Isabel Sanders – Houghton STAR

The first time I made bread, it turned out like a rock. I asked my mom what had happened. You killed the yeast, she told me. If you want to make bread, know this before anything: don’t add boiling water to the yeast. If the recipe says warm water, then that does not mean boil water and let it cool for a few minutes before using it. My sister does that, but I’m wary. I turn the hot water faucet on as hot as it will go.

There are basically two kinds of breads: quick breads and yeast breads. Quick breads include things like banana bread. Yeast breads take much longer to bake, roughly two hours give or take for the whole process, and include your typical sandwich breads. You can make an enormous variety of breads. I used to make bread every Sunday morning last year when I lived in a townhouse. I started with basic wheat bread: water, yeast, butter, a little brown sugar, wheat and white flour. Then I branched off into other wheat bread recipes. Then oatmeal and rye. Finnish pulla.

After you realize that warm water does not mean boiling water, making bread is pretty simple, especially if you choose a standard recipe like the one outlined above. Things get more complicated if you branch off, but if you can buy ingredients and read a recipe, you’ll be fine. For example, rye flour and the caraway seeds make rye bread rye. Trying out new bread recipes might mean buying other kinds of flour, adding molasses, eggs, or even cocoa powder to your dough, or shaping the dough into braids or circles.

Baking bread usually occurs in this sequence: mix ingredients, knead dough for eight minutes, let dough rise in bowl for an hour, punch risen dough and form into loaves, let dough rise for half an hour, bake for thirty minutes. And the result? A slice of bread way heartier and tastier than the flimsy pieces you usually find in the grocery store. Kneading bread can also be therapeutic. Don’t have time to make bread? Try walking down to the co-op and buying some of theirs. Yum, I mean YUM.

Lastly I would advise future bread makers not to be afraid of failing. Even a semi-experienced bread maker like me still has the occasional rock loaf that didn’t rise. Just feed it to the birds and try again!

I admit I had my reservations about Friday night’s VOCES8 concert. Within my first two years at Houghton, I heard the famed Chanticleer sing sweet melodies from the Wesley Chapel stage and they set a high standard. So when I saw that a group called VOCES8 was coming to campus, I immediately and rudely thought, “What, so we couldn’t get Chanticleer?”

Trying to keep an open mind, I saw that they were from Britain. That is a redeeming quality; I like the Brits. I would spend another semester in London in a heartbeat. I like their characteristically dry sense of humor. I like their museums, their fish and chips, their countryside. They have a lot going for them—James Bond, Mr. Bean, corgis.

Arriving last Friday night at the chapel, I hoped VOCES8 would play up their “Britishness.” They did not disappoint on any level. The octet of singers, six men and two women, sang a program entitled, “British Invasion Mixed.” They had not even sung any notes yet, and I was already halfway to being won over by their program title. Looking across the page at the list of singers, I saw British last names like Dickins, Wardle, and Dressel and first names like Barnaby and, yes, Dingle.

But all British love aside, these eight people knew how to sing. And sing practically anything. This program was the most diverse I had heard in a long time. Their repertoire spanned a timeline of roughly five hundred years. They sang Renaissance pieces by Byrd and Praetorius, jazz songs by Nat ‘King’ Cole, a gospel piece, “Go Down Moses,” and a wide assortment of popular music, including songs by Mumford & Sons, Simon and Garfunkel, and The Beatles. And the genres were not all clumped together, either. One minute I was listening to Renaissance and the next, jazz.

Instead of creating a jarring affect, the switching back and forth between styles kept the overall tone of the performance fun and light. Of their varied format, Sally Murphy said she “was pleasantly surprised by their playful willingness to branch out into different genres.” They were not afraid to spice things up a little either with some funny choreography, like in the James Bond tribute, “Nobody Does it Better,” or the ending number, “Slap that Bass.”

Most of the members of VOCES8 would periodically come to the mic and say a few words about the next selection. One such member included the aforementioned Dingle. I think if I ask people who went to the concert in several months’ time what they remembered most about the program, they would mention Dingle, and not just because of his unusual name.

As the tallest member of the group, with dark-rimmed glasses and well-poofed hair, Dingle immediately captured the audience’s attention. His string bass impersonations kept the jazz pieces alive, while his fragmented, witty speeches into the mic kept the audience chuckling. Not to mention how everyone swooned at his beautifully resonant solo during the opera medley encore. Oh, and do not forget his drunk play acting during said encore as well.

But not only Dingle enchanted me. All the singers kept me invested in their performance with the overall atmosphere they created. This concert was about enjoying and appreciating a wide range of music, all the while having a fun and relaxing evening.

While there are not any more Distinguished Artist concerts this year, there will be some next year, and I encourage all Houghton students to attend. They are free! Non-students have to pay fifteen dollars. But the free part is just a bonus. These concerts provide students with a professional-level performance right here on campus. It is fun to get a little dressed up and hear some good music. And if there is another “British Invasion” at some point, you would not want to miss it.