The greatest gift

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This article was published 22/12/2016 (3446 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

In this season of miracles, it’s safe to say Winnipeg Symphony Orchestra principal cellist Yuri Hooker knows a thing or two about the concept of divine intervention, including having witnessed his own guardian angel sent as though from heaven itself.

One fateful night in September 2012, the 17-year veteran of the WSO experienced a critical health crisis that brought him perilously close to death.

The Calgary-born musician and father of two children, Elly, 14, and Ari, 12, with Michelle Mourre, his conductor/pianist wife of 18 years, now calls it an unexpected gift.

“It’s never been hard to see it that way,” Hooker says during an interview with Mourre at a downtown coffee shop. “Aside from some physical pain, almost everything has been good that’s come out of it. It’s far less than what other people go through every single day in Winnipeg, who have no place to eat or sleep, and with no end in sight. It also taught me an incredible amount.”

The late music journalist Gwenda Nemerofsky chronicled Hooker’s journey in the Free Press in December 2012. I’ve always wanted to catch up with the musician to see how he’s doing, and how that harrowing experience has affected both his personal and professional life during the last four years, including his unshakable Christian faith, which played a pivotal role in his recovery.

Hooker, now 41, had just finished a dress rehearsal in Ottawa, where he was performing with the National Arts Centre Orchestra for the Opera Lyra’s production of La Bohème. He decided to stop in at a local club afterwards — a rare post-rehearsal outing for the musician — to hear a klezmer band with a friend. The next thing he remembers is waking up from an induced coma three days later at the Ottawa Civic Hospital. He had suffered a serious cardiac arrest; his life had been saved by an anonymous bystander who administered CPR, and whose identity he has never discovered.

“My heart just kind of went haywire,” the otherwise healthy Hooker, who had no past history of heart disease, says of his since diagnosed rare condition. Surgeons implanted a cardioverter-defibrillator into his chest in September 2012. The device delivers electrical shocks to restore normal cardiac rhythm as necessary.

“One of the things I came to understand throughout this whole experience was the fragility of life, and also to trust that whatever happens, my life is in God’s hands,” the devout Christian says. “I once had a friend ask me, ‘Don’t you feel a great deal of anxiety over this experience?’ and I said, ‘Actually, no — if anything, I have far less anxiety now than I would have otherwise.’”

After receiving the slumber-jolting midnight call from the Ottawa hospital telling her Hooker was in intensive care, Mourre flew with their children and Hooker’s parents to the capital city as soon as he regained consciousness.

She, too, has noticed the musician’s increasing contentment.

“He’s always been a pretty even guy,” Mourre says. “He never really overreacted to things, but now it isn’t just him trying to control himself; he actually feels genuine compassion and love toward people. And it’s been inspiring for us as a family, and makes us want to respond in that same way. We all really get along in a lovely way. It doesn’t mean we’re just nice; we try to be patient and compassionate with each other, because we learn from him.”

Elation Pauls, the WSO’s assistant principal second violinist, who has served as co-artistic director of the Rosamunde Summer Music Academy with Hooker since 2011, played an instrumental role in collecting funds to help with expenses, as well as organizing friends to deliver home-cooked meals to the cellist’s family during his recovery.

Pauls echoes Mourre’s sentiments. “Since I arrived in Winnipeg in 2008, it has been obvious to me that Yuri is highly regarded as an artist with integrity and strong convictions. People connect with his genuine and sincere musical delivery, which is the public expression of the depth of his introspective contemplations, rooted in his Christian faith,” she says in an email. “If anything, I think this event only made him more of who he already was.”

Another way Hooker teaches is more literal. He leads a scripture memory club at Grant Memorial Baptist Church, explaining the rigorous discipline of memorizing Bible verses allows its proponents to live their faith in deeper, more meaningful ways as they internalize the holy words. He admits it’s tougher than it sounds, especially in our Google-happy age.

“Certain passages are just naturally rhythmic,” he says, adding that rhymes, raps, repetition and review are his pedagogical techniques of choice. “But you do want to pay attention to the music of the language as well.”

In fact, Mourre’s recitation of the Book of James — which Hooker had completely under his belt before his heart attack — at his hospital bedside helped him retrain his mind during rehabilitation. He peppers our interview with Bible quotes, easily tossing off verses to illustrate points. For her part, Mourre is also completing her first entire reading of the Bible this month as a two-year labour of love.

“Neurologists will say what you repeat is what you learn,” Hooker says. “The more we review the words of God, the more our neural pathways are reshaped — that’s the way our brains form. So when I think about a particular passage of scripture repeatedly, it’s actually making a difference in the way that I react to different situations.” (“It’s a different kind of practising scales,” Mourre quips).

The cellist’s soulful journey has also led him to embark on a master of divinity degree program through Providence College Theological Seminary, making the trek to Otterburne each week to take classes when he’s not in rehearsals, performing with the WSO or as a core member of the Winnipeg Chamber Music Society, or teaching his private studio of award-winning cello students.

He recounts how he discovered his own voice — literally — two years ago during a church trip to Ecuador to visit the child their congregation sponsored through humanitarian group Compassion Canada. Hooker, who serves as an elder at Grant Memorial, was thrust into the role of public spokesman and prayer leader — an unfamiliar role for the soft-spoken artist.

“All of a sudden, I felt like I had woken up and spoken a language I hadn’t ever spoken before,” he marvels. “I never had any ambition to go into ministry vocationally. But when I got home, I just couldn’t get this idea out of my mind, and so enrolled at the seminary.” He is open to the possibility of becoming a full-time pastor someday should his spirit move him in that direction, and he has already delivered sermons at several area churches.

However, he’s adamant that music will always play a significant role in his life, possibly entwining itself with his future aspirations in some yet-to-be-determined way.

In terms of musical heroes, it comes as no surprise that J.S. Bach has long been the artist’s go-to composer, renowned for profoundly spiritual works born of his own Lutheran faith. After awaking from his coma, one of Hooker’s first actions was dictating the opening phrase of the baroque master’s The Musical Offering to his wife.

“I don’t really know why, except that I love Bach and the work. I spent a lot of time on it, arranging it for cello ensemble,” Hooker told the Free Press four years ago.

Another, more intriguing inspiration is Joseph Haydn, often overshadowed by his brilliant classical compatriot, Mozart. Hooker will be featured next month during the WSO’s Papa Haydn concert held Jan. 13 and 14, with the cellist joining associate concertmaster Karl Stobbe, oboist Beverley Wang and bassoonist Alex Eastley in a performance of Haydn’s Sinfonia concertante in B-flat major.

“Haydn is absolutely one of my favourites,” he says. “His music is just so fresh, and so funny, and so clear. As great as Mozart was, for me, Haydn was a true original, as someone who could make something out of nothing.”

During the often stressful Christmas season where shopping malls are packed, and so many fret about finding just the perfect gift, or brace for testy relatives over the holiday dinner table, Hooker’s deeply felt inner peace is palpable.

“I just feel incredibly blessed that I have been given the opportunities that I’ve been given. That I’m still here to share music, and to share my faith and walk alongside people,” he says. “I really see life as a gift. Intellectually, I would have always said that, but I have a much more visceral sense of that now.”

Perhaps Mourre says it best, when describing how that September night four years ago transformed their lives forever:

“His heart has changed, definitely.”

holly.harris@shaw.ca