room and walked around the entire church, trying every door. Each one was locked. We finally gave up and left the church, feeling a bit defeated. However, we were also happy that we finally found a few doors that opened, even if what we found them wasn’t as exciting as we had hoped. We are hopeful that in the two remaining weeks we will find an unlocked door that will have been worth opening.

Program and ticket for the consevatory concert

While in Leipzig we attended a concert at the Hochschule fur Musik and Theater, a conservatory in the city. Out of all the concerts that we have seen thus far I think that this one was the one that I found the most inspiring and influential. All of the performances and concerts that we have seen have been absolutely incredible, and the level of musicianship and artistry that we have had the privilege of seeing has been incomprehensible, however, the concert at the conservatory was different because for the first time we weren’t watching only professional musicians and conductors. We were watching students, some of whom were around the same age we are. Seeing students our age perform at such a high level makes you realize that age what people our age are capable of. We grow up reading about and watching videos of people our age perform at high levels like these students, but being able to see it live makes it seem more real. Most likely none of us will become as talented as the students in the orchestra and choir that we saw were, but we can still use them as an inspiration to keep working and to be as ambitious as we can be. 

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