I was almost asleep during my first night in Champaign-Urbana, when an avalanche of concerned text messages woke me up. There was a shooting at Northern Illinois University by a student currently enrolled at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. Hell of a way to start auditioning.

Flying to UI was an adventure because it was the first time I had ever flown on a plane with propellers. Yes, it was noisy and a little bumpy but the trip had such a retro vibe that could not be beaten. UI has its own Institute of Aviation and its own regional airport — a charming, small building in the middle of endless cornfields. If you thought that there was nothing to be seen around Oberlin, go fly over Urbana-Champaign’s surroundings: the vastness of the open spaces reserved for crop culture is mesmerizing!

When I arrived, I was taken over by the size, the number of students and the busy environment of the campus. Home to more than 30,000 undergraduates, countless academic red-brick buildings and several college downtowns, there was nothing pointing to the fact that outside this beehive there was only popcorn-in-the-making.

The Student Center resembled Wilder, times four. At Kinko’s I repaired my scruffy-looking scores and for lunch, I found a popular Thai place, conveniently located near the School of Music, which was built in the late ’60s-early ’70s. Boasting windowless practice rooms for non-piano majors, offices and classrooms, it breathed out the ’70s like no other place I have ever seen — the wooden walls, the couches in the lounge, the architecture.

The impressive collection of grand pianos is in pretty darn good shape. Access to the instruments is reserved for keyboardists, positioned on the highest floor of Smith Memorial Hall, a 1920s, heavily ornamented, Romantic-esque building with large, ceremonial marble staircases; seashells in the walls and rosettes on the ceilings. Faculty studios and the classic mahogany-tiled concert hall also fit in there. Submerged in such a charming and old-fashioned environment, I felt like a preserver of ancient art, confined to bloom in those specific surroundings. The Illinois meeting of Hogwarts and Harvard?

The hospitable, down-to-earth and widely-renowned faculty was fascinating to meet and comfortable to play for. The audition was a positive experience, supported by the faculty’s interest and involvement with its prospective student body. This seems to be a characteristic that UI professors share, and the Music Education department faculty was also highly praised by their master’s and Doctorate students.

I left windy Urbana-Champaign the next morning, thinking back about the Illinois shooting with a heavy heart. Thinking about life and death and art.