KE Ireland Tour

We've returned from Ireland with great success! We had an awesome time, but are happy to be back all the same.

Check back for some photos.

Ireland Blogs

The KE Ireland tour is over!!

Hey Everyone!

As you may or may not know, the Elements are just coming off of an amazing tour to Ireland. We spent ten days touring the most famous Irish cities, seeing the sights and singing our little hearts out. Despite sketchy Internet reception for most of the second half of the trip, we did keep blogs so that we could share our trip with everyone when we got back. (Sorry for not writing during the trip, but I guess the pubs got the best of us...)

Overall, this trip was an amazing experience, and we all really enjoyed ourselves. After seeing the way that the group got along, and hearing how fabulous we sounded together in performances, I know that BTE (Brave The Elements, our annual spring concert), is going to be an incredible success this year! So, without further ado, here are our blogs... and be sure to consult Facebook and our website soon for all of the awesome pics!

I arrived in Galway one day before the group arrived, so I was able to settle in and explore the town. Galway is a small, quaint Irish city with a lot of charm. Our hotel - Flannery's Best Western - was a fun walk into the town. When the Key Elements got into town on the 3rd of January, we hit the town and went exploring. After several people exercised their novel ability to drink a pint of Guinness (or Beamish or Murphy's), we found our way to the beautiful St. Nicholas's church in the town centre. We played a scavenger hunt with the old church relics and then circled up to sing "House of the Rising Sun" with the help of amazing church acoustics! In the evening we all enjoyed some relaxation in the local pubs and were thankful for such a smooth and pleasant first day of tour.

The next morning we awoke and ate a full Irish breakfast including bacon, eggs, beans, and blood sausage. We explored the town and some of us visited an old stone church in the northern part of town for Sunday mass. Upon our return to Flannery's Best Western, we ran into some problems with the management. Our tour manager Lauren displayed impressive amounts of intelligence and integrity with handling the crass, discourteous manager of the hotel. We decided to leave and check into a hostel down the road called Snoozles, which was very accommodating. We checked in and had a long rehearsal. Once again, we went out that evening and met a lot of friendly Irish locals who showed us just how to have a good time in Galway!

Posted by Aaron, Class of '08, Bass

While in Ireland we spent a fantastic two days in Cork City, surrounded in history and culture. After quickly checking into our hotel, we took a historical tour of Cork led by our tour guide, John. John said that Cork is one of the oldest communities in Ireland. Cork started as a Celtic community but due to its strategic location was taken by the Danes and Normans and British respectively. The city began as many islands in a swampy region where boats could actually navigate through the city streets. Eventually, the city was walled by the Normans, and later drained in the 1700's to make the island on which the heart of the city currently resides. During the British occupation, the city of Cork was a hot bed of Irish rebellion activity, and the British fort built to defend the city still stands today.

The second day in Cork was spent in Blarney and at the Blarney Castle, as well as a Pepsi plant in a nearby town. The Blarney Castle is an astonishing sight that is not easily forgotten. The castle grounds were originally a hunting lodge for the old Irish Kings but in the 1400's it was converted into the massive castle that still stands today. Today, the castle is an impressive ruin that contains at its highest peak, half of the infamous Blarney stone. The Blarney stone is said to have been brought to Scotland from Jerusalem during the crusades. In Scotland the stone was rumored to have supernatural powers and in order to protect the stone it was split. Half remained in Scotland, and half was sent to the strongest and most defensible castle in the British Isles, Blarney Castle. If you kiss the Blarney stone you are given the gift of eloquence; this legend originates from Lord Blarney himself. Lord Blarney used his skill of words to flatter the English Queen while avoiding giving her what she really wanted, and this is why the stone contains the gift of quick wit and fast talking. While at Blarney Castle we sang in what was originally the banquet hall of the castle. It was an amazing experience to sing at such a historic sight, and it was obvious that the visitors of the castle enjoyed our performance. While in Blarney we also visited the Blarney wool mill, which has been spinning wool since 1901. Wool is an Irish product that has been produced for centuries, and no trip to the emerald Isle is complete without at least one woolen garment.

After visiting Blarney we toured a Pepsi plant that was twenty minutes outside of Cork. This was an interesting tour because here at this plant, Pepsi mixes their secret ingredients to make the solution that creates Pepsi. This visit was particularly interesting to me as an ILR student because I was able to ask questions about the Irish labor system and what the relationship was like in the plant. The rest of the day was spent exploring the city of Cork and absorbing the Irish culture. Cork is a city rich with history and culture and certainly holds its title as the jewel of southern Ireland.

Posted by Mark, Class of '10, Tenor

We spent less than 24 hours in Waterford, but a lot was accomplished. Our hotel sat neat the water which housed numerous swans. These swans were beautiful and looked so elegant sitting in the calm water. This setting was very different from the busy city aspect of Cork, where we had just traveled from.

After arriving in the late morning, we got ready for our performance at the Waterford Crystal Factory. At the factory, the group was given a private tour that showed the various steps taken to make a Waterford Crystal finished product. One of the most interesting parts of the tour was learning that the craftsmen begin their training at the factory at just 15 years of age and work for years to become specialists at creating the crystal.

After our tour, The Key Elements performed in the Waterford factory showroom. The employees were greatly impressed, not only by our musical talent, but by how well we presented ourselves and represented Cornell University. At the end of the performance the group was given a beautiful crystal vase as a gift for performing. The factory head spoke to us about how impressive our performance and demeanor were, and then told us a little bit about the current state of the company. Unfortunately, the Waterford Crystal Company is struggling financially right now, and is in need of investors. However, despite this problem, they remain positive, and were incredibly friendly and welcoming to us,making our visit very enjoyable. While the visit to Waterford was short, I learned a lot at the factory and was able to take great pride in the group for our performance.

Posted by Samara, Class of '11, Alto

Our bus from Waterford left sometime around half-six, so still mostly asleep we left our hotel in the early morning darkness and boarded the bus to Dublin. It was unquestionable that the whole group was eager to get to Dublin, and upon our arrival at the bus station around half-ten, at least I sensed a lively buzz, an integral energy around me. Our cabs took us to the Avalon House, the hostel at which we were staying, and performing that night. It was exciting to see our posters hung up on the walls, advertising the concert, and after checking in we stored our things because the room was not ready yet, and headed out into the city.

After lunch we split up into smaller groups and went off to shop, explore and sight-see on our own - our stay in Dublin was much less structured than in other cities, and days were spent finding our own entertainment. Samara, Chrissy, Lauren and I decided to wander through town and do some shopping, strolled through an outdoor market and then stopped into a consignment shop. Necessarily, we tried on all the absurd dresses and took pictures.

When Lauren left us, Chrissy, Samara and I wandered over to Trinity College. We immediately felt at home on the campus and simply loved the atmosphere. Standing in the center of what I supposed to be their academic quad, we identified each building's Cornell look-alike - there was even an equivalent of an Ezra Cornell and Andrew White statue.

Dublin, overall, is a very globalized city with many American and European companies and many European-run businesses. I felt as though I saw more foreigners on the streets than I did Irish, which made me feel as though I wasn't even in Ireland. While to some extent this seems to be a trend in many of the places we've been, it is clearly the history and architecture that defines each city as distinctly Irish, rather than the ethnic demographics.

Our first evening in Dublin we had our second "official" gig of the trip in the café of the Avalon House. The overall consensus from the group was that it went really well and it was one of the most fun performances we've ever done. The audience seemed to really enjoy it as well, which definitely helped to make it better. I must be honest, it is VERY nice to perform for people who are not completely sick of a cappella music as students at Cornell are! The people who work at the café offered us nothing but compliments and were so friendly to us for the remainder of our stay. Our set was nine songs long and included a mixture of some of our KE favorites, as well as some Irish Traditionals and Euro-pop that we learned specifically for the trip. Although our set was long, it went by so quickly and by the time it was over, we all wanted to sing more.

Our special guest at this performance was Eoghan, our official Ireland contact who is both a Cornell Law and Glee Club alum, and who helped us out a lot with this trip (thanks again Eoghan!). We were glad to have him and his cousin Tom with us on the Musical Pub Crawl that we took, following our performance. A pub crawl is an event that lasts about 2 or 2.5 hours where someone takes a group around to several pubs and tells the history of the pubs, as well as cultural stories. The Musical pub crawl was led by two people who played Irish Traditional and contemporary music. To our surprise we were asked to perform at the end of the night for the "open mic" portion of the evening. The crowd was really receptive and we had a really good time performing for them. We also made friends on this pub crawl, one of whom came out with us afterwards, and the others, members of the US Army, came to our concert at St. Ann's the next day.

I think, more than anything, these experiences with people have been the most valuable over the course of this trip. Every time we go out I try to talk to someone new. As someone who desires greatly to assimilate to the local culture of wherever I go, I love to learn about the people's backgrounds and their world-views. It really gives you a wider perspective on the societies among which we live.

Our second day in Dublin started late. Apparently we were supposed to check out of Avalon House at 10, but no one had told us this so at half-ten, the cleaning woman came in and asked us if we were leaving. Many, including myself, were still asleep. Our room at Avalon house was fantastic. It was two stories and fit all of us comfortably. The beds were comfortable and clean, and living so tightly in one big room together with everyone was a great bonding experience.

We were out of our room and dressed in concert attire within about an hour and a half, then headed over to St Ann's Church, the location of our final concert. The church was beautiful – the architecture unique and tasteful, elegant stained glass windows and an intricate altar. Our audience was about ten people – our American friends, who I previously mentioned, Amanda Guise, a Cornell alum living in Germany, and several Irish people. The sound was incredible in the church – so echoey that when singing eighth notes you would hear the on-beat echoing back to you as you sang the offbeat. Our sound had been tighter in the café, but singing in that church was a wonderful experience and opportunity, and it was really great that we actually had an audience. The rest of the evening we spent searching for food and moseying around the city before we caught our evening bus to Belfast.

We returned to Dublin 2 days later after our stay in Belfast for our final evening and our morning tour of the Guinness factory. As it was a Sunday night, most pubs closed around eleven, so some opted for a quiet evening at the hostel. Others of us wandered the city in the rain searching for a pub that would take us in.

The Guinness tour the next morning was really interesting – we learned a lot about the process of making and the history of Guinness. A few people pulled their own pints while the rest waited to enjoy theirs in the sky lounge, seven stories over Dublin. We only had a few hours left in the city so we split up and some went to eat while others went to look at Christ Church, St Patrick's Cathedral and Dublin Castle. The Christ Church crypt is the oldest standing structure in Dublin, and it certainly smells that way as well! It's unbelievable to me that the church's entire structure is supported by the columns in the crypt. There were several dozen chalices on display as well as monuments and even the bodies of a cat and rat, found mummified in the organ pipes centuries ago, which interestingly, served as an inspiration to James Joyce. St Patrick's Cathedral, as well, was beautiful and so big inside it was overwhelming.

Overall, our experience in Dublin was great and will not be soon forgotten– the city is rich with history, personality and diversity.

Posted by Tia, Class of '11, Alto

We took a break from the busyness of Dublin-town and bussed it on over to Belfast in the North. We arrived in the evening and immediately unpacked our bags into the shoebox-sized room they allocated to the 14 of us. Soon after we were settled, Jared, Alex, and I conducted a mini pub crawl while the others explored the hostel. The three of us discovered some great venues with new beers and cheap hors d'eouvres for our eating and drinking pleasure. I also met a Scotsman who ran the NYC marathon in the 70s... whodathunkit?

Our main activity for our first full day was a trip to the Giant's Causeway, which is a main attraction for anyone travelling near Belfast. It consists of thousands of interlocking volcanic rock columns jutting out into the sea on the northern coast of the country -- and it's quite a walk from start to finish! Aaron and I completed the trek in about two hours; a hot Irish stew and a cold Harp Ale were awaiting us at base camp.

Since we had no singing to do that night, we decided to enjoy some of the finer pleasures that Belfast had to offer. While in the liquor store, we encountered a group of locals who opened our eyes to some very significant cultural norms that exist in this part of Europe. A man approached us in the store (which also happened to be a pub), told us Americans were not welcome here, and emphatically asked us to leave. The men also brought up topics of anti-semitism and the American involvement in the Israeli-Palestine conflict. We never felt like were in any sort of danger -- the experience was just a side-effect of travelling to places outside the States.

The next day was another day of shameless tourism, which involved a double-decker bus and a wise-cracking Irish tour guide. We made several stops on our bus tour: a few historical buildings in Belfast, the shipyard where the Titanic was built, the Northern Ireland Parliament building, and some famous Irish murals panted on walls and the sides of buildings. These murals were of particular interest; they depicted many political and historical themes of the area. Some illustrated Irish folklore, some depicted eighteenth and nineteenth century rebellion heroes, some murals honored men who fought died during "The Troubles" of the twentieth century, and some murals blatantly criticized George W. Bush and his foreign policy. This last theme was reminiscent of my experience the night before at the pub -- are we really this unpopular in other parts of the world?

After all the excitement, we hopped on a bus to take us back to Dublin for our last nights in Ireland.

Posted by Matt, Class of '09, Tenor

...And that's all the news that's fit to print. Now, I'm off to a semester abroad in Denmark, so, tragically, I won't be singing at BTE. But, I know you'll have a wonderful time, and I can't wait to hear all about it!

Much love from KE's ever-devoted Ireland Tour Manager,