On May 31^st 2023, Trent University held the official, grand opening ceremony for the long-awaited Jalynn Bennett Amphitheatre. Funded in part by a considerable donation from the Jalynn H. Bennett Foundation, with the provision that we, the students of Trent University “be bold,” the open-air amphitheatre is to be an arts and culture hub for downtown Peterborough. The project—which has for the past school year torn up much of the Catherine Parr Traill College campus, leaving students, faculty, and staff subject to detours to access Bagnani and Wallis Halls—was completed after nearly a year of construction earlier this month, with the ceremony marking the official unveiling of the outdoor venue space, as well as its first use for a performing arts event.

Perborough-born artist Mary-Kate Edwards played a piano set while attendees gathered, before Trent University Vice President of Communications and Enrolment Marilyn Burns took the stage to introduce the program, making special mention of Edwards’ EP, Blueberry Pie. Burns then proceeded to introduce Traill College Principal,  adjunct professor of Canadian Studies and History, and emcee of the matinee’s proceedings, Dr. Michael Eamon to the stage, who gave a few remarks about the history of Traill College and its location atop one of Nogojiwanong’s seven drumlins. Anyone having attended an event at Traill will no doubt be familiar with Dr. Eamon’s storytelling interests, and while Trent’s official land acknowledgement was not read, Eamon did make sure to highlight the first peoples’ use of the portage which wrapped around the Traill drumlin, long before centuries of colonial ravages warped our priorities to such a degree so as to care about something as admittedly trivial of the opening of an amphitheatre.

Yes, it’s nice to have an outdoor stage I’ll grant, especially one so proximal to the downtown and readily usable by students. However, let’s talk just for one second about the design of the structure. 

The newly-constructed amphitheatre consists of a sunken stage surrounded by a tiered, amorphous seating arrangement in a loose pseudo-semi-circular shape. That in itself is not a considerable issue, though as a veteran of a thoroughly hands-on high school drama production program, I will admit that I’d be none too eager to perform on a small, circular stage with no wings of which to speak. Further, some attendees confided to me they had concerns about accessibility. While the space is equipped with ramps, and access to Wallis Hall provides use of elevators, the tiered system certainly makes it difficult for those requiring mobility aids to access the middle sections of the venue.

Dr. Eamon also drew special attention to a fixture of particular note when discussing the amphitheatre’s various features—the inclusion of a VIP box. I mean no disrespect to the donor whose contributions generously aided the financial viability of this project, though I can’t help but feel odd about such an amendment to an outdoor, ostensibly-public venue. Money talks at Trent University, and when you’re in the thick of it amid the donors and bigwhigs, an undergrad like myself certainly feels out of her depth. While students were in attendance, the majority of them were Traill college employees, or else press such as myself and my colleague Sebastian Johnston-Lindsay. The box, at least in my admittedly theory-addled interpretation of it, presides figuratively over the rabble, implicity delineating a class division, however superficial. Something about carving up a space used predominantly by undergraduate students—not a particularly affluent demographic at the best of times—to be partitioned as a venue for the wealthy strikes me as somewhat contemptible, and if anything, irreconcilable with the stated aims of the collegiate system. 

What I take most issue with, class wars aside, however, is the frankly baffling decision to install Astroturf®—artificial grass—on each of the tiered seating areas. While I certainly get what the landscape architects were going for, let’s just say it’s giving more “Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater 2 stage” than it is “Simulacrum Hanging Gardens of Babylon.” Further, with Wednesday’s temperature an inhumane 31°C (really makes you think about them carbon emissions, don’t it), the plastic grass was, unsurprisingly, hot as all balls and thoroughly unpleasant to my sensitive hands. 

Many of the performers and speakers remarked upon this fact, with the midday sun positively beating down on the exposed stage. “It does indeed feel like Oklahoma here today,” Dr. Eamon remarked, before introducing indigenous acapella and drum group Unity, who performed “Southern Oklahoma Sunny Song” for those assembled.

Luckily, Traill College staff did provide complimentary sit-upons, which made us feel slightly less like hams in a Dutch oven, though when you’re obliged to give attendees something to shield their ass from synthetic convection grass, maybe you should’ve just picked a different building material to begin with.

After the performance, Eamon returned to the stage for a discussion of Traill’s history and the role of the collegiate system as the lifeblood on which Trent was founded. Eamon himself is an outspoken proponent of collegiate life, and an enthusiastic representative of Traill College in the community at large. Reflecting on the college’s historical role as an all-women’s college, and one intended to honour the legacies of pre-eminent settler women in the Humanities and the Sciences, he invited members of the 4^th Line Theatre Company to present an excerpt from a theatrical biography of Traill’s life.

After the performance, Dr. Eamon invited Ashburnham Ward City Councillor and Deputy Mayor of the City of Peterborough Gary Baldwin to offer remarks on behalf of the municipality, reminiscing about “[seeming] to recall all these funny looking people running around downtown and Traill wearing green robes,” which prompted a laugh from a number of the older Traillites.

Eamon then invited a current Traillite, classically-trained vocalist Anthoy Varahidis to perform a brief set, which featured covers of Chris Isaak’s “Wicked Game,” Bruce Cockburn’s “Lovers in a Dangerous Time,” and Jan Arden’s “Good Mother,” whom Varahidis chose “to honour and represent Canadian women.” 

Dr. Eamon then offered regrets on behalf of those unable to attend—including Peterborough—Kawartha MP Michelle Ferreri and Trent University President Leo Groarke (who was curiously able to attend the unveiling of a number of large metal pine cones on Symons campus the day before)—before handing the mic to Trent Chancellor and Trent University alum (though Eamon did remark that he was a Champlainer), Stephen Stohn. 

In his speech, Stohn fondly reminisced upon lazy days around the downtown campuses. “Back in those days, we’d ride our bikes between [Traill], and Peter Robinson College, and a little place called Rubidge Hall in our gowns, and they’d flow out behind us like tails,” he chuckled. 

To myself, a present Trent undergraduate student, the extent of the posturing towards the idealized “Collegiate Life,” rings vapid considering the lack of resemblance to it which the contemporary Trent University bears. It’s as though extolling the virtues of a horse that is already dead—there’s no pretense of this being a “fixer-upper” project, that’s just the way it is! Sitting as I was amidst Traill alumni and wealthy patrons of the university, I couldn’t help but feel this whole affair was some sort of spectacle meant more to flatter their nostalgia than it was about an improvement to my standard of education or campus life. The Traill of the collective recollection of the featured speakers and the attendees to whom myself and Sebastian spoke is not the Traill which I experience today. It’s not a place of camaraderie and life, but merely a fact of one’s education; a venue in which to hold classes, maybe stop at the shelter for a smoke as you make your way home or to Sadleir House. Perhaps Stohn, himself also a founding member of both Trent Radio and Arthur, best summarized my thoughts when he said, “I wish we still had Peter Robinson College.” 

Me too Stephen, me too.

The residential college system has long been something intimately tied up with the image of Trent University, and while many of the alumni in attendance have very well-founded and genuine memories of Trent in its collegiate heydays, this model of social organization seems more or less lost on students today. It’s rather hard to “Be Bold” when Trent’s colleges are less a place to call home and more a place of convenient occupation for the duration of a given academic year. Perhaps in this respect Traill stands a better chance than the Symons campus colleges, which house principally first-years and are mostly bereft of activity over the summer, to revivify some of this lost spirit. Even so, it’s a daunting undertaking to be sure, and the decades-long dismantling of the college system has proved a difficult obstacle to overcome. 

After a performance from local musical outfit The Verandah Society, Dr. Eamon returned to the stage, carrying two comically-large pairs of scissors, as he invited VIPs and donors to come forward for the official ribbon cutting ceremony. Chancellor Stohn and Councillor Baldwin were offered the sharps, and my favourite moment of the proceedings transpired when Stohn remarked to the deputy mayor, “We’ll see which of us is the better scissorer.” 

With the venue officially opened, attendees were treated to a brief musical interlude with a rousing performance of “Stand By Me” led by Dr. Eamon himself, then left to mill around and enjoy refreshments among the idyllic heritage buildings of Traill College. Promises as to the significance of the new performance space were abundant. One can only hope the time proves them well-founded.

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