Week of Music

Bo Newsome and Graham DeZarn are two talented musicians from North Carolina and Virginia. Between the two of them, they play about a dozen instruments, and they can sing, too! It's enough to make Vivaldi jealous.
Each year, the students work with the musicians to put on an opera/musical performance. They get a chance to learn about music composition, song writing, things like tone, pitch, harmony, etc. They also get their hands on a variety of instruments including violin, piano, and drums. This year our performance is centered around William Steig's The Amazing Bone. I love William Steig, so I'm thrilled by this. Sylvester and the Magic Pebble was one of my favorite books as a kid, and last year, 6-8 read Abel's Island, so we're all fans.

This story is about a pig named Pearl who is walking in the woods one day, enjoying the beautiful springtime, when she happens upon a talking bone. The two become fast friends and manage to get themselves into a couple of tight fixes. As we read the story, the kids were calling out characters they'd like to play, mostly the bad guys, but at the end, Bo asked them why they thought he would have chosen this particular story to use for the opera.

Elijah said, "Because it has lots of action and characters."

Bo nodded, agreeing. "Why else might this make a good opera?"

Cadin, very seriously, replied, "It's got a pig."

Because, you know, all the good operas have talking pigs.

Add this to the list of Things Bradley Loves.