By: Abeera Shahid

The Hamilton Philharmonic Orchestra has been bringing orchestral music to the city since its humble beginnings in the late eighteenth century. As it approaches key milestones, the HPO is collaborating with McMaster’s history department to discover its legacy through the eyes of its community.

Carol Kehoe, the former executive director, started the HPO Legacy Project because at the heart of HPO’s success lies individuals who have tirelessly advocated for its existence.

Their stories are missing from the musical records, and the project seeks to rediscover their experiences and contributions to the orchestra.

The five-year project is in its infancy and will culminate in 2019 to celebrate the 70th anniversary of the HPO’s designation as a semi-professional ensemble.

In addition to a permanent archive of the oral history, the final product may include a commemorative book, short videos and events.

Edin Duranovic, an Honours History and Political Science student, was part of the first of nine cohorts from McMaster to participate in the HPO Legacy Project through a historical practicum course last semester.

His cohort captured oral history through interviews with 15 community members.

Future students will be digging through Hamilton’s archives for further insight on the earliest members of the orchestra.

As a student unaware of the HPO’s presence before the project, Duranovic now fondly shares the conversations he had with community members about their involvement with the orchestra. One such experience was with Glen Malorey, the force behind children’s programming.

“He said that everything he wanted to do in his life, he was able to. His main passion was to teach children the wonders of concert music, and he got to spend 50 years of his life doing that by being the conductor of the youth orchestra. Glenn represents what it means to give back to the community without expecting anything in return,” explained Duranovic.

He even met musicians like Darcy Hepner, who started his journey playing cello with the youth orchestra, then switched to the flute while attending McMaster in 1975, but his true passion lies with the saxophone and jazz music.

Hepner then spent 30 years playing in cities including Miami, Boston and New York. He returned to Hamilton in 2005 and came full circle by performing with his jazz band at the HPO in 2011.

Hepner’s musical journey is intimately connected to his experiences in Hamilton and he even remembers some amusing times with the orchestra.

“I was a shy guy who sat in the back, impressed by all the musicians that surrounded me [and] when I was principal cellist, we were supposed to show up to a concert in black and white, but because it was the 70s, I wore platform heels. About 6 inches high... People in the audience told me how they couldn’t take their eyes off my shoes,” said Hepner.

Duranovic was inspired by the stories he heard because of his own love for playing music, adding that since working on the HPO Legacy Project, he has been inspired to try playing the double bass.

Diana Weir, the new executive director and an alumna of McMaster strives to continue the narratives being showcased through the HPO Legacy Project by fostering new collaborations with the community. Most notably, the HPO has partnered with local indie bands to reimagine orchestral music.

Electronic rock band Illitry was one of the first music groups they experimented with, where the HPO’s composer and musicians worked with band members over the span of a few months. They rearranged the band’s music, brought in orchestral elements, and created a unique cross-genre set.

Tory Witherow, the lead singer of Illitry began to see his own music differently.

“It opened my eyes a little bit to the music I write and normally listen to, maybe the music that I am coming up with isn’t as interesting as it could be,” said Witherow.

The HPO’s willingness to evolve and engage with people has created their place as an anchor arts organization in Hamilton.

The HPO recognizes that orchestral music has different meaning for each individual.

For some it is associated with the orchestra coming to their school when they were young, while for others they are proud that their community supports musicians.

“I really believe in the power of [an] orchestra’s music and its power to touch a person’s life [and] to offer solace in a hectic lifestyle. It [has] power to make people see the world in a different way and to offer a sense of belonging for people,” said Weir.

The hope of the project is to assure that the efforts of everyone involved will not go forgotten.

HPO’s exploration of the past showcases how they want to recognize and value the individuals whose contributions allow the orchestra to continue to touch the lives of Hamiltonians.

My dad chilling with the White Lady, circa 1965.

It’s hard to imagine a time at McMaster when there was no hospital on Main Street; when undergraduates were counted in the hundreds, rather than the thousands; when there were a mere four buildings populating campus.

It’s both a humorous and humbling adventure exploring archival articles and photographs from back in the day, and has become a frequent pastime of Sil staff. So much has changed (or not changed) over the course of McMaster’s history, for better and for worse. This week, we wanted to share a piece of that history in the form of featuring throwback content in every section.

Perhaps most striking about these recycled pieces is how timeless they are in their continued relevance to student life, government policy and Hamilton culture. Behind the yellowed newsprint and antiquated language are opinions, issues and thoughts that still matter and deserve a second run of publication.

Such nostalgia is a powerful conversation starter. Personal connections and forgotten stories often find their way into the present when we spend a moment wondering about the past. If we hadn’t published last week about the vandalized White Lady statue – who she is and where she came from – I would never know that once upon a time, a toddler-father of mine once sat in her arms in a blue jumper (and that there’s photographic evidence, as pictured, to prove it).

It’s easy for memories like that to get lost in the passage of time, especially on a campus where student – and student government – turnover happens at an accelerated rate. What is particularly disheartening is when those fighting the good fight on any variety of issues don’t have long enough to accomplish their goals in such a short time here, and when the progress they started is forgotten shortly after their convocation date. Their concerns and campaigns are often reincarnated a brief time later – but only once the momentum has died and the advocates, representatives and leaders don’t have the context or history to pick up where others left off. They’re back to square one.

That’s why concerns that were raised 30 years ago about (and by) the SRA are echoed today, the same old opinions get written every year, clubs have continuity issues and statues remain – years later – sadly graffitied, former glory all but forgotten.

This is how it has always been, but not how it needs to be. Sometimes, it isn’t until we take a moment to look back that we can know more clearly how we want to move forwards.

Look around.

To your left, the blinding fluorescence of multi-coloured coveralls shimmers. Just to the right of that, a mob of incessant cheering has broken out and will most likely ring on for about an hour or so. Right in front of you, people are probably parading around to the cackling of talent-bereft pop monstrosities, who, through relentlessly roaring radios, shriek on and on about a morally bankrupt society. Don’t be alarmed. Don’t be afraid. This is your welcome. This is your University.

After two years, your University – while still entirely new to you – has become my home. It didn’t start out that way, though. I came as you did, or perhaps more truthfully, even less than that.

Jump back a few years, and you’ll find me packaged in a pair of mustard-stained underwear. It was a slip of the mind, a mistake of nerves, anxiety and general uncleanliness. I was scared out of my pants (and clean tighty-whities) of the prospect of entering a foreign environment. McMaster was big and I was small and I wondered if I would really matter at all.

Yet in time, things changed and I was able to call McMaster my home. To this day, whether by sheer loyalty or my own volition, McMaster still is. It isn’t the University itself that conjures this feeling, however. Nor is it the community or unwavering kinship that I have developed over the years.

Instead, it is both the first warm smile I received and my first bitter disappointment. It is that day on a piano singing with strangers. It is finding a way onto the roof of Hamilton Hall only to wonder how anyone could get down. It is the best night that will never be remembered and another night that I only wish I could forget. It is that time looking up at the stars reading Kurt Vonnegut aloud. It is cramming before an exam. It is a laugh, a kiss, a conversation, a feeling, a thought, a hug, a cry, a test, a workout, a game, a secret, a dance, a drink, a car ride. It is an entire two years sandwiched into an article.

For what my home is and always will be is a single moment that is built upon brick by brick, memory by memory – just like a house would be. During both the good and bad times, it serves as a place for comfort and reflection. It reminds me of where I was and where I am going. Friends, family, and people that I will never have the chance to meet, people that I will never be able to talk to – all of them fit into that house, that shelter. My shelter.

My home.

Yet it is not mine alone. It will be yours, just as much as it is mine. It also belongs to the person who just passed you by. And the professor who is lecturing you. And the custodial staff who are working tirelessly. It is all of ours together.

This is because these moments, however fickle they may be, are the aggregate of 125 years. Arising from a Christian education centre in 1881, McMaster was founded as a Baptist seminary. In 1890, the first degree programs were offered. 1892 brimmed with zany sport cheers like “Boom on Star”. 1894 saw the first students graduate. 1902, and the school colours were chosen. Then, in 1930, McMaster found its home. Hamilton.

This is but a brief snippet of various instances that comprise McMaster’s history. It, however, barely scratches the surface. There were numerous accomplishments in education and research. There were times of uncertainty and hardship. There were harrowing accounts of students being drafted into the Great Wars proud but never returning.

Without all of these – a hundred unrecognizable faces and names, the sum of people before and after me, a collective spirit of students that yearned for knowledge and social interaction, all the alumni, all the professors, all the staff, all the people who walked where I walked, did what I did, and felt what I felt – my moments, my home, and everything else I value in this place, would not exist.

Perhaps that’s a tad dramatic. It is often said that while all atoms exist, not all are important. Maybe that’s true. Maybe we are truly inconsequential in the scheme of things. Maybe no one will remember me five years from now. Maybe this very sentence will fade into obscurity.

But understand that while we have probably never met and it is likely that we never will, I have been where you have been, and no matter what has happened here at McMaster, whether it be happiness or sadness, frustration or serenity, I keep coming back and back and back again.

For this place is what you make of it, and what you make is this place.