flâneur

Retirement has a nice ring to UC Berkeley’s Campanile carillonist

sfchronicle.com · 955 words · saved by 1 readers

Davis chat with former students, including Brunston Poon in the white shirt and Leslie Chan in the red and black shirt. Davis shares his impressions with a former student, Erika Anderson, after his final concert. Jeff Davis arrived for his last day of work at UC Berkeley only to find that someone was in his campus parking slot. After calling the tow truck, he went to his campus building to find the elevator malfunctioning. This was problematic because Davis’ workstation is 200 feet up in the sky. He is the university carillonist, and Sunday was his last day after 24 years of playing the system of 61 bells that ring out from Sather Tower — better known as the Campanile — with mini concerts three times daily and longer concerts on Sundays. “Retirement never looked so good,” Davis, 80, said after contemplating that long walk up the stairs on a hot day. After jiggling with some keys, he found a workaround that would keep the elevator running so long as he was there to run it. So on his ret

Jeff Davis bid farewell to UC Berkeley’s Campanile with a final concert Sunday. Laure Andrillon/Special to the Chronicle Jeff Davis arrived for his last day of work at UC Berkeley only to find that someone was in his campus parking slot. After calling the tow truck, he went to his campus building to find the elevator malfunctioning. This was problematic because Davis’ workstation is 200 feet up in the sky. He is the university carillonist, and Sunday was his last day after 24 years of playing the system of 61 bells that ring out from Sather Tower — better known as the Campanile — with…

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