Homecoming

22 October 2018
WRITTEN BY

Julian Scott

Musician

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I wasn’t sure what this tour diary was going to be about, so I decided to walk around Verona and just see what my consciousness let through.

It was a stunning day and my rehearsal schedule was non-arduous to say the least, so time was on my side. I walked to the river and took pictures of anything that caught my eye - a beautiful bridge, the amphitheatre, an old bike, a classic Fiat 500, a Piaggio Vespa, the remains of the city gate. Later on, drifting off to sleep in the park after a big lunch, I reflected on why those things caught my eye. They were all really old! That was it - I liked them mainly because they were old! I continued to reflect on old things in my life... I just moved into a Georgian flat in Edinburgh (a city well known for its historical buildings); I recently bought a VW T3 High-top camper van with my brother (OK... that’s not really old, but it was built before I was born - that’s sufficient oldness for me); I love Bach and have an affinity towards music much older than that; I just bought a Baroque oboe (albeit a modern replica); I loved Latin at school... the list goes on. So now I had my thread, my theme for the tour diary. I was eager to see what the next day would bring.

              

It didn’t disappoint. It did, however, take a while to get the ball rolling. In the morning I battled with intermittent Wifi (ironically I was trying to use the Wifi to write a scathing Google review about the bad Wifi... ). The constant traffic noise was driving me insane and I was annoyed that the hotel staff insisted in providing me with three new towels a day. Anyway, too far away from Verona to venture by foot into the city, I went for a walk in the countryside. I didn’t know where to go, but just left. What a good decision that was! From there on, everything fell nicely into place.

Having successfully navigated my way beyond the concrete jungle surrounding our hotel, I landed on a path. No cars, no noise, no new towels. It was just me, some fields, rolling hills and the occasional wine casa. The long dirt path led me into Il bosco della Fratta, as some old, weathered signs let on. Twenty minutes or so later the forest opened up onto an endless expanse of vineyard, and the path split. I thought of Robert Frost, ‘Two roads diverged in a yellow wood…and sorry I could not travel both…’ What was the rest? I made a mental note to check later, sure it was somehow significant.

Here it was peaceful and I felt at home. I stayed for a while, cautiously sampling some of the grapes, soaking up the sun and listening to the birds. At some point I noticed a shotgun cartridge on the floor and became suddenly aware that I might be ignorant of Italian trespassing laws. So I left, back through the forest.

Serendipity is a good friend and she has a tendency to evoke my inner nostalgia, to take me back in time. Going back to nature is, I believe, the ultimate example of this nostalgic regression. That is, regression free of atrophic associations, in its purer sense - quite simply that of ‘going back’.

Perhaps like many people, my two roads diverging in the wood have a lot to do with old and new. One way represents the advancements of the modern world, which so often comes into conflict with the other - our return to nature and times a gone. The world is fraught with this inner conflict and our obsession with progress has led to a state of destruction that is certainly not sustainable and unlikely fully revertible. Billions of people worldwide gather every year to sing Auld lang syne, an old Scottish folk melody (and probably our must successful export besides Whisky), celebrating the arrival of the New Year, but longing for the past. We all long in some way or another... to return. Enough ranting...

The end of this tour diary returns, however, to music. Just like my day in the forest, concerts often feel like a return to the past or a kind of homecoming. This particular one featured Bach, Mozart and Shostakovich, and was very beautiful indeed. I wasn’t sitting outside in nature, but here I also felt at home, lost in the realm of nostalgia.  :)


Photos: Julian Scott

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