During the year I’ve shared musical
ideas, examined strategies for singing books, and explored iPad apps for
(music) classroom use. In the summer, I launched a 3-part plea for listening locally, focusing on
singer songwriters from the Midwest and Ontario who have contributed substantively to
the early childhood repertoire. My campaign will return in 2015, highlighting
another region of the United States and Canada. Stay tuned!
ring.blogspot.com/2014/11/singing-story-magic-of-musical-books.html Singing a Story – pt.2
I offer two celebratory gifts to
light up December’s darkness. The first is a Solstice song by Stuart Stotts, a fellow CMN member and
friend. It appears on his most recent
blogpost, but don’t stop there. If you investigate a bit, you’ll unearth many sonic treasures!
 |
| http://stuartstotts.com/darkest-days/ |
This song commemorates the darkest days that go hand in hand with
the season – at least in our hemisphere! The message of hope and light, however,
is too transcendent to be consigned to a one-day observance. It also lends
itself perfectly to the EC classroom use. Recommendation: Present this as a
listening activity before teaching the song. That way, your kiddos can hear the
arc of the story and experience Stott’s personal singing style and exquisite
guitar work. After the song has been learned, sung, and moved to, ask students
for their ideas. Even deep in winter…
Wintertime / Winter’s Tale
My second gift is to offer another
way to sing a book. What’s that you say? We’ve already done that? Well, yes and
no. I propose that there are times to bravely disregard the given text, and
instead to substitute it with the lyrics and melody of an unrelated, but
thematically connected song.
This is a different approach than
November’s Piggybacking
Melodies, where a book’s text is sung, or piggybacked, onto a familiar (children’s) song.
Drum roll, please. It’s time to beguine.
I can’t remember which came first –
hearing and falling in love with Joanie
Calem’s Wintertime from her CD, Dancing Through the Seasons, or
stumbling across Robert
Sabuda’s paper engineering masterpiece, Winter’s Tale,
and becoming enraptured with its images. At some point, I put the two together,
and magic happened.
The lyrics are a perfect complement
to the book’s images. When I sing this storybook, the room becomes hushed as
the listeners give themselves over to the perfect fusion of image, lyrics, and
melody. If Sabuda had been familiar with Wintertime,
he might have just thrown up his hands and declared, “My talent is manipulating paper into improbably gorgeous forms. I’ll
leave the words to Joanie!” Artists appreciate each other – or so I’ve been told.
The video I’ve provided is far more
static than the reality of what happens when the book is presented in real
time. Each page is slowly opened, revealing the marvelous artistry of the paper
structures. Every page except for the final one has an additional side flap
that, when opened, expands the story with another layer of pop-up animals.
Click on link to access video:
Full disclosure: I’ve taken a few liberties. The
books sequence from page to page has been rearranged to accommodate the lyrics.
The chorus should be sung twice every time it occurs. For brevity’s sake, I
limited the repetition in the Shadow Puppet. When I present it to my kiddos, I
always sing it as written.
You can find out more about the
song, access sheet music, and even hear Joanie signing the song with guitar accompaniment sponsored by
the excellent Songs for
Teaching site. Access to the mp3 and sheet music is
free of charge.
Thank you for joining me! Have a
glorious holiday and lovely new year.
I look forward to greeting and exploring 2015 with you!
Wintertime
©2002
Joanie Calem
Refrain: Wintertime
is cold time, slow time, snow time,
Wintertime’s
the soft time of the year.
1. Rabbits
hop through the cold,
Digging up
their summer gold.
Hop and jump
all the day,
They aren’t bothered by the gray.
They aren’t bothered by the gray.
Cardinals
chatter in the trees,
Finding
winter’s nuts and seeds.
All their
other bird friends
Flew down
south ’til winter’s end.
2. Squirrels
jump from branch to limb,
Climbing
trees with shimmy shim.
Busy all
year ’round,
Nice warm nests above the ground.
Nice warm nests above the ground.
Possums,
skunk and raccoon,
All are
friends of winter’s moon.
Prowling ’round in mud and snow,
The cold just makes their thick coats grow.
Prowling ’round in mud and snow,
The cold just makes their thick coats grow.
Refrain
3. Now bears
are a diff’rent story.
When they
hear the North Wind’s song,
They climb
into their caves,
Sleep away the winter long.
Sleep away the winter long.
Refrain
I am continually inspired by
The Children’s Music Network (CMN)
community. an international group of socially conscious musicians, educators,
librarians, families, songwriters and good people, who “celebrate the positive
power of music in the lives of children by sharing songs, exchanging ideas, and
creating community.” Please visit CMN, and find a gathering in your region.
©2014 Brigid Finucane *
847-213-0713 * gardengoddess1@comcast.net
http://prekandksharing.blogspot.com
http://brigidfinucane.blogspot.com
@booksinger1
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