Education
The suspension, which runs through the end of the fall semester, impacts only the Harvard-Radcliffe Orchestra’s social activities.
Harvard College has suspended the Harvard-Radcliffe Orchestra’s social calendar for the rest of the fall semester following a complaint of alleged hazing.
“It is an unfortunate and very unexpected situation,” said Federico Cortese, the student-run orchestra’s music director and conductor.
“I fully agree with Harvard’s strict anti-hazing policy (I really do, and I really mean it),” Cortese added in an emailed statement. “In this sense I consider this incident a very serious mistake and a very poor choice of the students.”
News of the suspension came shortly after the orchestra’s annual retreat, which happened off-campus Sept. 6 at the Greenwood Music Camp in Cummington, according to The Harvard Crimson, which first reported the sanction. Harvard did not respond to a request for comment Friday.
Three people familiar with the matter purportedly told the Crimson the hazing investigation followed a freshman student’s complaint about activities at the retreat. The newspaper reported that returning HRO members lined up new recruits during the retreat and led them into the camp’s dining hall, where they were quizzed on the names of upperclassmen in the club.
Regardless of their answer, the new members were allegedly blindfolded and taken outside, walked up and down a hill, and asked to tap an upperclassman once for a drink of water or twice for a shot of vodka, according to the Crimson. The new members were ultimately brought back to a rehearsal space and the entire club exchanged notes, with members alternately sharing their hopes and fears about the start of college and offering each other advice, the newspaper reported.
According to Cortese, the incident in question happened during an informal social event, with only some of the orchestra students in attendance.
As a whole, the orchestra’s members are “not only outstanding musicians, but also a remarkably warm, kind, friendly and respectful group of students making music together at a very high level in a very healthy and generous environment,” Cortese noted. “I have no hesitation or doubt saying that.”
However, he also said he is “convinced that anything that can be perceived as hazing, under any circumstance, is wrong.”
Cortese said the suspension will last until the end of the semester in mid-December, impacting only HRO’s activities as a social group, not as an orchestra.
“All the concerts and rehearsals will take place regularly,” Cortese said, explaining that the orchestra will for the time being perform under its academic class number — Music 110 — instead of the HRO name “in an abundance of caution, to avoid any possible confusion.”
He vowed to ensure the orchestra complies with Harvard’s sanctions.
Still, Cortese denied seeing “anything resembling a discriminatory, intimidating or abusive behavior” in his time with HRO.
“All that said, they should have known better and should have realized that any behavior that may be considered hazing is strictly forbidden,” he said of the students. “They made a serious and incomprehensible mistake.”
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