University challenge

The first London Bulgarian Choir concert of the year is in Cambridge. We’re guests of St Catharine’s College, aka Catz. It’s a great excuse for me and my cousin Veronica, a fellow singer, to bunk off and hit the town early to submerge ourselves in collegiate culture before we’re due at the chapel for the pre-concert run-through.

Catz call

Kettle’s Yard is our first stop, the home of Jim and Helen Ede. Jim had been a curator at the Tate Gallery in the 1920s and 1930s, befriending the likes of Henry Moore and Ben Nicholson and acquiring works by his mates and other artists. The Edes moved to Cambridge in 1956 and transformed four cottages into Kettle’s Yard, as Jim said at the time, ‘a place where people would find a home and a welcome, a refuge of peace and order, of the visual arts and music… in which stray objects, stones glass, pictures, sculpture are arranged in light and space’. The couple later donated the place to the University of Cambridge, and it has been left as it was, the centre of a programme of music and exhibitions. 

The Edes’ home for cherished art and furnishings 

There’s an overwhelming sense of peace and calm, and, walking around, I want to copy every exquisite little detail in my own home. Round grey stones arranged in swirls, awkward alcoves turned into intimate dining spaces, coloured glass pieces catching the setting sun. Sculptures are perfectly positioned and paintings hang in beautiful groups, a Miro here, a Moore there. People are scattered about the place reading art books and catalogues. 

No stone left unturned

Crystal palace

Casually placed canvas

We drag ourselves away to take a look at an exhibition in the adjoining gallery. It turns out to be equally contemplative, on the landscape artist and poet Ian Hamilton Finlay. He and his wife designed a garden in front of their home in the Scottish Borders, placing sculptures and stones carved with poems among the plants and trees. They called it Little Sparta and the show features images and a film of the garden.

Stone work by Finlay

Next, we move on to Peterhouse, my father Eric’s old college. He was a fellow there in the late 1940s to early 1950s, and honed his rock climbing skills on the perimeter walls when he failed to make it back before the gate was locked.

Peterhouse sunset

I stop for a Chelsea bun at Dad’s favourite café, Fitzbillies, just along the road. This place is a Cambridge institution and, as such, was stuffed to the gills with trippers and tourists.

Daddy cool

The concert is an atmospheric one. There are dozens of music students in the audience, which is a little daunting for us, but everyone seems transported. Little do they know that we haven’t sung together since Christmas, as our leader has been on maternity leave. Luckily we’re the only ones aware of the bum notes and at the drinks after the concert, people approach us with faces alive and eyes shining. I think we got away with it…