This week, I had a great time interviewing Lloyd Van’t Hoff and listening to his story as an Australian clarinetist and a Master’s Student in the School of Music at Yale.
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Lloyd was born in Darwin, Australia and lived in a remote place called Charters Towers throughout much of his life, where he started learning music and became a musician. He went to Brisbane for undergraduate study and moved to Melbourne to work professionally in the music industry. It was not until the pandemic happened and affected many artists that Lloyd started to reflect on if he was happy with the career trajectory he was on. He then realized that he wanted to study abroad and look for new opportunities. The diversity and richness in the Master of Music program at Yale were really attractive to him, so he applied and got accepted, moved to the US and has had an inspiring year at Yale so far.
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At Yale, Lloyd’s life includes taking classes on music, playing orchestral and chamber music, and weekly meetings with his principal teacher. It is amazing for Lloyd to have the opportunity to be in contact with many big figures in the music industry that Yale’s platform brings, whom Lloyd also finds are the most humble and open, which keeps Lloyd motivated and hopeful in continuing his professional journey. Yale opens a lot of doors and gives many new ideas to Lloyd, and he is interested in the dissection of music and community/regional area education. He would love to keep doing research and use the tool of music to help create a better future for people coming from similar backgrounds as him.
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We had a very interesting conversation on Vegemite, a classic Australian food spread made from leftover brewers’ yeast extract. I have seen people outside of Australia mistake this spread with Nutella and have hilarious reactions when they tried it the first time, so I had to ask Lloyd for some first-hand information. He told me that like coffee and alcohol, as time goes on, people build up their tolerance and are gradually able to enjoy it. Lloyd insists that finding the right butter to Vegemite ratio on toast is essential for growing a healthy love for the condiment.
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#humansofoiss
