MAKING MUSIC LIVE
A Tapestry of Faith Resource
MAKING MUSIC LIVE
A Tapestry of Faith Resource
VERSION 1.0
BY NICK PAGE
© Copyright 2009 Unitarian Universalist Association.
This program and additional resources are available on the UUA.org web site at
www.uua.org/tapestryoffaith.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR(S)
Nick Page is a Boston-based composer, song leader, conductor, and author. His sings at the UU General Assembly have become legendary, and he has led sings at hundreds of UU congregations. Nick conducted the first National UU Honors Children’s Chorus at the Nashville General Assembly. He is the author of three books: Music as a Way of Knowing (Stenhouse Publishers), Sing and Shine On! An Innovative Guide to Leading Multicultural Song (World Music Press), and The Nick Page Sing with Us Songbook (Hal Leonard). He has published more than fifty choral works with Boosey & Hawkes, Hal Leonard, Transcontinental Music, and World Music Press.
Nick was a conductor with the world-renowned Chicago
Children’s Choir at
PREFACE
Within Tapestry of Faith, the role of music is to make our lives and our children's lives more vibrant and connected to each other and to the universe. We do not need to be trained musicians to make our music come alive. Whether we are experienced singers or shower singers, we can make great music. To paraphrase an expression from Zimbabwe, "If you can talk, you can sing. If you can sing, you can lead a song."
It is only in the last sixty years that the leadership role for making music in our diverse communities has been delegated to specialists. Before that, everyone was a song leader—one simply started singing a song, and people joined in.
I am honored to offer this simple guide to help you weave music into our Tapestry of Faith programs. I was raised a Unitarian Universalist and love our musical traditions, our hymns, and our anthems. But like many within Unitarian Universalism (and within the Judeo-Christian world), I have sought out new music, chants, folk and popular songs, and song traditions from many lands. I have led these songs, old and new, within hundreds of UU communities and at General Assemblies since 1990. I want to share with you some general principles as well as specific techniques that will guarantee powerful music-making with our children. I will keep my methods simple, but please know that the simplicity I speak of never means dumbing down. Simplicity means focus of purpose. The great composer and song leader Alice Parker says, "You get what you ask for." To use a simple metaphor, when you focus on the simplicity of fire and your purpose is to create that fire—that spark, that flame that symbolizes our faith—you can light the world.
I will also offer tips on dance, listening, storytelling combined with listening, and drumming. None of these require singing, but the majority of what I offer celebrates the act of opening our mouths and letting our emotions fly out through sound. That is what singing is: the vocalization of emotions. Singing brings children and communities together like nothing else.
You do not need to be a singer to lead songs, but I won't lie to you—it helps. My advice for people who don't sing, but want to share singing with children, is threefold: First, start singing. Maybe not publicly right away, but start somewhere. Your confidence will grow. Second, take it one step at a time. Start singing a song everyone knows already and, BING BANG BOOM, the children will sing along. In an instant you're a song leader. Third, don't be afraid to ask for help. There are always adults in the community who will gladly volunteer to lead or teach a song, but more importantly there are youth in every community who love to sing. For years I attended the LRY and YRUU youth conferences where there is a longstanding tradition of young people leading each other in songs, and doing it quite well. Involve the youth in your community. Ask them to lead younger children in singing. If you are a song leader in training and not ready to take the leap, let the youth do their thing. They will. All you have to do is ask.
So here's my plan. I begin with the many uses of music within UU communities and end with important principles, including some essential information on the misappropriation of diverse musical traditions. (In general, you can skip around and read what you need to know, but please be sure to read the information on misappropriation. I do not offer the final word, simply some thoughts for an ongoing dialogue.) The chapters in between provide how-to information, followed by ways for making our communities come alive with music. There is a huge difference between a flickering flame and a great burning light. Our music can be that great beacon, and all of us—if we know how—can let it shine.
I've also added an extensive resource section at the end of the book. We need to know our resources.
An important note on language: I write in the first person, from experience. My language leans toward the Humanist side of Unitarian Universalism, but occasionally the word spirit pops up. As Unitarian Universalists, we strive to welcome diverse theologies, but sometimes in our goal of creating a language common to Humanists and Theists (not necessarily two different things), we sometimes end up with a language that appeals to the least offensive common denominator. In our effort to avoid offending anyone, we sometimes remove the spirit. Musically, the results can be dispirited, a sound that lacks life, a sound that is, quite frankly, dead.
Here's the secret: singing is all about the emotions. Our emotions can range from blah to zest, from complacency to compassion. Whether we are singing of love or singing of the spirit (Mystery, God, Goddess, Lord, Mother, Father, Brother, Sister, Gaia), we need to engage our hearts as well as our minds (I would also add bodies). Singing with spirit and singing about spirit are two different things. Whether you sing of the spirit is up to you and the consensus of your congregation. I believe in bringing a diversity of beliefs, including spiritual beliefs, into song—but whatever you do, do it with spirit. Engage the emotions. Bring song to life. Let it shine. I consciously use that phrase a lot.
We enjoy the ritual of lighting the chalice on Sunday mornings. When we do, I often think of the spiritual chorus, "This little light of mine, I'm going to let it shine." For me, "let it shine" means creating a positive environment in which the emotions can be a blazing light, where connections can be made, and where we become fully alive.
Faith in sound
In his book, The Disciplined Mind, Howard Gardner speaks of teaching children three moral structures: 1) the ability to determine what is true and what is false; 2) the ability to determine what is moral and what is immoral; and 3) the ability to determine what is beautiful and what is not. As Unitarian Universalists, these goals are consistent with our Seven Principles.
1. The inherent worth and dignity of every person
2. Justice, equity, and compassion in human relations
3. Acceptance of one another and encouragement to spiritual growth in our congregations
4. A free and responsible search for truth and meaning
5. The right of conscience and the use of the democratic process within our congregations and society at large
6. The goal of world community with peace, liberty, and justice for all
7. Respect for the interdependent web of all existence of which we are a part
Celebrating music with our children isn't just about the music; it is about seeking what is beautiful, what is true, and what is good. An Earth-Centered chant can help us feel—actually feel—our interdependent web. A hymn like "Bring Many Names" and a subsequent discussion of its words can help children respect a diversity of thought. Knowing that each child is capable of creating great beauty speaks of our belief in the dignity of every person.
Music connects body to mind, mind to emotions, emotions to body, and all of those to the mystery that is the universe. Music connects our communities, adjoining us to the past and future and to all people. And music is an act of compassion: when we sing, we make the world a more beautiful place.
Let it shine.
Chapter 1 - Where and How to Make Music
The two places where we make music with our children are in worship—both in their own and with adults—and in the RE classroom. To a child, the adult church service can seem stern and rigid, but it offers a wonderful discipline of order, calm, and ritual. The minister announces the hymn and the hymn number. The organist or pianist plays the hymn through once. At a designated point, the congregation stands and enacts the old tradition of combining words and melody, thoughts, and emotions in the singing of hymns.
Children need to be taught to embrace the past as well as the future. Beloved hymns like Folliott Sandford Pierpoint's "For the Beauty of the Earth" (Singing the Living Tradition, # 21) and Carolyn McDade's "Spirit of Life" (Singing the Living Tradition, #123) need to be part of children's religious life. I will show you how to teach and lead these hymns, but in the classroom you can supplement the singing of them with discussion about what the words mean. Pose simple questions like "What does Pierpoint mean when he says, 'For the love which from our birth, over and around us lies'?" You might have to translate a line or lyric into wording they can better understand.
You can let the imaginations of younger children run wild by starting a story that explains what the hymn means: "A little boy loved to play outside where a friendly bird followed him around and sang happy songs. It was a love bird, and it sang 'All you need is love,' and 'I love you, Yeah, Yeah, Yeah' and ... ." Have the children finish the story. They can. Then sing the first verse of "For the Beauty of the Earth" again to bring it all home.
The UUA publishes a supplement to Singing the Living Tradition called Between the Lines: Sources for Singing the Living Tradition, edited by Jacqui James. When you learn, for example, that John Newton—who wrote "Amazing Grace" (Singing the Living Tradition, # 205)—was a former slave-ship captain who repented and became an active advocate for the abolishment of slavery, it changes the meaning of his phrase, "that saved a wretch like me."
MUSIC AS A PART OF RITUAL
Music for worship in the classroom setting can take a variety of directions. You can honor the traditional adult way of worshiping, with preludes, hymns, offertories, and postludes, or you can take many new directions. Whatever you do, give worship a sense of ritual. As you light the chalice, for example, you can add meaning by singing a song like "Rise Up, O Flame" (Singing the Living Tradition, #362), Stephen Finner's "Chalice Lighting" (May This Light Shine, #2), or one of your own choosing. May This Light Shine: A Songbook for Children and Youth is a wonderful resource published by the Unitarian Universalist Music Network (available from the UUA Bookstore at www.uuabookstore.org).
Give songs for worship a sense of ritual. You do not need to wait until the pianist gets to a certain point in his or her play-through to have the group stand and sing. The simple act of beginning and/or ending with silence can make a huge difference. Beginning with a bell has a wonderful calming effect.
In one sense, ritual is a form of sacred theater that contains staged elements. When these elements are repeated week after week, they become ritual—but ritual is so much more. If we were to participate in worship at a synagogue, a Catholic church, or a Buddhist temple, for example, we would see rituals that connect participants to the past. The opening of the Arc in Jewish traditions makes thousands of years come alive in the present. You might take great comfort in singing an ancient text like the "Alleluia." The comfort is in knowing that, by singing this phrase, we keep the traditions alive. For many Unitarian Universalists, singing "Spirit of Life" connects us to our past, and knowing that we keep the flame of our faith alive by singing the song comforts us. Lighting the chalice is a ritual. In many UU fellowships, lighting the candles of joys and concerns is a beloved ritual. We can enrich each ritual by adding songs or music in the background.
CREATING A POSITIVE ENVIRONMENT
Creating a sense of ritual can also have a calming effect and help you manage discipline. We need to honor children's sense of play, but we also need to create basic discipline. Discipline need not mean the old hierarchical model of the oppressive teacher, but discipline does require a supportive classroom.
In a supportive classroom, children learn to respect ritual as well as each other. A simple discipline trick I learned as a substitute teacher in my early teaching days was "the thirty-second rule." In the first thirty seconds of class, the children may challenge the teacher's authority in some small way. Children are not inherently rude, but they can be if allowed. At the first indiscretion, simply pause, smile, and make it clear that we always prefer respect. Phrase it in a positive way and never call someone bad, no matter how inappropriately the child behaves. Behaving inappropriately does not make us bad people. Smiles are essential in a positive environment, and offering one can be quite effective at putting an end to whatever quickening pulse is adding to the chaos. If you make positive behavior the norm, it will continue (with an occasional reminder).
If on the other hand you let negativity be the norm, the classroom experience may not be fun for anyone. There's always room for a little creative chaos, but it has to be positive chaos—fun. Discipline is sometimes overlooked in liberal education because we often think discipline is authoritarian, the old power-over paradigm. Our goal is to reach a high level of focus—a preferable term for discipline—based on the power-with paradigm. Getting there, which isn't easy, requires a positive environment in both worship and the classroom.
Here are some ways to create a positive environment:
1. Understand pulse (or pacing). Talking fast will excite children and sometimes lead to chaos. Talking slowly and softly can quiet them down. As we begin to lose control of the group (it happens), we tend to speak faster to get the children's attention. Try the opposite; a slow, quiet pulse will slow them down. The scientific word for this is entrainment. (For more information about entrainment, see my book Sing and Shine On! at www.worldmusicpress.com).
2. Make your language exceedingly positive. Phrase everything in yes terms. I do a mini ritual that reinforces positive behavior. When someone suggests a good idea, I say to the group, "Repeat after me: What a good idea!" The class repeats. Then everyone wants to have a good idea. They will, and each child should be equally rewarded. This approach is simply a playful adaptation of B. F. Skinner's positive reinforcement dictum. E. O. Wilson and other behavior theorists developed a new term, reciprocal altruism: when we do good things, good things will happen in return; when we do bad things, bad things happen in return. Do unto others as you would have them do unto you: a celebrated teacher named Jesus called this the Golden Rule. Similar paradigms exist in all the world's religions. Simply put, positive behavior invites positive behavior.
3. Capture the group's attention. Children need to be taught to listen and pay attention. Music is the perfect tool for this. When I say, "Repeat after me: What a good idea!" the children repeat, "What a good idea!" The act of repetition requires their attention. Keep these simple echoes going throughout your time with the children—but don't dumb down. This is very important. Simplicity never means dumbing down. I will repeat that phrase a lot.
If the children do not echo back exactly what you say, then they are not really listening. If they are not really listening, then they are not really attentive. When I work with five-year-olds, their teachers sometimes tell me not to expect much—the children may be inattentive—so I have the five-year-olds repeat something after me. If they don't get it right I shake my head, smile, and quietly say, "That's not what I said. You need to listen." I say the phrase again, and about 70 percent of the group gets it. I say, "Much better, but still not there." Within a few moments, the class of inattentive five-years-olds is in the palm of my hand. Why? You get what you ask for; I asked them to listen.
Another way to keep the children's attention is to vary the activities. Adding simple transition songs between activities helps move things along smoothly.
4. Engage their emotions. The old power-over paradigm created a learning environment devoid of healthy emotions. It gave rise to negative emotions, fear, and repression. The power-with paradigm works when children fully engage their emotions. Since music is, at its core, an emotional expression, we have the perfect tool. I'm talking emotional expression on the scale of grand operas: robust, jump-in-the-air emotions as well as calm, deep, meditative emotions. When I say, "Let it shine," I mean let the emotions shine. I mean let the spirit shine. I mean let each child have a voice.
5. Engage their bodies. Children need to move. They should sing with hand gestures, swaying motions (both sitting and standing), circle dances, improvisational movement, and isolation exercises (more on all this later). Movement needs to engage the heart as well as the mind.
6. Be playful. I'm fond of a particular mini ritual: I say, "Repeat after me," and I blow on the fingernails of my right hand. The children mirror. Next I polish my fingernails on my collar. They mirror. With lots of emotion I say, "We are the best!" They echo. "The very best." They echo. "We have zest!" My hands fly into the air. They echo. Then I droop down and slowly say, "Blah!" They echo.
We go back and forth between joyous zests and blah-blahs, through the full range of emotions. Throughout my time with the children, if they are doing something well, instead of saying "Good job," I might simply pause (pauses are good), blow on my fingernails, and polish them. It is playful. It is positive.
Chapter 2 - Movement, Expression, and Creativity
Along with vocal expression, dance and other forms of movement offer more ways to bring life and emotion to music and singing. Children love to engage in bodily expression when they sing. The music you use in the classroom or during worship need not be appreciated in stillness. Dance is a universal form of worship, a deep and often playful ritual that needs to be a regular part of the church experience for youth. In Resources, see Dances of Universal Peace, whose songbooks outline a variety of simple dances. You can also try some of the following activities.
THE LINE DANCE
The simplest form of group dance is the line dance, in which the dancers follow the leader either in a circle or in free patterns around the room. They can hold hands, place their hands on each other's shoulders, or place them around each other's waist. When in a circle formation, it's always fun to advance the children toward the center, while they raise their hands into the air, and then expand the circle outward again. The children should sing a song they know well, something repetitive like a simple chant or children's song, as opposed to a hymn with many verses.
The spiral dance is a more challenging form of line dance that is danced throughout the world. Have everyone stand in a circle, holding hands and facing inward. Take someone's right hand into your left hand and let go of the child's hand on your right. The person on your right is now at the end of the line. Facing the center of the circle, begin walking to your right, passing in front of the dancers at the end of the line and staying close to that outer circle. Keep singing. Continue walking in a spiral in which the rows grow tighter and tighter. When you come to the center and have nowhere to go, have everyone turn to their left in an about-face and wind their way back out of the spiral, dancing between the rows on either side that are still spiraling toward the center of the circle. You will eventually come to the outside of the spiral. When you do, turn right again and continue walking around the spiraling bodies until the opening circle is once again attained.
The first few times children dance a spiral dance they will be giddy with delight, and there may be some discipline issues to deal with. Children can get so happy they become hurtful of others. When the spiral dance/song becomes part of a worship practice, the giddy delight can gradually turn into something deeper—a powerful meditation or an ecstatic dance of joy.
THE MIX-IT-UP
With partner songs and rounds, you can do a mix-it-up. A partner song is made up of two or more songs that are sung at the same time. UU song leader Dr. Ysaye Barnwell of Sweet Honey in the Rock, for example, combines the chorus of "Wade in the Water" with "I Wanna Die Easy When I Die" and some other spirituals. (See her collection, Singing in the African American Tradition, from Homespun Tapes.) You can also combine "Wade in the Water" with the children's round, "Shalom Chaverim," and the Hey Yanna section of the contemporary Native American song, "The Earth Is Our Mother" (on the Nick Page Songbook CD from www.cdfreedom.com).
Have the class stand in a circle and assign each member a song from the ones you chose for the activity. Tell the children they will repeat their assigned song many times, and when the leader gives the signal they will mix it up: they will simply keep singing their songs as they walk in free patterns around the room, greeting each other with a handshake or hug. Add a hand drum or shaker to keep the beat and bring out the strong feeling of pulse.
The challenge for each child is to keep singing his/her own part while walking around the room greeting others who are singing different parts. This activity can create a tremendous sense of community, but it can also turn into chaos. If things get chaotic, use the experience as a life lesson, and do the activity again. This time instruct the children to concentrate on listening to each other while they sing, as opposed to singing their own parts at the tops of their lungs without listening to the music they are collectively creating. They learn that true community means letting their voices be part of the collective voice, and it can be a humbling experience for them.
Keep trying this activity—don't give up—and when you have successfully mixed it up, sit the children down, quiet them, and ask the group what the mix-it-up felt like. What did they learn? For some the experience will be deeply spiritual, and for others it will be frustrating and a great challenge, but it will be stimulating for all. They will all benefit from doing the activity again some other time, and again after that, until it becomes a ritual.
For music, you can use a two- or three-part partner song or a round that has two or more parts, like "Make New Friends." You can also do some simple improvisational things such as creating simple vocal drum parts (called vocal grooves). These can simply be repeated percussive syllables like Ch-Dv or repeated words from a song, either sung or spoken—such as "This little light, This little light"—while the rest of the group sings a song over these patterns. Keep the music simple and in sync; have everyone keep the beat.
USING HAND GESTURES
Adding hand gestures to songs can be a participatory event. For the song "Wade in the Water," for example, simply ask the children what motions would work for the phrase, "Wade in the water." The children will suggest some ideas for movement, and they will all be good. The motions might involve hands, waists, arms, legs, and facial expressions. Through the process of consensus you will agree on a suitable gesture. Make sure the gestures are respectful of the tradition from which the song comes; be careful not to trivialize the tradition with the gestures. (More on body movement later.)
The children's participation in shaping the music brings the music to life. As with all creative activities, be very positive. Do not allow any child to be negative in any way. Creativity flows in a positive environment; it ceases in a negative one.
ISOLATION EXERCISES
Find any excuse to get children up and moving, particularly with songs. Then bring in the emotions. Have them sing a song like "Simple Gifts" or "Morning Has Broken" while walking around the room showing sadness in their bodies as they sing. The songs will sound sad simply because their motions—and emotions—reflect sadness. Have them sing a song like "This Little Light" while walking around, showing joy in their bodies. You can also do a seated version of the song, during which the children simply show the emotions in their faces (more on this later). The group will discover the huge connection between their emotions and their singing and dancing. Everything we do is shaped by our emotions.
Once the children are accustomed to showing emotions in their faces and bodies, have them sing a sad song while walking with great joy, and then sing a happy song while walking with sadness. The technical term for this activity is isolation exercises. It is a fun and challenging way for children to disconnect their physical selves from their emotional selves. It is simply the next step in letting them find the emotional core of what they do. Try isolation exercises with other emotions, like anger, and laughter. Then return to the normal way of singing, using happy movement and faces with happy songs or sad faces and movement with sad songs. Have children play with the emotions, and allow them to be truly expressive, truly alive. Let their light shine.
LAUGHTER
There is actually a new form of yoga that has evolved in India: laughter. Simply initiate laughter among the children and have them keep it going. Laughter changes the chemistry of their brains. It connects them. As with all forms of creative activities, laughter must be practiced in a supportive environment. Be careful not to let the children hyperventilate.
IMPROVISED MOVEMENT
Allowing children to make up their own movements to recorded music is a great way for them to let off steam and let their creativity flow. Choose a variety of CDs that have fast and slow songs in different musical styles (classical, pop, world, and the like), or program your iPod. If you're working with a younger group, assign each child a space within which he or she can move. Older children can use the whole room. In each case, the children are challenged to move as the music tells them to move. A jumpy piece may inspire them to jump, for example, while they may simply sway their arms slowly to a moderate piece.
The first time you do this activity have the children take turns being the leader while everyone else mirrors them. You can connect the improvisations to a theme you are studying in class or have the children create archetypes using their bodies. Children act out archetypes all the time: the hero or heroine, the nurturing mother, the warrior, the healer, and so on. The children can first pose statue-like as their archetypes, and then move about the room, to music, as that archetype. If, for example, you're teaching a lesson about how life changes as we get older, you could have the class improvise the process of metamorphosis and slowly turn from caterpillars into butterflies. You might use the theme from Richard Strauss' "Also sprach Zarathustra" (from 2001: A Space Odyssey), or try "Blue Rondo a la Turk," by the Dave Brubeck Quartet, if you're looking for a longer piece.
If you are studying about Moses and the Exodus story, consider playing a recording of Paul Robeson or someone else singing the spiritual, "Go Down Moses." In their actions, it is essential that the children show the proper respect when working with a serious story like this. If possible, teach them the song first, and then have them stand in a circle, facing the middle. Play a recording of the song and have them truly listen to the words and the passion of the music. While they do this, instruct the children to pose like Moses or his sister Miriam and stare at an image, pretending that it represents freedom. Then slowly introduce movement, perhaps a simple line dance, or have one child at a time honor the object representing freedom.
Follow each improvisation with a discussion. Talk about the subject at hand, and don't be afraid to discuss the music as well. How did the music help the class tell the story?
DRUM CIRCLES
The phenomenon of drumming and drumming circles is still in its infancy. I predict that fifty years from now, world drumming will be standard curriculum in schools and will be a standard form of worship. Why?
Because drumming requires raised attentiveness, a level of focus that actually makes children better learners. It increases attention span and lets the emotions explode. Because drumming connects us with different cultures in a dynamic way, making rhythms come to life. Drumming creates community, a sense of belonging that is as primal as a mother's embrace.
Because prolonged drumming can lead to an altered state of consciousness, either in the form of a dream state or an adrenaline rush; states of mind that our ancestors needed to survive and evolve.
Milwaukee musician and educator Will Schmid developed a curriculum called World Music Drumming that consists of a series of guidebooks. Although Schmid originally created the curriculum for schools, it provides helpful direction to church leaders for how to prepare and teach drumming to children. His technique of speaking rhythms before playing them works especially well with children. For example, the complex djembe part of "Fanga," a song taught by Babatunde Olatunji of West Africa, becomes simple when spoken on the phrase, "We welcome you. You are welcome." That is the actual meaning of the song.
Drums are an ancient type of instrument and should be treated with great respect. The first thing children need to learn is a sense of ritual, even in the way they hold the drums. They must also learn that drums are not intended to be beaten for the sake of making noise. To teach this important concept, lay the drums in a circle and have the children stand outside the circle. During a moment of silence, explain that in parts of Africa the drum is actually a living spirit. When you play the drum it becomes a partner with whom you play a duet. You must treat the drum with the same respect you would treat any fellow spirit in this world. Then invite the children to stand quietly by a drum or percussion instrument.
Will Schmid's curriculum will help with the next steps of teaching children to make their first drum sounds and subsequent rhythms.
A FEW WORDS ABOUT CREATIVITY
You may have noticed by now that the possibilities for engaging children with music are endless. They invite creativity from each child and from you, the teacher. We are all creative. Making a shopping list is a creative act. Conversation is a creative act. But when creativity is connected to self-expression, it can become daunting, particularly in our culture, which can stifle creativity and self-expression. Here's a trick I learned from Nita Penfold, author of the Tapestry of Faith curriculum, Spirituality and the Arts in Children's Programming ,for making creativity flow. Think of creativity as a river: A wide river flows very slowly; a narrow river flows very quickly. If you ask children to write a song, but don't provide specific instructions, you give them a wide river; their creativity will flow slowly, if at all. If, on the other hand, you ask them to write a new verse for Woody Guthrie's "This Land Is Your Land," using the names of places that Jesus visited in his many journeys, you create a narrow river and their creativity will flow very quickly.
Going back to the metamorphosis example, you can teach the children the basic vocabulary words that describe a butterfly's metamorphosis, like cocoon, chrysalis, metamorphosis, and butterfly. Write the words on paper and cut them apart. Add words like wings and fly, and then ask the children to assemble the words into a lyric, adding verbs, adverbs, nouns, and so on, to connect the thoughts. Each child literally lines up his or her individual words and rearranges them until they make sense to that child. It does, of course, help to demonstrate the step-by-step process first. In the end you will have the beginnings of an original song.
The beauty of creativity is that each child (or group of children) will create a different, original lyric. We are all different. Originality means nothing more than being yourself. (In my book, Music as a Way of Knowing, I included a chapter that provides step-by-step instructions for writing songs with children.)
Another essential ingredient of all creativity is a positive environment. If a child suggests an idea and another child makes a negative comment about it, the creativity is likely to cease. Why? Because creativity is linked to emotion. A negative comment does not injure the creativity itself; it is the emotions that shut down.
I see creativity from a spiritual perspective. In his epic poem, "No More Secondhand God," Unitarian Universalist thinker Buckminster Fuller said, "God is a verb, not a noun." I rephrase it in a non-theological way: The universe is a verb, not a noun. When I read Fuller's words as a sixteen-year-old, my life was changed forever. We normally think the word table describes a noun, but a table is actually made up of billions of whirling atoms in the act of being a table; from this perspective, table is a verb. This concept requires a paradigm shift. You go from seeing the earth as a planet with life on it (in other words, a noun) to seeing the earth as a living planet (a verb). The verb that is the universe is constantly evolving. The universe is creative. We take after our universe, but there's more. The universe is also compassionate, what scientist Brian Swimme calls "the ultimate compassion." The act of creativity, the act of making the world a more beautiful place, is a compassionate act. It is our gift to each other. (For those interested in learning more about this and other paradigm shifts, I strongly recommend a simple book by Brian Swimme called The Universe Is a Green Dragon: A Cosmic Creation Story.)
STARTING A CHURCH CHILDREN'S CHOIR
People often think that the purpose of a children's choir is to perform during worship from time to time. Performance (or celebration) is the goal, the frosting on the cake, but the real heart of a children's choir is in the week-to-week community-building and skill development that occurs.
A simple model of a children's choir is to rehearse a song with a group of children. Rehearse it four or five weeks in a row (or more, if you have children who attend on alternate weeks). Have the group memorize the song, and discuss what the words mean, telling the song's stories. Then have the children share the song with other children or with the entire congregation.
For this simple model, I recommend that the children in each choir be within the same age range. Quite often older singers don't want to sing with younger singers. They don't want to sing "children's music"; they want to be challenged. For special occasions it is possible to mix older singers and younger singers, but I recommend that the youth be assigned as big brother/sisters for the younger children. Assign them actual responsibilities, not token jobs.
More advanced children's choir models require one or more professional conductors and several willing parent volunteers to coordinate the numerous details involved. Ideally, this model encompasses three age groups roughly divided by grade levels (grades 2—5, 6—8, and 9—12) or by level of singing ability. Many larger churches, such as the All Souls Unitarian Universalist Church in Tulsa, Oklahoma, and The First Church in Belmont, Unitarian Universalist in Belmont, Massachusetts, have ambitious children's choir programs.
The Unitarian Universalist Musicians Network (UUMN) publishes a guidebook on staffing a music program, called Music In Our Congregations: A Handbook for Staffing a Music Program in UU Congregations (see Resources). The UUMN also sponsors the National Honors Children's Choir that coincides with the UU General Assembly. Contact the UUMN at uumn @ uumn.org (at mailto:uumn@uumn.org) for information about auditioning children from your church for participation.
Whether you choose a simple or advanced model, I recommend that your choir(s) be repertoire-based, which simply means that you feature several songs in a repertoire for years at a time. These may even become theme songs. The more the children share the songs with others—for example, during worship or coffee hour, at church potlucks, at other places of worship, church bazaars, or on civic public occasions—the better they will become at singing and the stronger their community will be. Encourage the choirs to move their bodies, whether by swaying or engaging simple hand movements, to better bring out the message of the song. More adventurous choreography is not beyond the reach of most children. Certainly circle and line dances can work beautifully. There are few things more beautiful than a children's choir singing a processional or recessional. Dim the lights at night, light candles, and you have something that is downright holy.
Three incentives that will attract members to your children's choir are children's musicals/operettas, choir tours, and camp retreats. All require a lot of parent volunteer time, but they also do wonders for retaining singers in the choir program.
The great singing congregations are the ones in which the music director sees the congregation itself as the primary choir, with smaller choirs and ensembles within it. Similarly, you can treat your entire children's and youth program like one giant choir, with smaller sub-choirs organized by grade levels. Remember what songwriter Bill Staines has sung many times: "All God's critters got a place in the choir." Such a goal requires tremendous vision, but that is what Tapestry of Faith is all about: tools to make our faith communities come to life.
Chapter 3 - Four Simple Guidelines for Great Singing
(From The Nick Page Sing with Us Songbook, based on Sing and Shine On! An Innovative Guide to Leading Multicultural Song)
I have been leading songs to all ages for many years. I encounter non-singers, inexperienced singers, singers who haven't learned how to sing in tune (everyone can learn), and people who simply hate to sing. I have developed simple tricks to help them on their way. They work with all ages. Children are always more receptive to singing than adults. Something happens, particularly with males, when puberty sets in. The voice changes and something that used to be fun suddenly becomes awkward. Adolescence is also a time of rollercoaster emotions. Singing is, in part, the act of vocalizing one's emotions. Adolescence is an age when letting out one's emotions is a risky thing. The challenge for the song leader, both with adolescents and adults, is to make singing emotionally acceptable. The following guidelines work with all ages and are intended for all song leaders, whether they be non-musicians or seasoned pros.
GUIDELINE ONE: MAKE EVERY GROUP SOUND FANTASTIC
No one enjoys doing anything poorly. Mediocrity has no emotional reward. It breeds more mediocrity, and that breeds discipline and other problems. Make the singers sound great. Make them know they are great. Here are some simple tips:
1. Create a Positive Environment. In Chapter 1 I wrote about creating a supportive environment, including a segment in which I ask the children to mimic polishing their fingernails on their collars. They then repeat after me, "We are the best," followed by a whole sequence of positive phrases. These are all spoken, with no particular rhythm. I do this to create a positive environment, one in which emotions and creativity can flow. The children repeat, "We are the best!" This attitude is central to creating a positive environment. Expect the best: the best discipline (which means the best focus) and the best singing.
The song goes on, "I'm not better than you / You're not better than me." Singers must respect each other and support each other. There are a lot of adults in the world who no longer sing because other children (or teachers) made fun of their voices when they were children. There is no room for ridicule in a supportive environment.
The song continues, "We have no 'blahs'." Engage the children emotionally. We're talking operatic proportions. Singing is, at its core, an emotional experience. When we open our mouths to sing, the sound that comes out is pure emotion. The more singers let out their emotions, the more engaged they will be.
2. The Echo Technique. Echo songs are simple and easy for any group to sing. It is essential, however, that we never dumb down. If the singers don't echo accurately, tell them so (with a smile) and then ask them to do a simple thing: listen. Wake up their ears. Wake up their minds. The echo song is a perfect tool for this, but it's not enough just to echo the pitches and words. They must also echo the emotions. I call this dynamic listening—listening with heart, mind, and body. This leads to being engaged in heart, mind, and body.
I often begin a sing with a simple echo activity. It creates confidence in the singers, particularly if you can make them sound great. It wakes up their ears and prepares them for learning more challenging songs. And it engages their emotions, always the key element. (There is more info on the Echo Technique later in this chapter.)
3. The Nick Page Marshmallows-in-the-Mouth Technique. So how do we make a group of non-singers sound great? People new to singing often sing in a mushy and unenthusiastic manner. Say this to them: "Hold out your hands." They mimic all the motions. "Pretend your hand is full of marshmallows. When I give the signal, put the marshmallows in your mouth and repeat after me." They pretend to fill their mouths with marshmallows. You then sing a phrase of a song you are learning, but sing it with marshmallows-in-the-mouth mushiness. They echo (or sing along with you the first time).
Now you say, "Chew the marshmallows. Swallow the marshmallows. Now pretend your voice is like a drum. You're going to hit the note as if you are hitting a drum." You then demonstrate the same phrase with them echoing. You conclude, "This is called percussive singing. Do you notice how much better you sound?" To congratulate good work, I often give the zest hand sign (in which the children pretend to polish their fingernails on their shirt lapels as a silent signal that they're the best).
4. The Break-the-Ice Technique. We can grow irritated when children don't respond as we wish. We can jump up and down and plead with them to sing until we are blue in the face. What is happening is, they have not been given permission to let their emotions out. But sometimes the simple truth is the singers themselves are the ones who can "break the ice," giving each other the green light to open up and sing. The "ice" is a wall we all create to shield us from having to feel or express emotions, so the trick is to eliminate the wall and give permission for them to express their emotions through song.
Within minutes of beginning a sing, I find a charismatic member of the audience and have him or her come up front (sometimes more than one student). I have my volunteer echo the motions with me (the volunteer doesn't have to sing). The volunteer usually puts on a great show, giving his or her gestures a real Broadway flourish. The other children will respond enthusiastically, and instantly there is a change: the volunteer has broken the ice, torn down the wall, and given everyone permission to let out their emotions and sing. Throughout a sing, I continue to invite volunteers to help out. The children echo the emotions of their peers. Don't be afraid to ask your fellow teachers to help break the ice.
5. The Smiles-and-Frowns Technique. To demonstrate how central the emotions are to singing, try the Smiles-and-Frowns Technique. Bring up a volunteer. If the volunteer has an upcoming birthday, that's even better. Ask the volunteer to give everyone a great big happy face. Have the audience echo the happy face. Then ask for a sad, pouty face (with audience echo), then an angry face. Explain that everyone is going to sing "Happy Birthday" to the volunteer (make sure everyone knows the person's name).
Explain that when you say "happy face," everyone is to sing with a happy face. When you say "sad face," they sing with a sad face, and the same with an angry face. For the four phrases of "Happy Birthday" I usually do happy, sad, happy, angry. Then sing the song with these facial expressions. Everyone will be amazed at the results. The phrases with happy faces sound happy and the phrases with sad faces sound sad. Bring home to everyone how central these emotions are to singing.
Next step: Say, "Now I want you all to show happiness in your faces, but don't sound happy. Show sadness, but don't sound sad. Show anger, but don't sound angry." These are the isolation exercises I described earlier. Call out the emotions as everyone sings "Happy Birthday" again. The children will see that it is a remarkable challenge. You can supplement this activity by having the children walk around the room showing happiness, then sadness, and then anger. Then have them isolate their movement and singing, moving with one emotion and singing with another—not an easy trick, but fun!
6. The Nick Page No-Fault Harmony Technique. Ask older singers who have already learned to sing in tune to make up harmonies. You may have to first explain what a harmony is. Use a simple song like "There Is More Love Somewhere" (Singing the Living Tradition, #95) or a well-known song like "Happy Birthday" or "Amazing Grace." Introduce the Nick Page No-Fault Harmony Technique. Say, "It is like No-Fault Driving Insurance where you drive until you hit something, then turn. With no-fault harmonies, you find a note that sounds good. Keep singing that note until it doesn't sound good anymore. Then find a new note, and if you sing the wrong note, it's nobody's fault."
You can demonstrate this technique by having a small group sing the melody while you sing one note, switching notes when appropriate. Then have half the singers sing the melody while the other half makes up a harmony. Be sure to give both sides their starting pitches. Then switch the roles, so the other half makes up a harmony, perhaps giving the group a different starting note. This simple technique works surprisingly well. Singers find themselves stumbling into wonderful harmonies, harmonies that could never be reproduced on the written page. Sing the song a few times, allowing everyone to be creative. By the end, they will be wondrous (see Guideline Two). Be sure to choose a simple sing. Some songs are easier to harmonize than others; repetitive phrases are a good thing to look for, such as those in "Swing Low, Sweet Chariot."
7. The Own-the-Song Technique. Give the audience permission to "own the song." If you are singing a simple song like "There Is More Love" or "Amazing Grace," invite singers (a few is fine) to improvise counterpoints to the melodies. Counterpoints are phrases that weave between the phrases of the song, using the words of the song itself. Something magical happens. You create something completely new. An old song is reborn. You "own the song." The folk process comes alive when we give ourselves permission to make these subtle changes. "There Is More Love" is a zipper song (see the zipper song, in Chapter 6). Ask the audience for a new word like "There is more light somewhere" or "There is more justice somewhere." Make all changes with great respect to the tradition from which the song evolved. You would not, for example, want to sing, "There is more bubblegum somewhere."
Making up harmonies, making respectful changes to the words, adding counterpoint, singing the song high, low, fast, slow, or adding a variety of instrumental accompaniment—these are all simple changes that will give everyone a sense of ownership, an empowerment in which each member of the group feels this song exists because we are singing it. And then they may come to the realization that when we change the song, the song changes us. Think of the first time one of your elders displayed one of your finger paintings on the kitchen refrigerator or school wall. In that moment, you were helping to shape your environment. By shaping your environment, it became yours; you owned it. The same is true when we respectfully change songs.
A spiritual like "This Little Light of Mine" can sound lifeless. When we invite audience members to respectfully add new words, movement, harmonies, counterpoints, and claps, the song comes to life. We create a greater empathy for the song and its culture. We create a firsthand experience in which our voices mean something—our singing together as a community means something.
This folk process can also have negative results, particularly if we disrespect the song's tradition. I once saw a chorus end an otherwise excellent concert with a show choir version of "Go Down Moses." "Go Down Moses" is a powerful African American spiritual that uses the words of Moses, "Let my people go," to speak of the universal quest for freedom. It is a song born of the suffering of slavery that also shouts of hope. A show choir, on the other hand, is a choreographed choral entertainment. Show choirs can be great fun, but spirituals deserve serious treatment.
8. Tips for teaching people to sing in tune. Many adults stopped singing as children after someone told them they were out of tune or that they should "mouth the words." Singing is a very emotional activity, so being told you can't sing can create a deep wound. For this reason, it is essential to have a supportive environment. No child should be allowed to criticize or make fun of another child's singing voice. A positive environment is one in which every problem has a solution and where everyone supports each other, solving problems together.
A) Here is the simplest place to begin: Sing songs that are easy to sing in tune. For younger children, this means songs that have the descending minor third (na na, na na, na na na na na). It also means singing repetitive songs that don't have a large range of pitches (not too high and not too low).
B) For singers who are stuck in their lower voices, have them imitate a siren. On different vowels, have them swoop from their lowest pitches to their highest, then back again. Use beautiful, clean vowels like oo as opposed to screeching. Speaking in a very high voice, have the singers echo back in their own high voices. Use high spoken phrases like, "Hello everyone," or "What a lovely day." Use a slightly operatic tone to make it fun and to help the singers discover the higher parts of their voices.
C) Try to sing in a range in which the six notes from middle C to the A above is your center. Children are more apt to sing lower pitches out of tune, simply because they don't hear lower pitches as well as higher pitches.
D) Give the starting pitch. Using the first pitch, simply sing, "Here's your first pitch" or a similar phrase. If you're ever in a restaurant and you hear people singing "Happy Birthday" wildly out of tune, walk up to them and say, "Excuse me, I just read this great article that said all you have to do is give the first pitch and people will sing in tune." Give them the first pitch (middle C is a good note for "Happy Birthday") and see the results:in-tune singing. There is a simple formula: If you can hear the pitch, you can sing the pitch.
E) Singers who sing the pitch too low can benefit from a simple "wind-up" technique in which you ask them to slide their pitch up until they reach the note you are singing. You can pretend to wind them up as you do this. They will hear when they are singing the right note and stop sliding their pitch. With singers who routinely sing off pitch, simply ask them to stop and listen. Do this in a very positive way.
F) For boys whose voices are changing, particularly boys who don't do a lot of singing, singing the high notes becomes difficult and embarrassing. Most, at this stage, are not able to sing the low notes either. There is a range, called the cambiata range, from the F below middle C to the E above middle C. It is a small range, but it is a range that is more comfortable for boys whose voices are changing. These boys will have to sing a simple harmony within the cambiata range. Anders Nyberg edited two books of South African songs (see Resources). These songbooks (with CDs) have ideal tenor parts for boys whose voices are changing.
G) Sing a cappella. Singing without the aid of instruments requires singers to focus on listening. Instruments can drown them out so they don't really listen to themselves.
H) Right-handed people tend to have a hearing dominance in the right ear, while the left ear is usually hearing-dominant for left-handed people. In a chorus or classroom situation, seat strong singers by the dominant ear of the singers who need a little help. Don't do this in a way that embarrasses anyone.
Be rid of the popular misconception that some people can't sing in tune. Singing in tune requires two simple steps. First, singers must be able to hear the pitch. Second, they must then be able to sing that pitch. The first step is key. This process of "inner hearing" is often overlooked. People who sing out of tune are either not hearing the pitch correctly or they are hearing one of the many high overtones we create when we sing.
When we sing an ah vowel, we might not be aware of it, but we are creating several pitches simultaneously: high overtones two octaves and a third or fifth higher. The out-of-tune singer sometimes hears these high overtones, reproduces them accurately, and then we tell the singer he or she is not singing the note we are giving when the singer actually is; the singer is simply reproducing the high overtones. This is a complicated way of saying that we all hear differently. Children hear high sounds like the high overtones that many adults no longer hear. Adults hear low sounds that young children cannot hear yet.
The oo vowel is a safe vowel to have singers listen to and reproduce. It has relatively few high overtones and is the easiest one for singers to hear. The next step is to get the singers to truly listen to the pitch you give them. The key word in teaching people to sing in tune is listen. The same focus that is required to echo phrases accurately is required to listen (in our heads) to the pitches and sing them in tune. Expecting great things, like dynamic listening, creates great results.
Note that, with a very small percentage of singers, it is not about waking up lazy ears; some people have hearing loss they may or may not be aware of. The reason they can't sing a note in tune may be because they simply can't hear it. Their ears (or one ear or the other) might have range gaps where they hear some pitches better than others.
Guideline One Conclusion. Using these simple tricks, teachers can create great group singing. These techniques are tried and true; you simply have to trust them. Sometimes a beginning song leader will give up on getting a group to sing with energy. It can be frustrating. But you need to know that they can sing. Don't try to master all the above techniques all at once. Start by creating a positive environment, then eventually move to the Break-the-Ice Technique, then to the Frowns-and-Smiles Technique, then the Marshmallows Technique. You will find that each of these techniques will help make the children better singers.
GUIDELINE TWO: CREATE CONFIDENCE
Many people won't sing along if they become frustrated while learning a song. Imagine that a song leader sings a long song in a foreign language, and then asks the children to repeat it back. They won't be able to do it. Their confidence will diminish and they won't want to sing. For this reason, use every tool you can to create confidence. Use word sheets or overhead projections. Use written music. If teaching by rote (see Teaching songs by rote, in Chapter 5), begin by speaking the words only and having the children repeat them. Then do the same with short phrases. Do all this in a way that makes the children feel good about themselves. Gradually, as their confidence and memory grow, they can learn the song. You may want to have them learn only the chorus or one verse the first time you introduce a song. Use some of the techniques mentioned above, like percussive singing, to make them sound better. Then say, "You are sounding good!"
Confidence, however, is not your final goal. You want to transcend confidence to create awe. Using the techniques described above, any group can sound wonderful. Creating awe simply means letting the group shine and letting the children become aware of their potential, their light. If the children are elated by how good they sound after you finish a song, then you have transcended confidence and entered the realm of wonder.
GUIDELINE THREE: TEACH SONGS AS IF YOU WERE TEACHING THEM TO YOURSELF
In order to create confidence, children must learn the songs well. Constantly ask yourself, "If I were learning this song, what would I need?" It may mean using word sheets or overhead transparencies. It may mean using hand signs, like a reaching gesture for the word reach, and other simple movements that are powerful tools for teaching by rote. Teaching the song will definitely require repetition, particularly if you teach by rote. Repeat the words. Repeat the phrases. Repeat longer phrases. Then, when you sing the song again a week later, ask yourself, "If I had learned this song a week ago, would I remember it now?"
But don't let the rote process become dumbing down. Children must work at remembering what you teach. When teaching older youth, some song leaders say, "I'll give you your part twice and that's all. You have to get it." They will.
We all learn differently. Some of us benefit from hand signs and movement, while others need word sheets. Still others simply need to listen to the melodies. All of us benefit from repetition.
GUIDELINE FOUR: HONOR CULTURAL TRADITIONS
Songs tell stories or are a part of great stories that need to be told. When we tell the story behind a song or behind the world of that song, we create empathy, an understanding in the heart. The song "Thula Klizeo" (Singing the Journey, #1056) comes from a rich South African culture of singing and dancing. The words mean something, and the dance means something. In order for the full power of the song to emerge, these stories need to be told; otherwise it's just fun sounds. (For more information about "Thula Klizeo," see Teaching songs by rote, in Chapter 5, and my book, Sing and Shine On!.)
The Irish song "Cockles and Mussels" tells the story of Molly Malone, who long ago sold shellfish by walking house-to-house shouting, "Cockles! Mussels! Alive, alive-o." In the days before TV and radio (and the Web), this shouting was called advertising. Tell this story. It gives the song meaning and depth. Folk songs are like living things: When we sing them, they come alive. When we tell their stories, we honor the traditions themselves and help keep those traditions alive too.
All cultures are different. To honor other traditions, we must be aware of their differences. We can change the words to many folksongs (with respect). In fact, changing the words can actually honor the folk process, a process whereby the constant evolution of the music is part of the tradition. But with sacred folksongs like spirituals, keeping the original words honors the culture. Changing the words to these sacred songs, sometimes in an effort to accommodate a more liberal theology, can become a form of cultural misappropriation. (See Misappropriation, in Chapter 8.) It is always best to honor the original intent of each culture.
The song leader Dr. Ysaye Maria Barnwell of the African American women's vocal group Sweet Honey in the Rock is a Unitarian Universalist. She balances her own liberal religious beliefs with the beliefs of the living traditions of spirituals and gospel songs. In the amazing songs that she writes, like "Wanting Memories" or "Breathes," her deeply spiritual language speaks to her liberal theology, one that embraces all of humanity. And when she sings the old songs from her African American heritage, she honors those traditions with every breath of her being. I was introduced to the teaching of Dr. Barnwell at an Omega Institute weeklong workshop based on her book Singing in the African American Tradition. Before each song, she or George Barnwell spoke at length about history—sometimes painful history—so that when we sang, "Let my people go," these words had a new meaning, a new power. They came alive, and we sang with an emotional intensity that could move mountains.
Tell the stories. Dr. Barnwell's CD collection is an excellent resource for the African American tradition. Another resource is the UUA curriculum (with songbook) called Timeless Themes that uses spirituals and their stories to teach biblical history. More and more songbooks come with stories and historical information for each song, particularly the songbooks and CDs from World Music Press. There is a book listed in Resources called Ballad of America: A History of the United States through Folk Song, by a father-and-son team named Scott. Beginning with colonial days and ending with the civil rights movement, the book makes history and culture come alive through the combination of songs and stories.
Strive to be authentic by singing each song as close to the original style as possible. But also be yourself. Know that when one culture sings the songs of another culture, something beautiful can emerge: music that honors both the other culture and your own. My website, www.nickmusic.com, has several essays on the issue of multiculturalism in education.
Chapter 4 - How to Choose a Song
There are some songs that work with all ages and others that work best for specific ages. Echo songs and call-and-response songs work with everyone (except preschool children), as do many chants and one-verse songs. Preschool children need play songs that include circle activities, bounce-on-the-knee movement, march-around-the-room movement, and rolling-ball movement. Simple singing games are a great success, as are songs that tell stories, particularly repetitive stories.
Children in kindergarten through second grade are ready for simple echo songs, unison songs with lots of repetition, and simple call-and-response songs. They also love songs that have movement or involve a story. You can begin with simple rounds and partner songs (two or more songs sung at the same time). Pitch the songs between middle C and the A above and stay within this six-note range. Avoid going lower than middle C, simply because younger children can't hear the low notes as well.
Third- through fifth-graders can sing the same songs as K—2 as well as more rounds, partner songs, part songs (songs with harmony or counterpoint), and songs that have many verses that require a lot of reading. This group's singing range is from middle C to the C above that. Children's choirs at this age routinely sing to the F above that.
Youth can also sing the songs that younger children sing, but they are ready for songs that provide more challenge, both in terms of text and music. If junior-high-age youth sing unenthusiastically, use the marshmallow technique I described earlier to get them to sing more percussively. When their voices change, boys have a hard time singing both the high treble pitches and the low bass pitches. Their comfortable range (the cambiata range) is between the G below middle C and the D above middle C, a five-note range that limits what they can comfortably do. A book like Freedom Is Coming, edited by Anders Nyberg, has tenor parts that are ideal for this vocal range.
Chants are another source of songs for children. Chants are repetitive songs often used during rituals in many traditions. The diversity of chants on which you can draw is quite inspiring and includes Native American, Islamic, Jewish, Pagan, Christian, Earth-Centered, New Age, and the Sufi Dances of Universal Peace. Since Unitarian Universalists seek truth from diverse world faiths, these chants are a powerful resource for us.
Embracing the circle is often the emphasis of these songs. There is great beauty in the community a circle creates. Everyone experiences everyone else. It is an actual circle, but it is also the paradigm of the circle. Navahos speak of "walking in beauty," meaning we can be in a circle as equals with all life and all spirits. One can sit in the circle, dance in the circle, or drum in the circle.
Many of the well-known chants, like "The Earth Is Our Mother," have grown out of the folk tradition. We don't know who wrote them. They often are attributed to Native American, Pagan, or other traditions, but the scholarly work that is needed to find out if they actually come from these traditions has not been done. If it is not an actual Native American song, "The Earth Is Our Mother" was definitely inspired by Native American chant, but many Native Americans will remind you that they don't ever sing phrases like "Hey yanna, ho yanna." I asked an Apache friend about this once, and she remembered singing a song similar to "The Earth Is Our Mother" as a child. Wanting not to insult anyone's tradition, I preface such a chant by saying that the chant we are about to sing is probably a contemporary chant that draws its inspiration from Native American traditions. I also do everything I can to make it come alive with energy, spirit, and emotion.
In your choice of songs, try to honor the many religious traditions embraced by Unitarian Universalists, including Humanist, Christian, Jewish, Earth-Centered, Pagan, Buddhist, and Hindu. Try to honor the great diversity of cultural traditions including songs from the bisexual, gay, lesbian, and transgender community. Every culture creates its own music as well the songs shared by all of us. Folksinger, activist, and actor Theodore Bikel doesn't use the term melting pot to describe the great diversity of human expression. He prefers to call it a kaleidoscope, constantly changing colors and constantly surprising us with its beauty.
WHERE TO FIND SONGS
The Web. There are websites dedicated to song lyrics, some with chord symbols, some with music you can download as PDF files. I suggest you search Google or ask.com for "song lyrics." You won't find everything, but finding lyrics online is quicker than transcribing them from a recording.
For those who don't read music, you can scan music and create PDF files, then use PDFtoMusic software that you can download (including some free scaled-down versions) to listen to the music. The computer can even replicate the song lyrics, although often with off-kilter results. Search PDFtoMusic to find the software that best fits your needs.
Songbooks. John Feierabend created a series of songbooks for preschoolers, featuring bounce songs and ball-rolling songs, as well as songbooks for kindergarten and up, including The Book of Echo Songs,The Book of Canons, and The Book of Call & Response. These and many other books and CDs are listed in Resources.
The UUA offers four hymnals: Singing the Living Tradition; its follow-up, Singing the Journey; a collection of Choral Responses; and a wonderful new children's hymnal, May This Light Shine: A Songbook for Children and Youth. Both the teacher edition and the children's edition of this indispensable collection are available.
The UUA Bookstore (www.uuabookstore.org) offers collections like Sing Your Peace Songbook, Now Let Us Sing!, and Come Into the Circle: Worshiping with Children.
For Islamic and Hindu songs that children can sing and dance to, look for the songbooks published by Dances of Universal Peace (see Resources).
For Jewish songs for children, go to http://www.jewishmusic.com (at www.jewishmusic.com/). This is the website of Tara Publications, a company that specializes in recordings and songbooks for all ages on all the many Jewish traditions. If you are looking for Israeli hip-hop or Yiddish Gilbert and Sullivan, Tara Publications will have it. I am particularly fond of The Harvard Hillel Sabbath Songbook (see Resources).
Songs of Zion is a wonderful collection of African American hymns, spirituals, and gospel selections. These include chapters that explain each tradition. I also love Dr. Ysaye Barnwell's Singing in the African American Tradition, a set of CDs on which she teaches the parts (mostly for more experienced singers).
There are more and more collections being released on CD and DVD, particularly from cultures that defy the Western tradition of written music. These are songs that are intended to stay within the oral tradition, a tradition of learning songs without the aid of hymnals or songbooks. More and more denominations are publishing collections of songs you can teach without hymnals. GIA Publications, for example, publishes several collections by John Bell of simple Christian songs from all around the world that children can learn by rote. In synagogues, the music of Shlomo Carlebach, with its simple yet passionate phrases, has grown in popularity. Many of these songs offer choruses in the niggun (nign) style. The niggun is a Chasidic wordless prayer that people sing and dance. Singers chant syllables like "Yoy yoy yoy" or "Dy dy dy." These wordless nigguns are considered the highest form of worshipful song and must be treated with utmost respect when they are used in worship.
Hymnals from other traditions are excellent resources. I am particularly fond of the old United Church of Christ Pilgrim Hymnal, the Shaker Hymnal, the Friends Hymnal, and GIA Publications' African American Hymnal (non-denominational). Your church probably has copies of out-of-print Unitarian (red) and Universalist hymnals, each of which includes wonderful old gems.
There are several excellent Earth-Centered songbooks, but some of them may be out of print. They are worth hunting down through used books outlets or Amazon.com. Look for Kate Marks' Circle of Song: Songs, Chants, and Dances for Ritual and Celebration; Julie Forest Middleton's Songs For Earthlings: A Green Spirituality Songbook; and a collection called For the Beauty of the Earth, an environmental songbook to benefit the Hudson River Sloop Clearwater. Libana's songbooks (with CDs), A Circle Is Cast, Night Passage, and Fire Within, are still in print (www.libana.com), as are Joanne Hammil's Rounds & Partner Songs, Vols. 1 and 2 (songbooks and CDs). This Ancient Love: Reflective Songs of Carolyn McDade, a collection of thirty-six early Carolyn McDade songs, is still in print—as are several of her CDs (www.carolynmcdademusic.com). Her 2007 CD, My Heart is Moved, is full of her new earth-centered hymns. I am fond of Jim Scott's Earth and Spirit Songbook: An Anthology of Songs Celebrating Earth and Peace. This book and his CDs are available at www.jimscottmusic.com. Jim Scott wrote several of the songs in Paul Winter's Missa Gaia/Earth Mass. (See Resources for more information about the above titles.)
Simplifying songs. It is often necessary to simplify songs for children. They obviously don't need to sing hymns in four-part harmony when the melody alone will do. The same is true of many choral pieces like the songs in Anders Nyberg's South African collections, including Freedom Is Coming. A song like "Thuma Mina (Hear My Prayer)" can sound lovely when a group sings it in unison. Children don't need to learn all the verses of songs with many verses. They can learn the chorus and one or two verses, while you or a singer from an older youth group sing additional verses.
While it is okay to simplify songs, be careful not to simplify other languages. Children are good at picking up languages as long as you don't try to do too much.
CDs and DVDs. Teachers who need to learn songs by rote (as opposed to reading music) love the Rise Up Singing songbook and its accompanying set of CDs. The book provides only the lyrics (except on rounds) and you learn the melodies from the CDs. A California company called Music for Little People sells many CDs (with no songbooks) of children's songs that you can play in the background or sing along with. I prefer singing with no instruments or CD backup, but for some, singing along with a CD is far less threatening. My favorite Music for Little People CDs are All for Freedom and I Got Shoes, by Sweet Honey in the Rock.
Mollie Stone, a conductor with the Chicago Children's Choir, provides a DVD called Vela Vela from which children and youth can learn South African songs by echoing and watching South African singers sing and dance. Anders Nyberg has two sets of CDs of great South African songs, with songbooks. For nonmusical readers who want to learn and teach new songs, the resources keep growing.
Popular songs. The Unitarian Universalist movement is not the first to use popular songs in worship. It is an old tradition. Martin Luther brought a German drinking song into the church by changing the words to "A Mighty Fortress Is Our God." After the Civil War, church musicians introduced the popular-song format, brought into common use by Stephen Foster, to their churches. This new format, including the gospel song "Shall We Gather at the River" (Singing the Journey, #1046), helped bring people back to the church. "Praise songs" are extremely popular in contemporary Christian worship, as are popular-song formats within Jewish worship. There are Jewish hip-hop artists who employ something they call heeb-hop.
This kind of new music isn't always welcome. Many congregants prefer the older prayers, hymns, and anthems. The best solution is to create a balance between the old and the new.
SECURING PERMISSION TO COPY WORDS OR MUSIC
It is illegal and unethical to make multiple printed copies of copyrighted music. For information about purchasing or obtaining permission to print copies of music published by the UUA, go to http://www.uua.org/publications/singingjourney/50630.shtml (at www.uua.org/publications/singingjourney/50630.shtml). The UUA is developing a new system for simplifying the permissions process, but until this system is in place, the above website is your best bet. If you are dealing with non-UUA publishers, ask for their permissions department. They will usually accommodate your needs in a courteous, though not always timely, fashion. Anyone planning to copy material for an official UU function is required to obtain permission well ahead of time.
Mechanical Licenses. If you are making five hundred or more DVD or CD copies, you are required by law (and ethics) to pay what are called mechanical licenses. These give you permission to reproduce a copyrighted song (as opposed to a song that is in the public domain). Most copyrighted songs are registered with a company called The Harry Fox Agency. You can pay and register at the agency's website (http://www.harryfox.com/public/songfile.jsp (at www.harryfox.com/public/songfile.jsp) or simply http://www.harryfox.com (at www.harryfox.com/)). If you are a songwriter, but are not registered with Harry Fox, you have to contact the agency directly to obtain and/or pay for permission. Mechanical licenses are for recordings, not for print copies of the music.
Chapter 5 - Song-Teaching Strategies
Whatever song-teaching technique you use, it is vital to teach with energy. One of the biggest problems I repeatedly observe when I teach classes and workshops in song leading is people who teach with insufficient energy. Song teachers can follow every guideline and have the most brilliant strategy for teaching a new song, but if their energy is low and they are singing in a lackluster fashion, the students will not learn the song well; they will merely mirror the low-energy teacher. A high-energy teacher, on the other hand, will generate significant energy. In fact, I have seen high-energy teachers break every rule in the book, using little or no strategy, and still have wonderful results. One song leader, a student of mine, sang three lines in Japanese with terrific energy, then asked everyone to repeat them. Normally the results would have been catastrophic. No one would have remembered the first word, let alone the entire three lines, but because of this teacher's remarkable ability to sing with energy and to instill confidence and vitality in her students, the results were amazing. The children were focused.
Just what does teaching with energy mean? It means expecting great things; singing with lots of emotion, sometimes even operatic proportions; singing clearly and exactly—not slurring the melody or stumbling over the rhythm; modeling proper posture while singing, with both feet on the floor, and having good eye contact with the students. Teaching with energy means singing with resonance, as opposed to with a dull, breathy tone; singing with a strong sense of forward motion—not allowing the word phrases to fade away, but helping them build; singing with percussive consonants, as opposed to mushy pronunciations. Most importantly, energetic teaching means understanding the message of the song and its tradition, so you can teach it with a sense of meaning. When a song inspires you, the students will be equally inspired and will learn the song with enthusiasm.
In this chapter and the next, I introduce a wide variety of song-teaching strategies. Have fun with them, and have fun with your students
THE ECHO SONG
An echo song is a song in which the leader calls out a phrase and the group repeats it. You can find this form of song in a variety of styles all around the world. It is the easiest song-teaching technique and it is always exciting—assuming you are excited about the song and convey that excitement when you teach it. Students will not only echo what you sing, they will also echo your energy.
The most common form of echo song is one in which a leader sings something and the group echoes it exactly. My "UU Children's Blessing" in May This Light Shine: A Songbook for Children and Youth is an example of this kind of song. To teach it, speak or sing the words with an improvised bluesy melody. Have the children echo. Exaggeration is the game; have fun—don't take the teaching of it too seriously. Add simple hand signs to it by counting your fingers, as you would in the children's game this song parodies, starting with the pinky finger. I often preface the blessing by saying, "The Medieval mystic Meister Eckhart said, 'If you say one prayer in your life, let it be 'Thank You.'"
Well, well, well, well (echo)
This little piggy (echo)
Believes in God. (sim.)
And this little piggy
Believes in the Goddess.
And this little piggy
Believes in multiple deities.
And this little piggy
Believes in none.
But all of us little piggies
All of us little piggies
Gotta say "Thank you, thank you, thank you,"
"Thank you, thank you, thank you,"
"Thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you"
All the way home.
Amen,
Blessed Be,
Shalom,
Have a nice day.
(Note: I did this song at a Unitarian Universalist fellowship once and was hissed for singing the line, "believes in God." For the second service I began with "believes in the Goddess," then did, "believes in God." But I find it sad that in a religion that professes to welcome diversity, there would be intolerance for a diversity of thought. This is called fundamentalism.)
To lead an echo song, you simply find the right vocal range (not too high and not too low; B up to B), smile, and ask the students for an echo. Then sing each phrase and have the group echo. At first you may want to join the children when they echo, but eventually you should have them echo on their own. If they make mistakes the first time through, it is okay to simply repeat the phrase or a part of the phrase until they sing it correctly. Do this without losing the beat. In other words, don't stop the song to fix the mistakes; simply make the corrections part of the song. To repeat once again, don't dumb down. Just because a song is simple doesn't mean you should expect less from your students.
Maintain a steady beat. If there is an interruption—say, a visitor enters the room or a child asks a question—keep the pulse going. You may want to tap the pulse on your knee or have the children tap their knees to the beat (or alternate knee-clap-knee-clap). This principle holds for all echo songs.
You may sometimes want to adapt a regular song into an echo song. The song "Thula Klizeo" (see Teaching songs by rote, below) works well as an echo song, especially with younger children who may have difficulty learning the whole song in Zulu. You begin, "Thula klizeo." They echo, "Thula klizeo." You continue, "Na-la-pa-sey-ki-ya." They echo, "Na-la-pa-sey-ki-ya." Keep a steady beat as you continue. Repeat the song as long as you wish, and add the dance.
Have I mentioned that, week after week, you should sing every song you teach and make some of the songs a standard part of ritual? ("Go Now in Peace" may be such a song.) Songs from Singing the Journey that you can adapt into echo songs include "There's a River Flowing in my Heart" (#1007), "23rd Psalm" (#1038), " Eli Eli" (#1044; in both Hebrew and English), and the old gospel song, "Shall We Gather at the River" (#1046).
Gospel song evolved after the Civil War, in both black and white churches. It borrows the popular song format of alternating verses with a chorus. Also, the term gospel song does not necessarily mean such a song represents a specific gospel style—of which there are many—although it can. Thomas Dorsey's "Precious Lord" (Singing the Living Tradition, #199) is a gospel song we can sing in a variety of gospel styles. "Shall We Gather at the River" is a gospel song that is normally sung in hymn style, but with great gusto.
Using the echo technique to teach a hymn is actually a very old tradition. It is called lining out. Two hundred years ago, hymnals were rare and only included the lyrics. Leaders called out each line and everyone echoed. A leader teaching "Amazing Grace," for example, would sing, "Amazing Grace, how sweet the sound," and the congregation repeated the phrase. Once the melody was familiar, the congregation could sing the line, "that saved a wretch like me," after which the leader would quickly shout out, "I once was lost, but now I'm found," followed by the congregation singing that phrase. Because the leader shouted out the next line, the congregation could sing the hymn without stopping between verses. You can also use the echo technique to teach most rounds.
After a few weeks, once your group has learned an echo song, it is fun to ask the students to take turns leading it. Echo songs are great audience-involvement songs. (See The Book of Echo Songs, The Book of Canons, and The Book of Call & Response, all edited by John M. Feierabend, in Resources. These collections have great songs for children.)
It is easy to make up echo songs. Using two or three simple notes, such as sol,mi, and la in the universal playground chant, "na-na, na-na, na na na na nah-nah", lead a simple, silly call-and-response such as this: "Today is Sunday" (children echo), "It is a happy day" (echo), "A tip-toe-on-your-toes day" (echo), "A chase-the-clouds-away day (echo), "A peanut-and-sing-a-long-sandwich day" (echo).
Don't be afraid to be creative and spontaneous. If we had to plan every moment of our teaching day, we would never get any sleep. Make things up on the spur of the moment. Encourage creativity by setting up a creative environment—one in which you, the teacher, are creative. For example, echo songs make great transition songs. A transition song is a short song used to facilitate the end of one activity and the beginning of another. If you want to end a drawing activity and begin a gather-in-a-circle-and-worship activity, for instance, you could have your students echo, "Time to finish up" (echo), "Finish up your drawing" (echo), "Put away your papers" (echo), "Put away your crayons" (echo). Then, slowing down and getting softer, "Stand up quietly" (echo), "Come to the circle" (echo), "Make a nice circle" (echo). Then slower and softer still, "Ver—y Qui—etly" (echo), "Qui—et."
We sing slower and softer during this particular transition activity to create entrainment; when you slow down the pulse, it slows down the students' brain waves. We recognize it in the phrase, "Music calms the savage beast"—but be careful: some music animates the savage beast. For this reason, you can also use entrainment when transitioning from a quiet worship activity to a more playful activity. Simply start an echo song and gradually pick up the tempo: "Worship is over" (echo), "Time to get up now" (echo), "Time to jump up now" (echo), "Time to twist and shout now" (echo).
Scat. Scat is a style of jazz singing in which the singer makes up either nonsense syllables or word phrases like "do be doo wah, zee doo-da zee dwah" or "What's that scat cat doing with the hat, Matt?" Using the letters of the alphabet provides a simple way to teach scat singing to a class. Start by asking for letters. Lisa suggests the letter B, so you sing, "Ba ba ba biby baby bo" and the class echoes. You sing, "Be bop ba-boop bop bah" and the class echoes. As you might with any creative activity, narrow the river by using only two or three pitches (sol, mi, la) and keep the rhythms jazzy, but simple.
Next have everyone pair up. Ask one singer in each pair to sing a scat syllable to his or her partner, perhaps starting the letter B or D, and have the partner repeat it. Have everyone do this at once. It may be a little cacophonous, but the spark will be delightful. Then have the partners switch so the followers become the leaders. Remind the children to listen carefully, and tell the leaders that if the followers don't repeat the syllables correctly, they have to sing them again. By having the children sing in pairs you create confidence; it is emotionally safer to lead one person than it is to lead an entire class.
When the children are comfortable leading each other (perhaps after a week or two), you can assign a letter to everyone in the class. Then go around the room, asking each person to make up a scat phrase using his or her assigned letter while everyone else repeats the phrase. Avoid the letters F and P, as you may end with words like "pee-pee," "poo-poo," or worse.
Going around the circle like this helps build confidence in each singer, plus it's usually a lot of fun. Be careful, however—the wise guy/girl may want to throw in something negative. The best medicine is preventive medicine: Before you begin, tell the students there is no place for negativity in a positive classroom. If someone does something negative, respond immediately. Allowing children to get away with negative behavior sends a message that negative behavior is acceptable.
Speaking of the wise guy/girl, when asked to repeat after you he or she may play the game of repeating everything you say, even phrases like "Ready?" You can prevent this by making up a visual symbol for "repeat after me." Or you can use a method that Kodaly specialists such as Lois Choksy use: Before singing each echo song, you sing, "Be my echo." Everyone echoes, and then you begin the song. This technique is clear and it acts as an instant transition from a previous song or activity. You don't need to say, "Now we're going to sing an echo song." Simply begin the song.
The Moses Echo Song. Below is a marching drill song with new words that tell the story of Moses. You can include the song in a lesson on Moses. Or you can write new words to fit any lesson topic you are teaching: bullies, peace, Unitarianism, Universalism, biblical stories, other faiths, and so on.
Lead the song as an echo. Encourage students to tap their hands and march in place. It's a perfect song for using simple movements. Encourage older children to add harmonies.
Here's the creative part: Divide the children into groups of three or four and have each group write a verse or two. Keep the chorus as it is. Using the river analogy, be specific when telling the groups what to do. Say to one group, "Write a verse or two about Moses as a baby in Egypt" or "Write a story about Miriam saving Moses." Another group can write about Moses parting the Red Sea, while other groups have fun with the plagues and locusts. Have the older children write it all down. When they are done, they must share the song with everyone. The creative act is not complete until it is shared. If you have time, polish the song a bit. Suggest other rhymes. Be very positive. If possible, have your students share the song with all grades.
When we combine stories and creativity and sing with lots of emotion, we create a vibrant classroom that is alive with energy. The children learn their lessons both in the mind and in the heart. They own the process. As I said before, you can use the marching song to teach many lessons.
TEACHING SONGS BY ROTE
Learning songs by ear, as opposed to learning songs by reading music, is the basic strategy for teaching most but not all songs. The rote process involves no written music and most often no printed lyrics. Songs that are taught by rote are usually simple. Songs that are complicated or that have lots of words, particularly in other languages, require written lyrics either on overhead transparencies or word sheets.
There are six simple steps for teaching songs by rote.
1. Introduce the song, then wait for silence before continuing.
2. Perform the song with energy.
3. Have the singers echo you, phrase by phrase. If the song is in an unfamiliar language, begin by speaking the words only. Then sing them.
4. Have singers sing the verse in phrases first, then sing the entire verse. Don't try to do too much; one verse or chorus is sufficient to start. If you end up singing verses by yourself, that is fine—or you can invite youth or fellow teachers sing along with you.
5. Correct mistakes as they happen.
6. At some point, talk about the tradition from which the song comes and/or talk about the meaning of the song. Make the song come alive.
The order of these steps can vary. Because every song is different, the strategy for teaching each song is a little different.
When I teach the African American hymn "There Is More Love Somewhere" (Singing the Living Tradition, #95) by rote, I first wait until the children are completely silent. Then I sing the song Harry Belafonte sang in folk clubs and nightclubs during his early career, an experience he writes about in his autobiography. He learned that if he didn't wait until the audience was totally silent before he sang, he would never have silence throughout his performance. The same theory applies to teaching children to sing.
When the group is silent I sing the hymn slowly and calmly, yet with plenty of emotion. It's a powerful song. I then ask everyone to listen and repeat after me. The listening part is essential. If the students don't listen, have them sing the phrase again—without dumbing down.
I sing, "There is more love somewhere," and everyone repeats the phrase. I do the same with the second phrase. The third phrase is tricky, so I break it into two parts. I sing, "I'm gonna keep on... " and have everyone repeat it, followed by "... 'til I find it," which everyone repeats. Then I sing the entire phrase, "I'm gonna keep on 'til I find it," and have everyone repeat it. Take the time at the beginning to get a phrase right, because it's almost impossible to fix if the group learns it incorrectly.
Next I'm ready to start again, either having the children repeat each phrase or having them sing two phrases at a time. What I do depends on the support they need. One group may need to hear each phrase again, while another might be ready to put it all together. You don't need a piano or any other accompaniment—you simply need the beauty of the song to shine through.
"There Is More Love Somewhere" is in a zipper form, meaning that with each repetition you can "zip" in a new word; for example, "There is more peace" or "There is more spirit." (See The zipper song, in Chapter 6.) Be sure to show respect; don't allow phrases like "There is more cell phone service."
I once taught this song at a YRUU (Young Religious Unitarian Universalists) gathering. One night, the power went out at the camp, so we all gathered by the fire and sang songs. Soon we were singing, "There is more love," and someone suggested, "There is more light." In a mock evangelist voice I shouted, "Only if you believe! Do you believe?" "Yes!" the youth shouted. "Do you BELIEVE?" "YES!" they shouted even louder. We sang, "There is more light somewhere," and immediately the power came back on. Two hundred Unitarian Universalist youth jumped up and down shouting, "WE BELIEVE! WE BELIEVE!" It was a great moment. Having been raised to ask questions, they were soon wondering if this little miracle had been rigged. (It hadn't.)
I also teach "Thula Klizeo," a fantastic contemporary song from South Africa by Joseph Shabalala, the leader of Ladysmith Black Mambazo. When you teach this song thoroughly, with energy and in a way that makes the story behind the song come alive, the experience can be uplifting. If you teach the song quickly and with no respect to the tradition, it can be a disaster. For this reason, I outline my approach step by step, an approach you can apply to teaching songs from many cultures by rote.
Thula Klizeo by Joseph Shabalala
1. Introduce the song with information like the following: "Thula Klizeo" is a song by Joseph Shabalala of Ladysmith Black Mambazo, a South African group that became world-famous when they toured and recorded with Paul Simon in the late 1980s. Joseph Shabalala, the group's leader, wrote "Thula Klizeo" in 1987 while riding in a taxi in New York City. At that moment, he was homesick for South Africa and he missed his children. Because of the unfair apartheid laws at the time, he did not know if he would ever see them again. Joseph Shabalala, however, was calmed by the thought, Thula (be still) klizeo (my heart), Na la pa sey kiya (even here I am at home), and these words became the song. But the song means much more, as you will see in a moment.
2. Perform the song with energy, giving everyone an idea of how it sounds. I know that, at this point, some students will be thinking, "This is too hard for me to learn," so before the potential supernovas can sink into despair, I go on to the next step. Sometimes I can avoid potential intimidation by doing Step 2 after Step 3. It is important to perform the song at some point, however; otherwise the students will have heard only fragments of it. They won't know how the whole song should sound.
3. Speak the words of the song, word by word.
Leader: Thula! (too' lah)
Group: Thula!
In South Africa, much of the singing is deep and resonant, because the people's speaking voices tend to be deep and resonant. So when I speak the word Thula, I give it a deep sound from the gut. I also give it lots of emotion because I want the students to echo both the word and the emotion. I have them repeat the word again and, as I want more energy from the class, I shout the words with an enthusiastic smile.
Leader: Thula!
Group: Thula!
Everyone should be smiling at this point, and I do not continue until the class echoes sufficient emotion. Then I go on and speak another word.
Leader: klizeo (kleh zee' oh)
Group: klizeo
Leader: Thula klizeo
Group: Thula klizeo
Leader: na la pa (nah lah pah)
Group: na la pa
Leader: na la pa
Group: na la pa
Leader: sey ki-ya! (say kah-ee yah)
Group: sey ki-ya!
Leader: sey ki-ya!
Group: sey ki-ya!
This may seem like a lot of repetition, but don't forget that you must teach the song as if you were teaching it to yourself. If you were in the students' place, would you be able to remember all these words in an unfamiliar language with just one repetition?
4. Continue the repetitions, now with complete phrases.
Leader: Thula klizeo
Group: Thula klizeo
Leader: Thula klizeo
Group: Thula klizeo
Leader: na la pa sey ki-ya
Group: na la pa sey ki-ya
It is important to listen as the students repeat after you. This way it's easy to hear mistakes. If, for example, I hear that some students are having trouble with na la pa, and are saying na la la instead, I break up the phrase again and accent the P.
Leader: na la pa
Group: na la pa
Leader: na la pa sey ki-ya
Group: na la pa sey ki-ya
Leader: hey ki-ya (hay kah-ee yah)
Group: hey ki-ya
Leader: na la pa sey ki-ya
Group: na la pa sey ki-ya
At this point I repeat all the words again. I don't want to teach the melody until each singer feels confident with all the words. I cannot stress this enough: the singers must feel 100 percent confident at this stage of learning the song. You will be wasting time if you go on without their confidence. After a long period of time you may end up having to start again, but by then the singers may lose their energy and their trust in you may be considerably diminished.
5. When every singer is feeling sufficiently confident with the words, teach the melody. Sing the whole song, slowly at first, so that everyone can become familiar with the notes, and make sure you sing the melody in a range that is comfortable for everyone—not too high and not too low. This is critical. If the midrange of a song is between middle C and G (five notes higher) you are in a safe range for everyone.
Sing a few words at a time, asking the class to repeat after you until they are comfortable.
Leader (singing slowly): Thula klizeo
Group: Thula klizeo
Leader: Thula klizeo
Group: Thula klizeo
Leader: na la pa sey ki-ya
Group: na la pa sey ki-ya
If you notice that some students are having trouble singing sey ki-ya or another phrase, I isolate these notes and have everyone repeat them. Making mistakes when learning a song is very natural. No one should ever be made to feel inadequate or stupid for making a mistake. If you don't fix the mistake at this point, however, it may never be fixed. With younger children it may be impossible to correct a mistake once it has been learned. Get into the habit of correcting mistakes immediately, with kindness and clarity. I even go so far as to act like I didn't notice the mistake. I simply have them repeat the phrase with more care.
Ultimately, by teaching a song slowly and carefully (as if you are teaching it to yourself), the students learn it faster. If you teach this song quickly, many mistakes will occur. There will be confusion, and you may end up spending more time trying to re-teach it later. Uninspired singing will be the result.
Continue combining the words and melody, giving a "stop" signal with your hands to indicate that students should wait until you're finished each phrase group before they repeat after you.
Leader: (singing) sey ki-ya
Group: sey ki-ya
Leader: na la pa sey ki-ya
Group: na la pa sey ki-ya
Leader: hey ki-ya
Group: hey ki-ya
Leader: na la pa sey ki-ya
Group: na la pa sey ki-ya
Leader: hey ki-ya
Group: hey ki-ya
Leader: na la pa sey ki-ya
Group: hey ki-ya
6. Next, sing complete phrases and ask the students to repeat after you.
Leader: Thula klizeo, na la pa sey ki-ya
Group: Thula klizeo, na la pa sey ki-ya
Leader: Thula klizeo, na la pa sey ki-ya
Group: Thula klizeo, na la pa sey ki-ya
Leader: hey ki-ya, na la pa sey ki-ya
Group: hey ki-ya, na la pa sey ki-ya
Leader: hey ki-ya, na la pa sey ki-ya
Group: hey ki-ya, na la pa sey ki-ya
7. When all the singers sound confident, indicate that it is time to try the whole song. Pick up the tempo so you are singing the song at the intended speed.
All: Thula klizeo, na la pa sey ki-ya
Leader: (Say "repeat" or "again" at the end of the phrase.)
All: Thula klizeo, na la pa sey ki-ya
Leader: hey ki-ya (This reminds the group what the next phrase is. Speak all such reminders in tempo; in other words, do not slow the song down or stop it.)
All: hey ki-ya, na la pa sey ki-ya
Leader: Repeat
All: hey ki-ya, na la pa sey ki-ya
8. Repeat the whole song again. If the energy is right, there is often a spontaneous burst of applause at this point. There may be some in the group—particularly in a group of older students—who can sing harmonies. Always encourage singing in harmony. You yourself should sing a combination of melody and harmony. I do this in a very simple way: on the last held note of the phrase, I sing the melody note, and then quickly jump to a harmony note. By singing the melody note, you help those who need to hear the melody. By adding the harmony note immediately afterward, you give others an idea of how to harmonize. (There is a harmonized version of "Thula Klizeo" in Singing the Journey [#1056], but those harmonies are merely suggestions. Spontaneous harmonies are sometimes far more beautiful and make the songs come alive.)
Now everyone sings the melody again, and some begin to harmonize. Most don't, and that's okay.
9. There is a dance that goes along with "Thula Klizeo." Say something like "Ah, but there's more. It's time to learn the dance. In most parts of the world, people don't sit still while they sing. They move; they dance. This is particularly true in South Africa, where this song comes from. Our dance goes like this."
It is a simple standing-in-place dance. Bend your body forward slightly. With your feet, do a walking-in-place motion to the beat: quietly "stomp" your right foot out in front. With your hands, echo the beat of your feet during the first two phrases of the song, simultaneously pulsing them downward at stomach level, with your palms facing down. Smile.
When you sing the phrase hey ki-ya, raise both hands in the air and then bring them back to the same motion as before; every time you come to the phrase hey ki-ya, lift your hands to heaven.
I have everyone stand and we do the dance and song together, with harmony if possible. Again, there is great excitement once we sing the song through a few times—but something is still missing. It is now time to provide more information about the tradition behind the song, from which the real power of the song comes.
10. Present more information by saying something like this: "For thousands of years the Zulu people of Southern Africa performed great dances in which they kicked high in the air and stomped proudly on the earth. These were dances of great strength, defiance, and power. Under the system of apartheid, however, the Zulu people were not allowed to do their traditional dances. Nor were they allowed to show their power or defiance; if they showed power or defiance, they were likely to be locked up in jail.
"So they developed something called Es-kah-tah-mee-yah, which means 'tiptoe step,' or 'to stomp quietly.' That is what we do every time we put our right foot down. We show our anger and power. We are saying no to the apartheid system. We are showing our defiance in a way that will not get us locked up in jail."
Providing this kind of information about the song's tradition adds an essential element that lends immense power to the singing. This is the power inherent in all cultural traditions. Tradition connects us with the past. In a way, tradition awakens our memories. By honoring traditions, we somehow remember experiences celebrated by our own ancestors. Our heritage comes alive in us. Many cultures, such as the many South African black cultures, believe that making music connects them with their ancestors.
The more history you provide, the more powerful the song will become. You can talk about the Soweto uprisings of June, 1976, for example, during which the black youth of South Africa took center stage in the anti-apartheid movement. The DVD, Amandla! A Revolution in Four-Part Harmony, tells this history in a powerful way.
Continue sharing information by saying, "Let us now dance and sing the song again, and remember that even though the words mean 'Be still my heart, even here I am at home,' the dance means 'We are powerful, and no one can take that power from us.'" (I sometimes have the group repeat that last phrase after me.)
When you discuss traditions with your students, remember to adapt the language and concepts to the age group you are addressing. The previous description, for example, is geared toward older children and adults and needs to be adapted for a younger group.
Do the song and dance again, this time repeating them over and over for a long time. The song creates a trancelike effect, and—like all chants—its power builds with repetition. You can actually achieve a trance state through this type of singing, a state that should not be denied anyone, especially children. Allow the energy to build. Add percussive instruments if you want. Vary the dance movements by bending lower, stomping higher, or changing the movements into a march. Once people learn it, this song becomes infectious and is extremely popular. It is a tremendous energy booster and it has universal appeal. Whenever you teach and sing a song like this, however, don't let it become trivialized; its meaning and the power of its tradition must always be apparent.
In the next chapter we will examine other strategies for teaching "Thula Klizeo." In The Nick Page Sing with Us Songbook, you will find a story accompanying the song, which tells about the culture in a more engaging way, along with some advanced dance steps.
Chapter 6 - More Song-Teaching Strategies
Every song is different. Every group of children is different. You need to know a variety of song-teaching strategies. You may use hand signs to teach a song one day, then use the echo technique for the same song the next day. You may want to combine the echo technique with the story technique. You need to use your intuition and creativity. Above all, remember the four guidelines I discussed in Chapter 3, starting with making everyone sound fantastic. Ultimately, that is the rule that will help you choose the best song-teaching strategy.
THE CALL-AND-RESPONSE SONG
The call-and-response song is one in which the leader sings a phrase and the group sings a different phrase in response. You can sing "This Little Light of Mine," for example, by singing, "This little light of mine" and having the children respond each time with "I'm gonna let it shine." You all join together at the end with "Let it shine, let it shine, let it shine."
A similar call-and-response song is the civil rights song, "Woke Up This Mornin'". It is based on the African American spiritual of the same name.
A simple way to teach this song is to sing the lead part all the way through. Then teach the echo part, phrase by phrase, using the rote method (which is basically an echo). Be sure to use a lot of emotion and to sing percussively. As is true of most civil rights songs, you can replace key words. In this case, replace freedom with words such as justice or liberty.
When the children have learned the song, divide them into two groups. Then have one group lead (or call) and the other group respond. The Book of Call & Response, edited by John M. Feierabend, is a terrific collection of children's call-and-response songs.
The collection of South African songs called Freedom Is Coming, edited by Anders Nyberg, has many great call-and-response songs in this style. The song "Freedom Is Coming" has a tricky response that is inherently South African and lots of fun (Singing the Journey, #1035). I taught it to my seventh- and eighth-grade singers who then shared it with the younger children. The kindergarten students wanted to learn it, but I told them it was too hard—so they learned it from the junior high students. They came back and sang the song for me with both the call and the response parts. It was utterly charming, and I learned not to underestimate five-year-olds.
The spiritual "Swing Low, Sweet Chariot" can be another call-and-response song.
Leader: I looked over Jordan and what did I see?
Singers: Comin' for to carry me home.
Leader: A band of angels comin' after me.
Singers: Comin' for to carry me home.
And then everyone sings the chorus:
Swing low, sweet chariot,
Comin' for to carry me home. (2x)
Older children can learn to improvise their responses, as is often done in the African American style, by having the leader (you) or a youth/adult volunteer demonstrate. Basically you, or the volunteer, improvise an echo response: the group sings, "Swing low," and you make up the melody on the response, "Swing low." Continue in a similar way for the chorus. Once you demonstrate the style, divide the class into two groups. One group sings the chorus as it is written, while the other group improvises the response. Then switch and have the second group sing the call and the first group sing an improvised response. Next, see if any children will volunteer to sing solo. You might be amazed at the results. The sound is alive with energy and spirit.
TEACHING SONGS THAT HAVE HAND MOVEMENTS
Adding body movements and hand signs to songs is an amazingly effective way to teach songs to both children and adults. It is especially effective when you are teaching songs that have a lot of words. The movement strategy is usually twice as effective as the rote method, because it is multisensory: the more senses that are involved with learning, the quicker the learning is. You only need to sing the simple children's song, "Head, Shoulders, Knees, and Toes," a few times with motions in order for the students to learn it.
When Jim Scott teaches his song, "Common Ground," with the "circle of friends" chorus, he has the audience do the hand signs as he sings. He accompanies the phrase "In a circle of friends," for example, with the motion of drawing a circle in the air with his two hands: starting at the top, the hands arc downward in an opposing but synchronized way until they complete the circle at the bottom.
I teach a different version for "circle of friends," based on Jim's version. When you reach the bottom of the circle, use the American Sign Language symbol for the word friends: hook your two forefingers together, then switch the positions of the fingers two times in a linking motion.
For "In a circle of sound," make the circle motion I described above, followed by a symbol for sound: one hand touching the ear.
For "All our voices," touch your mouth with the same hand you used for sound.
For "will blend," hold out your hands, palms parallel to your stomach and with your fingers spread. Draw your hands together, "blending" the fingers.
For "When we touch," hold out one hand, palm parallel to the floor, and touch the back of that hand with the forefinger of the other.
For "common ground," bring your forefingers together in front of you, and then draw them out, hands moving parallel to the ground. (See Resources for where you can find music for Jim Scott's "Common Ground.")
The most effective way to create simple hand signs is to have the singers create them. Everyone knows the hand signs for the old children's chant, "Here is the church / Here is the steeple / Open the door and see all the people." Now have the children make up hand signs for a version I made up:
Here is the chalice,
Here is the flame,
Light the candle,
Our love proclaim.
Why is teaching a song with body and hand motions so effective? Mind and body are not separate; they are connected. Utilizing this connection is a natural and extremely effective way of enhancing learning. Generally speaking, movement songs teach themselves. Children pick up the melody and movement to a patty-cake song from watching and listening to it a few times. In a circle they can dance to a song like "Here We Go Looby Loo" right away. As the song progresses, everyone will join in: "You put your right foot in / You put your right foot out / You give your foot a shake, shake, shake / and turn yourself about."
While these songs are great fun for young children, make sure they sing in tune while they are having fun. If in-tune singing is in any way separated from fun singing, you are ultimately teaching the children to sing out of tune. If, on the other hand, you have to make a spur-of-the-moment choice between singing in tune or having fun, always have fun.
THE ZIPPER SONG
In a zipper song, most of the verse remains the same each time you sing it, but you substitute one or more words each time. "This Old Man" is a classic zipper song. "This old man, he played one / He played knick-knack on my thumb / With a knick-knack paddy-wack, give your dog a bone / This old man came rolling home." You then replace the underlined words with "two...on my shoe," "three...on my knee," "four...door," "five...hive," "six...sticks," "seven...up in heaven," "eight...on my plate," "nine...on my spine," "ten...once again." Other children's zipper songs are "Old McDonald" and "She'll Be Coming 'Round the Mountain."
Some African American hymns follow the zipper song form, although the noble beauty of the hymns defies the informality of the term zipper. Examples are "Over My Head" (Singing the Living Tradition, #30), "Cumbayah," and "There Is More Love Somewhere" (Singing the Living Tradition, #95). Use the rote method to teach "There Is More Love Somewhere" phrase by phrase. Sing it a cappella (without instruments). Teach the third line in two sections, because it is tricky. When the children have learned the song, begin substituting words, "There is more joy" or "peace" or "hope." Ask singers to provide one-syllable words, and make sure the words honor the tradition.
Zipper songs are great sing-along songs because they require little learning time and can be sung for a long time. During an assembly, the audience can pick up and join in on a zipper song with relative ease.
ROUNDS AND CANONS
Rounds and canons are a joy to sing. Participants are required to listen very carefully while singing, and anything that makes us listen is beneficial. There is no single strategy for teaching rounds, but there are some simple guidelines.
Teach each round using the strategy that best fits the song. You can use the simple rote method to teach a round like "Go Now in Peace" (Singing the Living Tradition, #413), for example, having students repeat one line at a time and eventually put the whole song together.
It is essential for the group to be able to sing the song well, without your singing along and without instrumental accompaniment, before you break the group into sections for a round. If singers still need your help, they are not yet ready to sing the song as a round.
Alice Parker, the wonderful composer and song leader, is fond of teaching a song, then suddenly having everyone sing the song in a round. She doesn't say, "Now let's sing it as a round." She simply cues part of the room to refrain from singing (raising the palm of her hand in a "stop" signal), and then she cues another section of the room to sing the song again. When it's the right time, she brings in the next group. She does all this seamlessly. We are singing a song in unison, then next thing we know we are singing it as a round. It inspires awe. She is fond of taking a familiar song like "Amazing Grace" and suddenly singing it as a round. Unfortunately, most familiar songs don't work well as rounds (unless you like a lot of dissonance).
Here are some more tips for leading rounds:
Have everyone sing softly so they can hear the other parts. The second most common mistake when singing rounds, after trying to sing a round before the group can sing the song in unison, is to sing loudly. When we sing loudly, we cannot hear the other parts, a group's tempo becomes too fast or too slow, and the combined sound becomes competitive rather than cooperative. Have students sing softly and listen when they sing rounds. If the round falls apart—which they often do—turn the activity into a team-building exercise.
The goal is to have everyone work together through listening to each other. You can have the singers face each other or, if you want the extra challenge, you can use the mix-it-up strategy described in Chapter 2. If you are teaching a round and the singers cannot yet sing it as a round, don't quit and leave everyone feeling frustrated. They may not want to sing it the next time or, worse, they may not want to sing at all. (See Chapter 3, Guideline One: Make every group sound fantastic.)
Remember to position your strong singers well when you divide the group into sections for a round; they should not all be on one side of the room. Also be careful not to create a class hierarchy by identifying the strong singers; divide the group in a subtle way.
Always teach the last line of a round carefully; it is often the hardest line to remember when singing a round. Practice singing a round a few times through in unison first, so everyone knows when to return to the beginning. Cue each group to repeat the round each time they finish. When students sing a round well in two sections, try increasing the number of sections.
Some rounds end well when you have all sections end at the same time, even though they may be singing different lines when they end. Section one might be singing the third phrase, for example, while section two sings the second phrase, and section three sings the first phrase. Give the singers a clear sign that you are ending the round and they will all end at the same time. If you choose this approach, you may have to rehearse individual section endings.
A much easier way to end a round is to have each section stop after its last line, one section at a time. Cue each section to stop. This approach can be challenging for you, as you are required to pay attention to where each section is in the song. The type of ending you use depends on the song itself. Canons are often composed to end together, while rounds often end one group at a time. However, this is not a hard-and-fast rule.
"Building Bridges" (Singing the Journey, #1023) is a fun though challenging round. It becomes a downright happy song when it's sung in a major key, such as in the version I have adapted (below), instead of a minor key. In Sing and Shine On! I outline a way to teach "Building Bridges" with hand signs. Most children (not all) learn it much faster with hand signs.
THE PARTNER SONG
A partner song is made up of two songs that are sung at the same time. Dr. Ysaye Barnwell uses "Wade in the Water" and three other spirituals at the same time on her Singing in the African American Tradition CD collection (see Resources). Also see Joanne Hammil's Rounds & Partner Songs, Vols. 1 and 2, and Robert Perinchief's Honor Your Partner Songs.
THE NON-STRATEGY
I have discussed many strategies for teaching songs, and so far I have left out one of the most common strategies: the one I call "the non-strategy." I don't know what else to call it; it literally means teaching a song without any strategy. How does one do this? Simple. Sing any song slowly and ask your students to sing along with you. Every syllable and vowel will be a hair late, but the song gets sung. With enough repetitions, your group will learn the song.
I do not recommend the non-strategy for most songs, but there are certainly times when the method is perfectly appropriate, particularly when you simply want to have some fun. An admirable goal.
Many songs simply teach themselves because of their simplicity. The joyful repetition in the classic spiritual "This Little Light of Mine" defies teaching. People simply learn it from hearing it. Try these additional verses: "All around the town ... " "Building a new world... " "Free of fear and hatred... " "Sing a song of freedom... " "Sing a song of justice... " "All around this world... " "Life is like a circle... " "I believe in music... " "Harmony of voices... " "Our voices sing together... "
You and your singers can make up a million more verses. Return to the first verse, "This little light of mine" once in a while. If you want, make other changes as you go along. Sing some verses fast, some slow, some loud, some soft. Sing some verses in a blues style or as a lullaby or a rock song or a rap song. Saying you're going to "let it shine" sometimes means letting the creativity shine.
STORYTELLING WITH SONGS
Storytellers have been combining songs and stories for millions of years, and to this day many cultures tell stories in song. Homer sang The Iliad. Praise singers in western Africa chant stories to local leaders, telling of the leaders' many achievements and ridiculing the achievements of their rivals. The songlines of Australia are ancient paths on which elders embark on walkabouts, singing Creation stories and recreating the world. The old Anglo-Saxon legend of Beowulf was probably told in song.
But you don't have to sing your stories. In this section I will explain how to weave singing throughout a spoken story.
Children love to sing, and they love to hear stories. Combining song and story excites children, and they become intimately involved with the tale. Pete Seeger's adaptation of the South African song/story, "Abiyoyo," is a terrific example. The story tells of a magician who can make objects disappear and his son who loves to sing a little song about a monster called Abiyoyo. In the story, the monster attacks, and only by having everyone sing the song with energy can they make the monster dance and eventually lie down in exhaustion. When Abiyoyo lies down, the magician has a chance to make the monster disappear.
The combination of story and song in "Abiyoyo" is irresistible. The song is sung throughout the story and eventually becomes an integral part of it. The leader sings the song the first few times, and soon the children will know it and can all join in.
More and more children's stories like "Abiyoyo" are appearing in books that combine story and song. There are illustrated versions of "Lift Every Voice," "Follow the Drinking Gourd"and" Stars and Stripes Forever." The Nick Page Sing with Us Songbook has "I Walk In Beauty," a song and story adapted from Navaho traditions.
Using your creativity and the creativity of your children, you too can combine stories and songs. Find a Native American Creation story. Find several places in the story in which to weave the chant, "The Earth Is Our Mother" (Singing the Journey, #1073), and then have fun with it. Any time you can add movement, do so. Having the children act out the story as you go along is always a thrill, particularly if they all get to participate in some way. Be cautioned, however: if you're working with young children and you know that most of them will not get to play the fox, tell them ahead of time.
You can add songs to your favorite stories, and you can add stories to your favorite songs. The possibilities are endless. Many songs are stories in themselves and can be adapted to become song/stories, including "The Fox, " "Froggie Went A-Courtin'," the Beatles' "Yellow Submarine, " Tom Paxton's delightful "Going to the Zoo," and Bill Staines' "A Place in The Choir."
The UUA curriculum, Timeless Themes: Stories from the Hebrew and Christian Bibles for Grades 3 and 4, with its accompanying songbook, Bible Songs on Timeless Themes, is an excellent way to teach biblical stories by learning African spirituals. The combination of the stories and songs creates empathy, an understanding in the heart, not just in the mind. The songs help the stories come to life—sometimes painfully, sometimes joyfully—and the stories help the songs come to life.
The book Ballad of America: A History of the United States through Folk Song, by John Anthony Scott and John Wardlaw Scott, teaches history from the colonial days to the Civil Rights Era. The stories are not in a format from which you can simply read, so you will have to adapt them.
Invite adults in to tell stories with the children. A teacher in Houston invites local astronauts and scientists from the Johnson Space Center and simply asks them which songs were important to them growing up. These scientists are from all around the world, so hearing their stories and songs can be an amazing experience for the children.
I taught the song "Donna Donna" to a group of junior high singers and explained that it is a song from Esterke, a Yiddish musical by Aaron Zeitlin and Shalom Secunda, adapted from a play produced in Poland in 1932. Shalom Secunda escaped from Nazi-occupied Poland and was befriended in the United States by composers like Gershwin and Irving Berlin.
The students were learning about the Holocaust, and they shared stories and songs with parents and grandparents at a special commemoration. After singing "Donna Donna," an elderly woman told the youth that she had sung the song when growing up in Poland. A connection was made, and the students (and teachers) were drawn into a living history. As the woman described how they sang the song on a transport train, our hearts began to swell. When we learned that this was the last song she sang with her family and that she was the only survivor, our eyes filled with tears. The woman said it brought her great joy to hear the youth singing it and asked us to sing it again. What had been a song and a story suddenly became real. It is an experience that neither my students nor I will ever forget. The song, the history—they both came alive that day.
Combining stories and songs lift our emotions, creating empathy, an emotional understanding. We can use this tool to teach moral lessons on faith, justice, peace, friendship, and caring for the earth. We can use this tool to teach cultures and world religions. A song like "Soon the Day, Bashana" (Singing the Living Tradition, #146) can teach us about Israel in the late 1960s, when the song was composed. You can use a song like Holly Near's "We Are a Gentle, Angry People" (Singing the Living Tradition, #170) to teach about the rights of our bisexual, gay, lesbian, and transgender communities. We can combine songs and stories to teach history, biblical stories, and myths.
Here is a simple technique: sing the song, tell part of the story, sing more of the song, tell more of the story, and continue to weave story and song together. First you need to find an appropriate story, and then figure out the best places to insert the singing. Through simple repetition, the song often teaches itself. Try to leave time for questions and discussion about what the story and song mean. After the discussion, go back and sing the song again. As was the case with "Thula Klizeo," the more we know about the song and its culture/history, the more powerful and meaningful the experience will be.
CONCLUSION
First, a review list of the song-teaching strategies you can try:
The echo song
The rote method
Call-and-response
Hand signs/movement/dance
The zipper song
Rounds
The non-strategy
Storytelling with songs
Choose your song and decide on the best strategy for teaching it. Practice teaching the song to a mirror or to a colleague before you teach it to a group. Although I have tried to make it sound easy, song-teaching is like any other kind of teaching: it takes practice. You have to be prepared: know the song, know the strategy, be prepared to fix mistakes. You should even be prepared to switch strategies mid-song, and you should also be prepared to have a great time. Be playful, and let your singers' light shine.
Once you've taught a few songs using each strategy, it will become easy. The challenge will then be to make everyone sound great, in tune, and full of life.
Sing and shine on.
Chapter 7 - Activities for Listening to Music
In a world of multitasking, sitting still and listening to a piece of music can be a great challenge for children. But music for meditation, such as a prelude, postlude, or actual meditation, is an important part of the worship experience. Children need to learn how to listen. It is best to not think of this music as background music, but as music for center stage. As part of the worship, have children perform for each other. Prepare for this by saying, "Judith has a gift for us: a piece of music she will play. We must receive this gift quietly. Receive this gift with your ears and with your mind. Receive this gift with your body and soul."
Instead of thinking of the music as performance, think of it as an act of compassion. The beauty of the gift makes our world more beautiful.
When the sharing is complete, ask the students to give thanks with their eyes, their minds, and their hearts—all quietly. Or the children can respond to the gift with a gift of their own: thunderous applause. Applause is an emotional response to an emotional gift. In most cases, I prefer that the gift of thanks be internalized in some way, as the sound of applause can disrupt the flow of worship time. But sometimes we just can't help but applaud. It is a necessary response to a wonderful experience.
A music DVD is a useful tool for teaching children to listen. There are educational DVDs available that present a wide range of music, from pop to folk to classical. I love showing children Ingmar Bergman's The Magic Flute, a cinematic adaptation of Mozart's opera.
There are also creative ways to draw children into the experience of listening to music. The eurythmics approach to music education teaches students to listen to music with their bodies. They react to fast music with fast, improvised movements and to slow music with slow movements, with the goal of translating actual emotions into specific movements. Then, when students take the next step of simply listening to music, they can concentrate all the same on the emotions the music evokes.
As with all creative activities, narrow the river. Instead of having students move with their entire bodies as the music tells them, instruct them to move their right arms as the music tells them. Then you can gradually expand the motion directives to include the whole body.
Similarly, when adding writing and drawing activities to the listening experience, narrow the river. If you are studying world peace, you could play Barber's Adagio for Strings and ask the children to let the music tell them which two crayon colors to choose. They will each be drawn to different colors. Further, you could instruct them to use only circles in what they draw. Or you might say their drawings must represent the peace they hear in the music. The possibilities are endless. When they are done, be sure to gather the children in small groups to discuss their creations, and then have a class discussion about what colors they chose and why. It will be quite illuminating and you will find that they actually listen to the music.
The next step, of course, is to have the students listen to the music without drawing. They can, however, utilize the same creativity as before. Encourage the children to picture objects in their minds that relate to whatever piece of music you are playing (the objects can relate to peace if you are listening to Barber's Adagio for Strings).
Matthew Fox's University of Creation Spirituality has developed dynamic forms of worship that combine creativity and spirituality. These art-as-ritual endeavors involve art, music, dance, and a whole host of creative activities. I have led many art-as-ritual sessions with children. Anyone who says that children cannot experience spirit is looking at spirit from an archaic (sit-in-your-chair-and-be-quiet) perspective. Children need to play, dance, and sing. This is not your grandmother's Sunday School; this is vital spiritual exploration.
I love to combine listening with poetry, a technique that Nita Penfold teaches. I play some music, often a wild orchestral piece like Stravinsky's "Rite of Spring." I hand out words written on pieces of paper to each child, and they must arrange the words in an order that the music dictates (that is the essential listening part of the exercise) and create a poem. Then they must write their poems, adding verbs and nouns as needed. A child who receives the words red, cloud, music, hate, and cloth may choose not to use the word cloth. Another child may create the poem, "I hate the red cloud. The music I love," while another child may write, "Clouds or music, Clouds or hate, Make a choice." Because it is as much a music activity as a writing activity, don't be afraid to talk about the music and how it shaped the poems.
Nita Penfold also teaches an art and writing activity to which I have added music. I play some music such as Charles Ives' String Quartet No. 1, 1st Movement, or Beethoven's Piano Sonata No. 14 (known as "Moonlight Sonata"), 1st Movement. The children listen to the music as they walk quietly around a table full of postcard and magazine photos. They must let the music tell them which image to choose, and then they write poems based on both the music and the image. You narrow the river by having them base their poems on both the music and the image. They must share their results, and they will amaze you. All these creative activities work best when you model them beforehand.
Learning to listen to music takes years. Your goal can be to help the children begin to experience the pure joy of receiving music, to listen. Listening means reaching out to the sound, hungering for the beauty, loving the beauty. Scientist Brian Swimme says that the more in love we are, the more alive we are. I would add that the more we listen, the more alive we are. The more we express ourselves, the more alive we are. This is part of what I mean when I ask you to let music come alive.
Chapter 8 - Culture and Music
In this chapter I address the issue of misappropriation and then share an essay I wrote about multiculturalism in music.
MISAPPROPRIATION
Misappropriation refers to the misuse of music in which culture is the defining element. Culture defines all music. The differences between a Hindu raga and a Bach chorale are as much cultural as they are musical, and understanding and honoring these differences is vital. If we sing an Indian raga like it's supposed to be a Bach chorale, then we could be guilty of misappropriation. We often assume that all music is free, ours for the taking. Further, we sometimes incorrectly assume that because the music is "free," we are allowed to make whatever changes we want, including changing the words to fit our personal beliefs. We must balance our need to express our own beliefs with honoring other cultures. Honoring cultures must come first—these cultures do not belong to us. This sometimes means singing words we do not believe. When I sing these words, I do so in a welcoming spirit. I welcome a diversity of thoughts and beliefs. I neither try to make others conform to my beliefs nor change the songs of diverse cultures to fit my beliefs.
Misappropriation statement from the UUA. The discussion on misappropriation is ongoing and will continue to evolve. The UUA website features the beginning of the dialogue on misappropriation in a beautiful series of statements written by Jacqui James, Jason Shelton, and fellow musicians from the UUA and UUMN (Musicians Network). The UUMN website (www.uua.org/uumn) publishes the following statement and links:
Cultural misappropriation is the term given to the set of injuries marked by:
? using music, reading, symbols, ritual, or iconography of a group without a willingness to engage in their struggle and/or story and connecting their struggle and/or story with our own (UU and community).
? the use of cultural practices as bait rather than an as organic part of our cultural experience
? an unwillingness to respect the community of origin or dishonoring the refusal of a community to share
? disrespect or casual engagement with a practice, or
? unwillingness to share the pain caused by intentional or unintentional misuse.
Links to helpful Web resources on cultural misappropriation:
http://archive.uua.org/re/reach/winter01/social_justice/reckless.html (at archive.uua.org/re/reach/winter01/social_justice/reckless.html)
http://secure.uua.org/actions/responsive/06racism/borrowing.html (at secure.uua.org/actions/responsive/06racism/borrowing.html)
http://www.uua.org/leaders/leaderslibrary/culturalmisappropriation/23371.shtml
I do not pretend to have answers, simply pieces of the dialogue. On the one hand, I am concerned that UU music could grow "safer and safer" and eventually become bland and free of joy. On the other hand, I worry that our fear of misappropriation could prevent us from celebrating music of great power. We should celebrate all music. Make it live. Honor the traditions and revel in the differences. But we need to do our homework: we need to learn how to sing the music of different traditions, learn the stories behind the music, and make these stories and the music come alive. Diversity should not rise from tokenism or a need to be politically correct, but rather from a sincere need to express ourselves and our faiths in a culturally rich environment, a musical ecosystem in which each piece of the diversity supports every other piece.
I believe in the voice of one humanity, but admit that its time has not come. Our differences are great, but our common voice is greater. You can go anywhere in the world and intone the universal sound oo, as in cool, and everyone, regardless of their language, will understand its meaning. It is a universal vowel sound expressing a universal sentiment. Our emotions are universal, which is why music is universal. We struggle with misappropriation because we want our individual religious and cultural actions to be universal as well, but they are not. This is the challenge.
This quote by composer Charles Ives in his 1910 book, Essays Before a Sonata, keeps me on the journey: "The time is coming when music will develop possibilities inconceivable now—a language so transcendent that its heights and depths will be common to all mankind."
The essay that follows, called "The Cultural Connection," is a blend and rewrite of two earlier essays I wrote. When I speak of diversity in the essay, I am referring to diversity of religious beliefs, cultures, race, economic systems, sexual orientation, and the obvious diversity of musical styles. Welcoming diversity means opening to the discussion of both conservatives and liberals. We are all on a journey to seek truth, and every voice is important.
THE CULTURAL CONNECTION
Choosing to embrace multiculturalism requires us to look at music and culture from many perspectives instead of just one. With a single cultural perspective we assume that everyone believes as we do and that we can use the same performance practices and standards for all music. With the multicultural perspective we see that there are many cultural beliefs and that there are many performance practices and standards. This diversity enriches our lives, broadens our understanding of the world we live in, and deepens our appreciation for the music of our own cultures.
Music helps to define who we are, creating our communal self-identity. Our musical likes and dislikes, to a great extent, are defined by the culture we identify with. The reason some people dislike classical music may not be because they dislike the music. It may be because they don't identify with the culture associated with classical music. The same can be said of someone's antipathy to country music or rap music or any other kind of music. Perhaps it is the culture they don't relate to.
Because culture is such an important part of music, we can look at music from a cultural perspective as well as a musical perspective. The differences between a Drum Gahu chant from West Africa and a Gregorian chant from Europe will be primarily cultural. Likewise, the musical standards (quality of the performance) for a gospel performance will be different from the standards of excellence for a Renaissance piece.
Ethnomusicology. The study of the relationship between music and culture is called ethnomusicology. Ethnomusicologists spend many years studying the music of a particular culture. They live with the people they are studying and learn their languages, customs, and mythology. Ethnomusicologists fully acknowledge that no matter how hard they try, they can never fully understand the music of another culture. Most ethnomusicologists also live in the culture of academia, where they publish papers on their fields of interest. They use the same tools to examine the culture of Gregorian chant as they do the culture of Drum Gahu rituals. Modern ethnomusicology has also expanded to embrace the new field of biomusicology, the study of humanity's common genetic propensity to need and make music.
John Blacking was an Irish ethnomusicologist and expert on the Venda people of South Africa. He studied how children from many cultures learned music. They imitate what they hear the adults do. Their imitations are greatly simplified with all the seeds of what they will eventually express as adults. Teachers of children are often criticized for simplifying the music of many cultures with children, but as long as the cultural elements are not trivialized, there is no harm in simplifying the music. In fact it is a necessity. One would not attempt Bach's Magnificat with most children, but one could sing melodies by Bach as an introduction to the glory of his music. The same is true of the complex rhythms of West African drumming or the complicated ragas of India.
Honoring Our Differences. Singing is universal, but our reasons for singing are not. Within the Western music canon, we sing primarily for recreation, performance, or for worship, three very different reasons. There are many other reasons for singing. For many cultures music is a living force. A West African musician might sing as a blacksmith forges a tool. Without the singing, they believe, the tool would have no strength. For them, the music has power. In many cultures singing is used for diagnosing and healing illnesses. Through the use of dance and chant, many cultures use singing as a means of spiritual transformation reaching altered states of consciousness. Many cultures use singing to make powerful connections to their bodies, through a variety of toning practices, and to their ancestral pasts through ancient rituals.
For many cultures singing is not performing at all. For these cultures, music is an act of compassion. By singing, these cultures make the world a more beautiful place. Music becomes an act of sharing. There is no audience for this act of compassion; everyone participates. For us, understanding these radical differences and teaching and celebrating them makes all the difference in the world. If, on the other hand, we view other cultures from a monocultural perspective, we end up with seemingly sanitized (some would say, "white-washed") music. This sanitized music can exist in both conservative and liberal environments. In other words, we can think of ourselves as being enlightened liberals, but still express ourselves within a monocultural framework (while claiming to be multicultural).
Other Differences. Not all cultures have performance traditions with divisions between the audience and the performer. For many cultures there is no division between the talented and the untalented. In her essay, "Gender and Navaho Music: Unanswered Questions"(from Women in North American Indian Music), Charlotte J. Frisbie writes, "In the Navaho world anyone can sing and all are encouraged to learn songs. . . . Not knowing any songs or not having the ability to create them is equated with poverty."
We tend to think of singing as either being monophonic (single melody), homophonic (with harmony), or polyphonic (many voices like a round). Consider this quote by Hewitt Pantaleoni, from his book, On the Nature of Music: "Most of the world's harmony is heterophonic. Our Western tradition of precise unisons and carefully planned counterpoint is, in the broad view, peculiar." A simple definition of heterophony is when everyone sings the same melody differently at the same time. The best-known example of the heterophonic texture is in Dixieland jazz. You also hear heterophony in Celtic, Native American, Asian, African, and most of the world's folk traditions. If we listen to the heterophony of a Navaho chant, in which everyone sings the melody in different ways—and we think to ourselves, why can't they get it right?—then we are using our own cultural standards to measure the standards of another culture.
Most cultures learn songs by rote instead of from the written page. Teaching songs by rote doesn't mean we have to dumb down. Sometimes simplicity is measured in humility; by letting go of such things as the written music, a prearranged harmony, and even a conductor (blasphemy!), we open ourselves to tremendous beauty.
Singers from many cultures move when they sing. In the choral music of Polynesia, singers sit on the ground, swaying back and forth. Most black South African choral music would be unthinkable without movement. Movement helps tell the story. Pilipino choirs routinely use elaborate choreography in their singing. North American Sufis offer Dances of Universal Peace. These chants from several world faiths combine dancing, whirling, and a variety of movement with singing (quite joyful and deeply spiritual). They publish songbooks full of wonderful chants. American gospel singers use a variety of steps that bring the music to life. (A word about the American gospel step: Usually the conductor cues when the choir does the step, as opposed to the step spontaneously erupting from the music. The conductor decides when the step will begin, sometimes waiting until after the middle of the piece as opposed to from the beginning. The same is true of the claps on the off beats. The reason is, it can be a challenge to sustain the energy for clapping and moving throughout a piece. The clap and the step lift the energy tremendously.)
There are other vocal timbres besides bel canto. The word timbre refers to the tone of the voice or instrument. The flute has a woody timbre while the oboe has a reedier timbre. Likewise, the timbre of South African choral singing is rich with deep vowels while the timbre of a classical aria would tend to have a more operatic timbre. Eastern European singing tends to be reedy (nasal), while most contemporary folksongs are woodier (folksy). With children, you can use simple analogies to describe the timbre you want them to achieve, such as like a flute or like an oboe. You might have to demonstrate. Children are masters at imitation and can pick up on different timbres quickly. When you ask them to sing more operatic on a hymn like "For the Earth Forever Turning" (Singing the Living Tradition, #163), the results can be spellbinding.
The more we each learn about the differences, the more we learn about the uniqueness of our own cultures. The great violinist, Yehudi Menuhin, studied and performed jazz, the classical raga traditions of northern India, and other traditions. His studies gave him a new perspective on Bach's music. In the 1960s, ethnomusicologist Mantle Hood recommended that every conservatory student study and become proficient in the music of two cultures. He called this bi-musicality.
Respecting Traditions. Because we want to honor cultural beliefs, we must sometimes not sing certain songs from some cultures. We want all songs to be universal, but they are not. The late ethnomusicologist David P. McAllester spoke of how many Native American cultures have songs that belong only to their sacred time and sacred space. Speaking about a song from a Navaho ritual, he writes in his essay, "North American/Native American" (from Worlds of Music: An Introduction to the Music of the World's Peoples), "An uninitiated person might use one of these songs improperly, through ignorance, and cause great harm to the community, or worse yet, rob the song of its potency."
Sometimes honoring these beliefs means not singing certain songs. This does not mean that we shouldn't sing Navaho songs. There are certainly many appropriate Native American songs. (See Moving Within the Circle: Contemporary Native American Music and Dance by Bryon Burton.) The reason we get into trouble is that in our mass culture there are religious songs we can sing on bus rides, in the shower, or wherever we want. When we make the assumption, however, that sacred songs from other traditions can also be sung on a bus or in the shower, we are applying our own cultural values to the values of another culture.
With African American spirituals and gospel songs, we need to be careful not to change words like Lord and Father, because we would be changing another culture's beliefs. Spirituals should be treated with great respect. Either sing them as they have been sung for hundreds of years or don't sing them. This is a powerful statement, a controversial statement, but to assume that the freedom we celebrate as Unitarian Universalists should apply to other people's faiths is simply arrogant. In a world of many cultures, we need to fully respect each other's differences, not try to make everyone conform to our beliefs. There are African American Unitarian Universalists like Dr. Ysaye Barnwell who are writing powerful new music that fits beautifully within the evolving Unitarian Universalist tradition, but if and when Dr. Barnwell and others perform the music of their African American tradition, they make the spirit of its origins come alive. Hundreds of years of oppression, triumph, and joy come alive. The past becomes present—an eternal flame that we can all celebrate and honor.
With sacred Jewish music, we need to be sensitive to the use of the Hebrew name of God. According to Josh Jacobson, "The holy name of God, the tetragrammaton YHWH (often written out as 'Jehovah') was considered so sacred in ancient Israel that it could be pronounced by only one person (the High Priest), in one place (the innermost room of the central Sanctuary in Jerusalem), once a year (Yom Kippur—the Day of Atonement). Therefore, Jews generally avoid pronouncing that word, substituting instead, the euphemism, 'Adonai' which means, 'my Lord.' More observant Jews will even avoid pronouncing that word, and will use a euphemism for a euphemism, usually 'Hashem' ('the Name') or 'Adoshem' (a word which has no meaning, but incorporates elements of both words, 'Adonai' and 'Hashem'). The word 'Adomai' was invented by choral conductors as a substitute which comes closer to the sound of 'Adonai'.
"In my Zamir Chorale we generally will sing 'Adonai' in a sacred text. Of course, if an individual member is more strictly observant, he/she could sing 'Adomai' while the rest of the choir is singing 'Adonai' and the sound would not be discernibly altered. The only time we will consistently use 'Adomai' is when we are chanting a blessing (the formula, 'barukh attah adomai . . .') which is intended for a specific liturgical use only. For example, the blessing over the Friday night wine— as in Kurt Weill's wonderful 'Kiddush' —would be inappropriate for a Sunday afternoon concert where no wine is being blessed or consumed."
David Tilman, who is the cantor at Beth Sholom Congregation (designed by Frank Lloyd Wright, a Unitarian) in Elkin Park, Pennsylvania, once told me that, as a rule, if a Jewish piece was written for worship and you are singing it outside of worship, you should change 'Adonai' to 'Adomai' or 'Adoshem.' He says that if a piece was written for the stage, like Leonard Bernstein's Chichester Psalms, then singing the original 'Adonai' would be fine. Because it can be controversial (with many opinions) it is always safe to discuss with your singers your use of these sacred words before singing them.
Authenticity. Complete authenticity can only be achieved by the original culture in the original setting. As soon as people from outside the original culture perform an arranged setting of a song from that culture, several degrees of authenticity are lost. A Zulu unaccompanied group in South Africa singing Solomon Linda's 1939 song, "Mbube," would be authentic. An American rock group singing the same song in doo-wop style with its American words, "The Lion Sleeps Tonight," would be less authentic. A North American children's choir singing it and thinking it's a Walt Disney song would be even less authentic. Do we despair that we can never get it right? No. This is where the beauty of multiculturalism comes in.
If a single piece of music arises from one culture, it is said to be authentic. Authenticity in its purest form is a culture making its own music in its own place and time. But authenticity in its most corrupt form is a culture singing the music of another culture with no knowledge of or respect for that culture. When we teach a piece of music from a culture other than our own, we naturally aspire to be as authentic as we can be, which means getting the right sound and teaching as much as we can about the song's culture: telling its stories and respecting its traditions.
But many of us fear that if we are not authentic enough, we will disrespect the tradition. Our fear often leads to avoiding the music. We need a new understanding of the term multicultural. If a single piece of music uses styles of music from more than one culture, then that single piece is multicultural. Debussy, Stravinsky, Copland, Bernstein, and living composers like Glass and Bolton have fused classical traditions with jazz, Latin American, raga, West African drumming, and an endless list of popular music styles. More and more of today's choral composers (me included) revel in combining cultural elements.
"Hope for Resolution," by Caldwell/Ivory, is a popular example. It combines the Gregorian chant, "Of the Father's Love," with the Zulu prayer, "Thula Sizwe," adding a piano part reminiscent of old-time black gospel music. "Of the Father's Love" and "Thula Sizwe" are both cultural compositions. "Hope for Resolution" is a multicultural arrangement of the two. In my choral compositions I have used cultural styles ranging from jazz, raga, bluegrass, gospel, Celtic, and salsa to Baroque. For me, the cultural palette is one of the five palettes every composer draws from (whether consciously or unconsciously): the musical palette, the physical and emotional palettes, the cultural palette, and finally the spiritual palette. (See my essay, "Composing from a Cultural Perspective," at www.nickmusic.com/newshome.html).
In defining multicultural music, it is essential to distinguish between authentic music and music that "borrows" from other cultures. I have heard pieces that sound South African, but were actually written in the United States by composers with a great love of South African music. World Music Press (www.worldmusicpress.com) publishes my transcription of the South African anthem, "N'kosi Sikel'i Afrika," as sung by Joseph Shabalala and his group, Ladysmith Black Mambazo. I spent two weeks studying with Joseph, transcribing his music. I sat down with him and sang each part of "N'kosi" from beginning to end to get his comments and changes, both to the pronunciation and the pitches. The published octavo, with extensive performance notes and historical information, is as close as I could get to an octavo representing authenticity. Boosey & Hawkes publishes "Shout the Praise," a composition of mine inspired by Psalm 150, which fuses gospel forms and salsa rhythms—a choral fusion.
There is, of course, a whole spectrum of gray areas between the world of authentic performances and the world of cultural fusions. One could argue that a concert of Zulu music celebrating 80 years of Zulu culture, from traditional to sacred to pop, represents many subcultures within the Zulu culture and is therefore a multicultural concert. In the same way, a concert spanning J. S. Bach's long career and many styles could also be considered multicultural, since he absorbed French, English, Italian, and other cultural styles during his lifetime and the environments in which he composed were each unique.
We come here to a seldom-discussed aspect of multiculturalism: the authentic music of every culture is actually a fusion of other cultural traditions. And this brings us back to the idea that all music is multicultural. Few cultures over the course of human history have existed in isolation from outside cultures. Their music evolves because cultures interact with other cultures, continually creating something new. For example, traditional South African Mbube singing owes as much to European hymnody as it does to traditional Zulu or Xosa chant. The same is true of Polynesian gospel music and other regions of the globe where European traditions have been assimilated into the cultures.
When Jewish scholar and composer Bonia Shur was asked to compose a song as a healing force of reconciliation between conflicting Black and Jewish groups in Cincinnati, Ohio, he created a piece called "Amen/Ose Shalom" that combined a traditional Hebrew prayer for peace and the familiar African American "Amen." The power of the piece comes from the merger of two cultures, creating something of both worlds that is also quite new. Nick Spitzer, the host of a radio show that has no cultural boundaries, admits, "I'm not a multiculturalist... I'm drawn to the boundaries where cultures meet and overlap and simmer together."
Assimilation is a broad term that can refer to the people of one culture choosing to absorb another culture, or it can refer to a culture being forced to strip itself of its own culture, in order to conform to a mass (often oppressive) culture. Whether intentionally or simply through "osmosis," the music of every culture from classical to folk to pop is a merger of many cultural styles that took place over many generations. It could therefore be argued that every individual piece, from a Bach motet to a Zulu prayer, is in itself multicultural. The songs of every culture are like living things: they evolve. Authenticity may simply represent snapshots in time. We focus on one timeframe within the evolution of a choral piece and we honor that moment's authenticity.
Here are four recommendations:
1. Don't trivialize a culture by insulting its traditions. It may be clever to sing "Go Down Moses" in the show choir style, but it is ultimately disrespectful of the spiritual tradition.
2. Distinguish between authentic and fusion performances. If your aim is to be authentic, teach the authentic intonation (not always with traditional Western tuning), teach the right timbres, use authentic instruments, and, most important, teach the stories that give power to the music.
3. If, on the other hand, you want to sing the music of another culture, but you don't want to change your timbre, intonation, or other traditional Western ways of singing, be honest. Honesty comes in the simple admission that the music you are performing represents another culture merged with your own choral sensibilities. Elements of both cultures will be present. This can be wonderful.
4. If your aim is to celebrate the intentional fusion of cultures, you also need to be honest. There is great beauty in the mixture of cultures. I have heard Bulgarian choirs singing with West African drummers, bluegrass bands playing with jazz bands, and the "Soulful Celebration" fusion of black gospel with Handel's Messiah. Each of these fusions honors the cultures from which they evolved.
In time, each of these fusions will become old traditions in themselves, and future performers will spend hours and hours discussing the correct authentic performance practices, which snapshot in time to honor. Hopefully, they will make the music their own, which is what we all do to keep the music alive. The music will live on as the living, changing spirit that all music is.
Chapter 9 - Closing Thoughts Becoming Magnificent
The potential for magnificence is there: the magnificence of Beethoven's "Ode to Joy," a spiritual like "Swing Low, Sweet Chariot," a Hindu chant, a rousing South African freedom song, or an Israeli folksong like "Bashana" ("Soon the Day," #146 in Singing the Living Tradition). I began this resource by discussing the difference between singing of spirit and singing with spirit, saying that what the two have in common is the emotional charge we give the music. A rousing "Ode to Joy," an uplifting spiritual, and a meditative Earth-Centered chant can all come to life simply by bringing the emotions to the forefront. We must never let our music become complacent and expressionless. Leave dysfunctional emotions at the door. Come to church to celebrate, to join our emotions in the flame of fellowship. As Marianne Williamson said, "Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure." We need to give ourselves permission to become magnificent.
Chapter 10 - Resources
UU-RELATED SONG COLLECTIONS, BOOKS, AND CDS
(Resources published by the Unitarian Universalist Association, UUA imprints, and other UU affiliates, including publishers and congregations, are available at http://www.uuabookstore.org (at www.uuabookstore.org/) unless otherwise noted.)
Bring Many Names: Music From Our Liberal Religious Tradition. Oakland, CA:First Unitarian Church of Oakland, 1989.
CD containing twenty hymns from Singing the Living Tradition. Includes "Bring Many Names," "Singing for Our Lives," "Spirit of Life," "Gather the Spirit," "What Wondrous Love," "Find a Stillness," "I Know This Rose Will Open," "For All That Is Our Life," and more. 38 minutes.
Choral Responses. Unitarian Universalist Music Network, 1995.
Forty-five tunes and lyrics for openings, chalice lightings, prayers, and closings.
James, Jacqui (ed.). Between the Lines: Sources for Singing the Living Tradition. Boston:Skinner House, 1998.
Provides historical and literary facts on the hymns, tunes, and readings in Singing the Living Tradition Hymnal. Includes suggestions for introducing and teaching new material to congregations.
May This Light Shine: A Songbook for Children and Youth. Unitarian Universalist Music Network, 2006.
Collection of thirty songs by UU composers featuring a wide range of song types, from chants and unison songs to two- and three-part choral anthems. Available in two spiral-bound editions: the Director/Accompanist Book and the Songbook. Set includes one Director Book and five copies of the Songbook.
McDade, Carolyn, This Ancient Love: Reflective Songs of Carolyn McDade.
CD containing a collection of thirty-six early songs. Available from Carolyn McDade Music, Crystal Spring Earth Learning Center, 76 Everett Skinner Road, Plainville, MA 02762; or in Canada at 89 Green Street, Charlottetown, PEI, C1A 2G1. The songbook and CDs can also be ordered online at www.carolynmcdademusic.com. Carolyn's songbook, This Tough Web, is out of print, but worth looking for.
Music In Our Congregations: A Handbook for Staffing a Music Program in UU Congregations. Unitarian Universalist Music Network.
To order, contact UUMN Administrator at uumn @ uumn.org (at mailto:uumn@uumn.org)or call 800-969-8866. One copy is free to each UUMN member; otherwise the handbook is available for $5 a copy.
Music in the Air: Music From Our Liberal Religious Tradition, Vol. 2. Oakland, CA:First Unitarian Church of Oakland, 2000.
CD containing twenty-five hymns from Singing the Living Tradition. Includes "My Life Flows on in Endless Song," "We'll Build a Land," "We Would Be One," "Bells in the High Tower," and more. 72 minutes.
Navias (at www.uuabookstore.org/contributorinfo.cfm?ContribID=153), Eugene(ed.), and LarryPhillip (at www.uuabookstore.org/contributorinfo.cfm?ContribID=706) (arr.). Bible Songs on Timeless Themes: Songbook. Boston:Unitarian Universalist Association, 1991.
Richards, Michelle. Come Into the Circle: Worshiping with Children. Boston:Unitarian Universalist Association, 2008.
Comprehensive how-to guide for creating meaningful religious experiences for children. Contents include suggestions on the form, style, and elements of worship, plus an extensive collection of opening words and chalice lightings, meditations and prayers, stories, songs, sermons, and complete orders of service. Text contributions made by UU religious educators from around the country.
Robbins (at www.uuabookstore.org/contributorinfo.cfm?ContribID=609), Phyllis (ed.), and HeidiLauckner (at www.uuabookstore.org/contributorinfo.cfm?ContribID=187) (illus.). Now Let Us Sing! Ontario:Kingston Unitarian Press.
Sixty-one hymns and songs for children's services and intergenerational worship. Simple arrangements for keyboard and voice, with chords for guitar or autoharp. Arranged in sections based on the Unitarian Universalist Principles and Sources.
Scott, Jim (ed.). Earth and Spirit Songbook: An Anthology of Songs Celebrating Earth and Peace. Shrewsbury, MA:Jim Scott Music, 2003.
Introduces songs that are set in contemporary styles, from the harmonic and rhythmic complexity of jazz and gospel to repetitive chants and rounds from a variety of cultures. Sponsored by the Unitarian Universalist Seventh Principle Project; available at http://www.uuabookstore.org (at www.uuabookstore.org/).
Sing Your Peace Songbook. Unitarian Universalist Peace Network, 1992.
Thirty-nine easy songs for congregations and peacemakers. Ideal for demonstrations, celebrations, and general worship. Intended for a cappella singing or singing with a simple accompaniment.
Singing the Journey: A Supplement to Singing the Living Tradition. Boston:Unitarian Universalist Association, 2005.
This 75-song supplement presents an exceptional variety of music for congregational singing. A large-print keyboard version is also available.
Singing the Living Tradition. Boston:Unitarian Universalist Association, 1994.
Unitarian Universalism's hymnbook featuring hymns, songs, and readings from around the world. Contains 415 hymns and songs and 317 readings. Hardcover.
Skwire, Marjorie, Mary AnnMoore (at www.uuabookstore.org/contributorinfo.cfm?ContribID=345), and NanneneGowdy (at www.uuabookstore.org/contributorinfo.cfm?ContribID=399). Timeless Themes: Stories from the Hebrew and Christian Bibles for Grades 3 and 4. Boston:Unitarian Universalist Association, 1991.
Curriculum accompaniment to Eugene Navias' Bible Songs on Timeless Themes: Songbook—an excellent way to teach biblical stories through learning African spirituals.
Page, Nick. Sing and Shine On! An Innovative Guide to Leading Multicultural Song. Danbury, CT: World Music Press, 1995.
Available from World Music Press, PO Box 2065, Danbury, CT, 06813-2565; 800-810-2040; www.worldmusicpress.com (at www.worldmusicpress.com/)
———. The Nick Page Sing with Us Songbook. Milwaukee: Hal Leonard Publishers, 2008.
Great sing along songs from many traditions including some fun Nick Page originals.
———. The Nick Page Songbook CD.
Twenty songs for sing-alongs. Available online at www.cdfreedom.com (at www.cdfreedom.com/), or call 800-937-3397.
Related content:
RECOMMENDED SONG COLLECTIONS AND CDS
Anderson, Cheryl P. Shaker Hymnal. Woodstock, NY: The Overlook Press, 1990. "Simple Gifts" is only one on many beautiful and profound Shaker songs.
Barnwell, Ysaye, and George Brandon. Singing in the African American Tradition: Choral and Congregational Vocal Music. Woodstock, NY: Homespun Tapes, Ltd., 1989. Six tapes or CDs on which Ysaye Barnwell teaches harmonies one part at a time—her way of keeping the songs within the aural tradition. Includes useful background information. Highly recommended!
Bell, John L. Come All You People: Shorter Songs For Worship. Chicago: GIA Publications, Inc., 1994.
GIA publishes several of John Bell's worship song collections. Most of the songs are quite simple, and all are beautiful. He draws on Christian music from many world traditions, so you will likely find, for example, an Alleluia from South Africa, India, Europe, and Indonesia.
Blood-Patterson, Peter (ed.). Rise Up Singing. Bethlehem, PA: Sing Out!, 1988.
The best collection of folk song lyrics around. CDs of the songs are available.
Burton, Bryan. Moving Within the Circle: Contemporary Native American Music and Dance. Danbury, CT: World Music Press, 1993.
Book and tape/CD. Especially teacher-friendly. Highly recommended!
Carawan, Guy, and Candie Carawan. Ain't You Got a Right to the Tree of Life? The People of John's Island, South Carolina—Their Faces, Their Words, and Their Songs. Athens: The University of Georgia Press, 1989.
A fascinating look at a fascinating culture.
———. Sing for Freedom: The Story of the Civil Rights Movement Through Its Songs. Bethlehem, PA: Sing Out!, 1990.
Includes excellent historical information.
Cooke, Nym. Awake to Joy! Christmas Carols for Part Singing.
An amazing collection of mostly early-American Christmas music. To purchase, send $15, which includes postage, to Nym Cooke, 290 Wine Road, New Braintree, MA, 01531-1604, or call 508-867-9144.
Davidson, Marilyn Copeland. Earth: Voices of a Planet, Teacher's Guide. Miami: CPP/Belwin, Inc.
Curriculum based on the CD, Earthbeat, from the Paul Winter Consort. Includes geography/culture lessons that incorporate the songs.
DiSavino, Liza (ed.). For the Beauty of the Earth.
An environmental songbook to benefit the Hudson River Sloop Clearwater. For copies, contact Hudson River Sloop Clearwater, 112 Market Street, Poughkeepsie, NY, 12601.
Ellington, Duke. Sacred Concerts. Miami Beach: Hansen House.
If you ever want to lead a jazz service, this collection is a great place to start. Duke Ellington composed three sacred cantatas at the end of his life. One of them, entitled It's Freedom, focuses on the theme of freedom and includes a most enjoyable song, "Sweet Fat and That."
Feierabend, John M. (ed.). The Book of Echo Songs; The Book of Canons; and The Book of Call & Response. Chicago: GIA Publications.
These series of songbooks are exceptional for people who sing with young children. Feierabend's books of bounce songs and other songbooks for younger children are also available.
Friedman, Debbie. The Best of Debbie Friedman. Cedarhurst, NY: Tara Publications, 1997.
Debbie Friedman is beloved for her contemporary Jewish folk and pop songs like "Miriam's Song," and "L'Chi Lach (You Shall Be a Blessing)."
Glazer, Joe and Edith Fowke. Songs of Work and Protest: 100 Favorite Songs of American Workers. New York: Dover Publications.
This is the Dover reprint of the 1960 collection of union and work songs. Complete with music and historical notes.
Gold, Ben-Zion. The Harvard Hillel Sabbath Songbook. Boston: David R. Godine, Publisher, 1992.
The second half of this book features secular Jewish songs of great beauty, with translations and piano accompaniments.
Hammil, Joanne. Rounds & Partner Songs, Vols. 1 and 2.
Joanne is a wonder working with children. Her songs sound and look complicated, but are quite accessible for children who love singing them. Her themes are consistent with UU themes. Her songbooks and CDs are available from http://www.joannehammil.com (at www.joannehammil.com).
Hirschhorn, Linda. Gather Round: New Hebrew Canons, Rounds, and Musical Settings. Cedarhurst, NY: Tara Publications, 1989.
Exciting collection, especially for those looking for new and/or feminist songs within the Jewish tradition.
———. The Music of Linda Hirschhorn: More Hebrew Canons, Rounds, and Musical Settings. Cedarhurst, NY: Tara Publications, 1995.
Her recordings with Vocolot are available from Oyster Albums, Box 3929, Berkeley, CA, 94703, or from Tara Publications.
Jagoda, Flory. The Flory Jagoda Songbook: Memories of Sarajevo. Cedarhurst, NY: Tara Publications, 1993.
Exciting Ladino songs, including "Ocho Kandelikas" and "Hanuka."
Langstaff, John, (ed.). A Revels Garland of Song: In Celebration of Spring, Summer & Autumn. Watertown, MA: Revels, Inc., 1996.
A collection of traditional processionals, carols, rounds, ritual, and children's songs. Revels also publishes a midwinter celebration curriculum. Both books offer ancient English solstice songs, rituals, plays, and traditions appropriate for earth celebrations.
Libana. A Circle Is Cast; Night Passage; Fire Within.
Three songbooks and CDs by the Boston-based women's chorus, Libana. Contains great chants from many traditions, including earth-centered traditions. Available from Libana, Box 400530, Cambridge, MA, 02140, 800-997-7757, or online at http://www.libana.com (at www.libana.com/).
Marks, Kate. Circle of Song: Songs, Chants, and Dances for Ritual and Celebration. Lenox, MA: Full Circle Press, 1999.
If you can find a copy, it is an excellent collection of earth-centered songs.
Masters, Brien (ed.). The Waldorf Song Book. Edinburgh: Floris Books, 1987.
The songs are beautifully sequenced from easy to advanced.
Middleton, Julie Forest (ed.). Songs For Earthlings: A Green Spirituality Songbook. Philadelphia: Emerald Earth Publishing, 1998.
If you can find a copy, this is an incredible collection of sacred and secular earth songs, many perfect for children.
Near, Holly. Singing For Our Lives. Oakland, CA: Redwood Records, 1982.
Music from Holly's albums, Imagine My Surprise and Fire In The Rain. Contains "Voices" and "Singing For Our Lives (We Are a Gentle, Angry People)"
Nyberg, Anders (ed.). Freedom Is Coming: Songs of Protest and Praise from South Africa. Chapel Hill, NC: Walton Music Corporation.
Great book and tape of songs and chants for mixed choir (SATB).
———. Freedom Is In Your Hand. Chapel Hill, NC: Walton Music Corporation, 2003.
Orozco, Jose-Luis (ed.), and Elisa Kleven (illus.). De Colores and Other Latin-American Folk Songs for Children. New York: Dutton Children's Books, 1994.
———. Diez Deditos 10 Little Fingers and Other Play Rhymes and Action Songs from Latin America. New York: Dutton Children's Books, 1997.
Parker, Alice. Creative Hymn Singing. Chapel Hill, NC: Hinshaw Music, 1976.
Alice Parker, a beloved American composer, conductor, and song leader, has much to teach us about making old hymns come to life again. This book is a must for all church musicians.
———. Melodious Accord: Good Singing in Church. Chicago: Liturgy Training Publications, 1991.
Pasternak, Velvel. The Jewish Music Companion: Historical Overview, Personalities, Annotated Folksongs. Cedarhurst, NY: Tara Publications, 2002.
Velvel Pasternak is a fascinating man, publisher of the Tara songbooks, and a renowned expert on a great diversity of Jewish music. This book is an introduction to a rich and diverse tradition.
Perinchief, Robert. Honor Your Partner Songs. Silver Springs, FL: Perry Innovations, Inc.
A fine collection of partner songs (two or more songs that can be sung at the same time). To acquire a copy, contact Perry Innovations. Inc., P.O. Box 395, Silver Springs, FL, 34489, 1-800-527-2966.
Peter, Paul & Mary: Deluxe Anthology. Alfred Publishing Co., Inc., 1990.
Contains melodies, lyrics, and chords.
Reynolds, Malvina. The Malvina Reynolds Songbook. Berkeley, CA: Schroeder Music Company, 1984.
Songs like her "Magic Penny" and "Turn Around" are wonderful for children.
Ritchie, Jean. Jean Ritchie Celebration of Life: Her Songs ... Her Poems. Port Washington, NY: Geordie Music Publishing, 1971.
Collection of sacred and secular Appalachian folksongs, including Jean Ritchie's song for the early environmental movement, "Now Is the Cool of the Day."
Schmid, Will (ed.). Get America Singing and Get America Singing . . . Again! (Vols. 1 and 2). Milwaukee, WI: Hal Leonard, 1996.
Three excellent songbooks prepared by the National Association for Music Education (MENC).
———. New Folk Favorites. Milwaukee: Hal Leonard Publishing, 1987.
Will Schmid is well suited to edit this collection of songs by his friends, ranging from Bill Staines and Si Kahn to Holly Near and Jean Ritchie, plus many others.
———. World Music Drumming: A Cross-Cultural Curriculum. Milwaukee: Hal Leonard, 1998.
A series of teacher manuals and octavos with CDs for teaching drumming with children.
Scott, John Anthony, and John Wardlaw Scott. Ballad of America: A History of the United States through Folk Song, Rev. 3rd edition. Holland, MA: Folksong in the Classroom.
Fine American songs telling our country's eminent history. Delightful stories accompany each song. Highly recommended! For more information and to download an order form, go to http://folksongintheclassroom.org/BalladOfAmericaOrder.pdf (at folksongintheclassroom.org/BalladOfAmericaOrder.pdf).
Seeger, Pete. Abiyoyo. NY: MacMillan, 1985.
This is an illustrated children's story adapted by Pete Seeger. Children can sing along with the song, "Abiyoyo," as you read the book to them. Delightful!
———. Where Have All the Flowers Gone: A Musical Autobiography. Bethlehem, PA: Sing Out!, 1993.
The story of Pete Seeger's life, told through the songs he learned and wrote.
Seeger, Pete, and Bob Reiser. Carry It On: The Story of America's Working People in Song and Picture. Bethlehem, PA: Sing Out!, 1985.
Seeger, Ruth Crawford. American Folk Songs for Children in Home, School and Nursery School. New York: Doubleday, 1948.
A classic collection of songs. Includes an excellent introduction about the folksong tradition.
Songs of Zion. Nashville: Abingdon Press, 1981.
Fantastic collection of African American hymns, spirituals, and gospel songs, with historical backgrounds for each style.
Stone, Mollie Spector. Vela Vela: Striving for authentic performance in black South African choral music. 2004.
Mollie presents South African choirs teaching their songs and dances on a superb DVD with accompanying handbook. You don't need to read music to learn and teach these songs. The songs are in SATB arrangements, but you can have younger children learn just the melodies and the dances. DVD and handbook available at http://www.molliestone.org/PuchaseVelaVela.html (at www.molliestone.org/PuchaseVelaVela.html).
Sweet Honey in the Rock. All for Freedom. Redway, CA: Music for Little People, 1989.
Recording of great African and African American songs for children, including "Silvie," "Cumbayah," "Little Red Caboose," "Ise Oluwah," and others.
———. I Got Shoes. Redway, CA: Music for Little People, 1994.
Weber, Sol (ed.). Rounds Galore! Captivating Rounds, Old and New. 1994.
The best collection of rounds. Recommended. An "informal set," including the book and a CD/tape of the rounds is also available. Distributed by Sing Out! Also available from Sol "Roundman" Weber, 25—14 37th Street, Astoria, NY, 11103-4228.
Wilson, Chesley Goseyun, Ruth Longcor-Harnisch Wilson, and Bryan Burton. When the Earth Was Like New: Western Apache Songs and Stories. Danbury, CT: World Music Press.
Book and CD.
Yogananda, Paramahansa. Cosmic Chants. Los Angeles: Self-Realization Fellowship, 1987. Remarkable devotional songs in English, Hindi, and Sanskrit.
IMPORTANT RESOURCES
Carolyn McDade Music
Crystal Spring Earth Learning Center
76 Everett Skinner Road
Plainville, MA 02762
In Canada: 89 Green Street, Charlottetown, PEI, C1A 2G1
http://www.carolynmcdademusic.com (at www.carolynmcdademusic.com)
CDs, songbook, and info about her projects and concerts.
Dances of Universal Peace
Sufi Islamia/Prophecy Publications
65 Norwich Street
San Francisco, CA 94110
Wonderful collections of spiritual songs with dances. They come from many faiths and traditions, with a strong emphasis on the Sufi faith, a mystical branch of Islam.
Homespun Tapes
Box 694
Woodstock, NY 12498
How-to tapes and videos on learning folk and jazz instruments. Also contains tapes on yodeling and singing in harmony, as well as Ysaye Maria Barnwell's exceptional set, Singing in the African American Tradition.
Nick Page
http://www.nickmusic.com (at www.nickmusic.com/)
My website features multicultural essays, a catalog of published octavos, books, and CDs, plus info on my sings and workshops.
People's Music Network (PMN) and Children's Music Network (CMN)
http://www.peoplesmusic.org (at www.peoplesmusic.org/) and http://cmnonline.org/ (at cmnonline.org/)
These related organizations offer support to folk musicians involved in progressive politics. They publish magazines and offer regional and national gatherings with workshops and concerts. Pete Seeger helped launch both organizations.
Tara Publications
29 Derby Avenue
Cedarhurst, NY 11516
800-827-2400
http://www.jewishmusic.com (at www.jewishmusic.com/)
Tara publishes hundreds of songbooks and recordings representing the great diversity of music within the Jewish tradition. Their catalog is a must!
Transcontinental Music Publications
838 5th Avenue
New York, NY 10021
212-249-0100
http://www.etranscom.com (at www.etranscom.com/)
Collections of sacred and secular Jewish music, including octavos for children's choirs.
Unitarian Universalist Musicians Network
www.uua.org/uumn (at www.uua.org/uumn)
E-mail: uumn @ uumn.org (at mailto:uumn@uumn.org)
800-969-8866
UUMN offers support for music-related issues, including a booklet on staff policy recommendations for church musicians. The network's summer music conference is always informative and fun.
Village Harmony
RD1 Box 668
Plainfield, VT 05667
802-426-3210
http://www.northernharmony.pair.com (at www.northernharmony.pair.com/)
Larry Gordon and Patty Cuyler offer summer chorus camps for youth. They rehearse early American, Bulgarian, South African, and Renaissance music for a week, and then tour New England for two weeks. They also offer camps in Soviet Georgia, South Africa, and Bulgaria, as well as publish songbooks and sell their CDs.
World Around Songs
Rt. 5 Box 398
Burnsville, NC 28714
704-675-5343
Small folksong collections, available since the 50s, containing music of many cultures. Appropriate for sing-a-longs with people/children of all ages.
World Music Press, Judith Cook Tucker, publisher
P.O. Box 2565
Danbury, CT 06813-2565
203-748-1131
800-810-2040
fax: 203-748-3432
http://www.worldmusicpress.com (at www.worldmusicpress.com/)
Judith Cook Tucker publishes excellent songbooks, CDs, and octavos of music from many cultures. The books are well researched and written with the classroom teacher and music specialist in mind. Highly recommended for anyone interested in exploring the music of many cultures with children.
West Catalog
1208 5th Street
Coralville, IA 52241
800-397-9378
http://www.westmusic.com (at www.westmusic.com/)
Huge supplier of songbooks, instruments for children, and recordings. Highly recommended.
Zamir Choral Foundation
P.O. Box 109 Planetarium Station
New York, NY 10024
Every summer, the Zamir Choral Foundation co-hosts a conference on Jewish choral music in the Catskills of New York. It is always wonderful.
OTHER RECOMMENDATIONS AND SOURCE MATERIALS
Becoming Human Through Music: The Wesleyan Symposium on the Perspectives of Social Anthropology in the Teaching and Learning of Music, Aug 6—10, 1984. Reston, VA: Music Educators National Conference (MENC), 1985.
A truly fascinating collection of essays on teaching culture and music.
Blacking, John. How Musical is Man?, Seattle: University of Washington Press, 1973. Among other topics, this book takes a cross-cultural look at how children learn music through imitation.
Dissanayake, Ellen. Music as a Human Behavior: An Hypothesis of Evolutionary Origin and Function. Los Angeles, CA: Paper presented at annual meeting of the Human Behavior and Evolutionary Society, Aug. 16, 1990.
Fascinating look at mother/child dialogue as origin of music and speech that was reprinted in the MIT Press publication, The Origins of Music.
Flatischler, Reinhard. The Forgotten Power of Rhythm. Mendocino, CA: LifeRhythm, 1992.
A New Age way of thinking about rhythm. It makes a powerful connection between rhythm and life. Also see the CD Planet Drum by Mickey Hart, formerly of the Grateful Dead.
Frisbie, Charlotte J. "Gender and Navaho Music: Unanswered Questions," Women in North American Indian Music: Six Essays (Richard Keeling, ed.). Bloomington, IN: The Society for Ethnomusicology, 1989.
Houston, Jean. The Possible Human: A Course in Enhancing Your Physical, Mental, and Creative Abilities. Los Angeles: J.P. Tarcher, Inc., 1982.
The author calls for a rise in consciousness. Good stuff.
McAllester, David P. "North American/Native American," Worlds of Music: An Introduction to the Music of the World's Peoples (Jeff Todd Titon, ed.). NY: Schirmer Books, 1984.
McClellan, Ph.D., Randall. The Healing Forces of Music, History, Theory, and Practice. Rockport, MA: Element Books, 1991.
The most comprehensive cross-cultural book on sound/music healing.
Menuhin, Yehudi, and Curtis W. Davis. The Music of Man. New York: Simon & Schuster, Inc., 1979.
Exciting book and video series.
Pantaleoni, Hewitt. On The Nature of Music. Oneonta, NY: Welkin Books, 1985.
Sahtouris, Elisabet. Gaia: The Human Journey from Chaos to Cosmos. New York: Pocket Books, 1989.
Fascinating story of evolution based on the hypothesis that the Earth is a living planet, not simply a planet with life on it.
Swimme, Brian. The Universe Is a Green Dragon: A Cosmic Creation Story. Santa Fe: Bear & Company, 1984.
Easy-to-read interpretation of modern physics and how it affects our way of thinking.