Notes from a Composer

A fainting spell nearly derailed the whole concert. 

But it was still a rousing success.

When I plan choir concerts for elementary student performers, I hope to choose songs that will appeal to the age group but also to adults, since the kids’ parents will be our audience.  I also like to choose some musically exciting pieces that may seem unusual or difficult, but which I believe children can master and will enjoy.  It challenges me as a teacher and artist to push against the boundaries of what is expected from a grade school choir concert.

So it was also with an all-Beatles program for 3rd graders at a Tribeca public school in Manhattan, a few blocks from the World Trade Center.  Choosing only Beatles songs of course limited me to some extent, but the breadth of their output still allows for much stylistic variety.  And although I may not have been able to include as many foreign languages as last year (where a “Joy in the World” medley included Xhosa (“Pata Pata”), Portuguese (“Mas Que Nada”) and German (“Berliner Luft”), yet, as you will see and hear, even The Beatles dabbled in some foreign languages.

View of the new World Trade Center from the school

The whole 3rd grade of PS 234 performs.  Over a hundred children.  The only time I get to rehearse with them all together is once or twice during the week of the concert.  Otherwise I meet with each class individually once a week for 12 weeks. Every Tuesday, five classes in a row, without a break.  Me singing in a high tenor range to teach them their parts.  Yes, it’s exhausting.

Nine songs in 12 weeks.  It is all a bit ambitious, I admit, but it came together just fine.  The concert was proceeding well, until…  well, what I couldn’t have anticipated was the fainting spell that nearly derailed the whole performance…

Before that, before the children were even led into the auditorium stage risers by their teachers that morning, I had lamented to the arts coordinator that I couldn’t record the concert to share on my blog, because getting media releases from over hundred families is impossible.  She said to me, oh no, everybody signs a blanket release at the beginning of the year.  Ah, if only I had asked earlier.  I would have brought my portable professional recorder.  Instead I made due with my phone’s voice recorder.  Which does effect the sound quality of the following, I’m afraid, but hopefully not so much that it still can’t be enjoyed, albeit with technical caveats:

3rd grade choir performance: Love & Life with The Beatles

0 sec – The Principal welcomes the audience.

1:25 –  I introduce the concert.

Continue reading →