Assiniboine Pavilion

Cernauskas, Pan Pipes

This wintry scene evokes some of my earliest memories as a child, although I remember it at night, with the muffled sounds of fellow skaters lazily looping figure-eights, laughing and chatting to keep warm on the twin ponds nestled down the hill on the far side of this pavilion, the icy luge-run from earlier in the afternoon now lost in the shadows and silhouettes of the vast, limitless Assiniboine Forest.

Flash forward to a taxi pick-up in mid-June, the penetrating warmth of late-afternoon sunshine having the effect of a battery charger on me after an enjoyable last day of examining at Winnipeg’s historic and vibrant Canadian Mennonite University. Just minutes down the road, in mid-conversation with the guy behind the wheel (quickly we had established a rapport that consisted largely of his teasing me relentlessly about my being from Toronto!) and the distinctive profile of the Assiniboine Tower and Pavilion caught my eye. I asked the taxi driver to pull in for a sec while I dashed in.

Ted (not his real name!) at security offered me a suspenseful moment of silence when I explained what it was I was wanting to do - to be given permission to ascend to the top of the tower to record some flute-playing and somehow save the world with my blog - before saying, to my surprise and delight: “Sure, let’s go!” and he was immediately on his feet, closing up his security kiosk. We ascended upwards, stepping over red velvet barriers one landing after another. He even operated the ‘record’ button from the level below while I played in the uppermost chamber of this historic tower!

This evocative piece, ‘Pan Pipes’ by Canadian Composer Kathryn Cernauskas seemed perfect for the occasion, after having had the opportunity and pleasure of hearing it played by a young candidate for her exam earlier in the day. The setting could not have been more quintessentially Canadian, or, given my own childhood memories, central to my own personal universe.