Author Archives: Erin

I recently re-discovered this picture from early this year: Sarah, Renee, and I went to see a Hildegard Von Bingen concert at the National Cathedral, which also featured several female composers. We even got a chance to ask Susan Botti, one of the composers, a question at a Q & A, where she talked aboutContinue reading “Ruth Oratorio: Meet the Team”

This post is an announcement I have dreamed of making for three years. I’ve spent hours at my desk with a score and a pencil, with a vision that seemed so distant, and all of a sudden the notes on the score have voices, and the vision has a venue, a date, and a time.Continue reading “The Renaissance of “Ruth””

“Are you coming to the UK on holiday or business?” Asked the border patrol guy. “I’m taking a class.” I said. “In?” My jet-lagged brain scrambled, In? In what? What’s a class? I don’t know–don’t be mad at me! “Here!” I said and handed him the letter of acceptance from Oxford, because apparently choral composingContinue reading “Same Spires New Studies”

I wrote a guest post on the Romanian Christian Enterprises blog, on the topic of the power and grace to be found when women one another. Check it out here! Since my visit there in 2014, the organization has been one close to my heart. While they primarily focus on rescuing and providing homes andContinue reading “Guest Post: RCE Blog”

I was sitting in a staff Christmas party when the news of Sandy Hook broke in the form of a text. I immediately took to Twitter and then CNN, and slowly the laughter and raucous banter of a faculty newly released into winter break faded into a surreal backdrop. Hands shaking, I glanced down theContinue reading “The Vase in my Podium”

This weekend a friend mentioned to me a song she had heard about from her grandmother, describing life in World War II for the women back home and the corresponding dearth of men. We immediately did some eager Google searching, not because a dearth of men is relatable in any way but because, you know,Continue reading “All the Single Ladies, Circa 1940”

Sunday October 22 was Reid’s birthday. The day of, I went to my parent’s house, and we celebrated with a nice meal and a little fall farm outing. The day before, though, I was out of sorts. Some years it hits me more than others. I turned to the one of the most significant avenuesContinue reading “Eventide”

Grief is super weird. And so is the month of October, at least for me. On the one hand, the incredibly basic autumn-loving pumpkin-everything-consuming side of me has always been in love with the weather and the overall aesthetic. October is my late brother’s birthday month, which is always a strange mix of wistful andContinue reading “The 5 Weirdest Things I Associate with Grieving the Death of my Brother”

I was in college when I first began to hear about academic medieval conferences. My medieval studies professor would sometimes disappear to present a paper, and then return with tales like how apparently Terry Jones (yes of Monty Python fame, but also medieval scholar) could drink them all under the table. It’s been ten yearsContinue reading “Hanging with the Big Kids”

Right now this picture is a decent representation of my life: She is probably lesson planning and recording grades rather than writing because summer is over, but the medieval part is also appropriate because the 10th grade Humanities has now crossed into the [other] most wonderful time of the year: The Medieval Unit. Literature, language,Continue reading “Here’s Hildegard”