May Morning

Tomos Watkins, Music Department, writes: 6.45am is not the time of day one usually associates with singing rude Elizabethan part-songs. Somehow, though, this was what we found ourselves doing on the morning of May 1st, following in the long Oxford tradition of celebrating the coming of Spring by standing atop a tall building in the freezing cold throwing baked goods at onlookers. Egged on by an enthusiastic crowd, a group of pupils and staff, aided by Mr Tester, welcomed in the supposed turning of the weather from the roof of Cowell’s with such hits as ‘Now is the Month of Maying’ and ‘Fair Phyllis’. The singers then turned to their doughy projectiles, doing their best to incapacitate those below with buns marked ‘E’ for St Edward. Sincere apologies must go to Mr MacPherson for the resulting cranial bruising. Oxford traditions (graduation ceremonies all in Latin, funny names for everything and the most prominent political figure a tour guide dressed as the Mad Hatter) rarely make much sense, but they’re often jolly good fun — here’s to another 500 years of this one!