For a music teacher, I live a remarkably music-free life.  Aside from the hours I spend in instruction and performance in my studio and church, I rarely listen or play much on my own.  I’m not sure why.  I think it began after I moved back home from New York; I found I had heard enough noise there to last through a very  extended silence, and I didn’t miss music even on long car trips and at home by myself.  Over the years I came to enjoy it again, but my laziness usually wins out: it takes effort, even the smallest sort, to put something on while I’m otherwise occupied.

[Aside: The other thing is that, as a visual learner, I cannot abide clutter in any form, and music feels like clutter unless I am focusing solely on it. I really do enjoy my students’ playing (and my own, when I can carve out some time for it) but it’s because it’s the only noise around.  Even a wiggly or talkative sibling in the room can ruin a lesson for me.  In the car, if I’m driving, I focus so much on the music that I’m afraid I won’t be able to pay attention; my last speeding ticket, several years ago, was the result of a rare trip with the radio on.  And my biggest complaint is to restaurants that blare a soundtrack so distracting I can’t converse.  Even sidewalk cafes feel the need to wire the outdoors so that you can’t possibly enjoy a moment of silence, save the tinkling of glasses and forks and the ocean’s swell of human voices enjoying each other's company.]

All of this is to say that it’s shocking and saddening how often I forget what music really means to me.  So it was an unexpected and memorable surprise to discover the Cite de la Musique at the Parc de la Villete one afternoon during our trip.  I wandered in to pass the time while the students were sketching in the park; I ended up staying long after everyone else had left, exiting only reluctantly when it closed.

(The Parc de la Villette, of course, is the sprawling complex of museums, lawns, and carnival rides that turned a seedy area into a bustling family-friendly mecca.  It’s punctuated with bright red follies that are a fun, lively, challenging example of deconstructivism, and I may have just a tiny crush on the architect. A tiny one.)

Though my French is pretty good (and was at its peak after nearly two weeks of constant practice) I most appreciated that the museum was set up multilingually.  An audio guide is included in the admission price – an unobtrusive pair of headphones wired to an iPod-sized device that hangs from your neck or handbag.  Throughout the museum, there are short audio samples – instrument demonstrations and soundtracks to accompany the videos on the screens throughout.  You just enter the number that accompanies the headphones symbol next to the exhibit you want to learn about.  And there are literally hundreds of them – everything from historical background to critique and performance.  I wandered through the displays of instruments –grouped by period, family and geographical location – in awe.  It was an amazing experience.  Here are a few of my favorite photos:

A huge bell – taller than me.  Probably a good thing this one was behind glass; it would have been really tempting to hit it with the clapper!

Intricate detailing inside a stringed instrument – a lute, I believe.

An antique wind instrument – much like a saxophone – with anthropomorphic tendencies.

One of the first keyboard instruments; clavichord, I think (I should have taken notes!)  I thought it was interesting that the colors of the keys are now reversed.

A guitar with gorgeous inlay patterns.

My favorite!  I think this guy is some kind of recorder.  Love his toady face.

Part of a huge set of Asian instruments; I think she’s part of the side of a huge gong.

Obviously, for a musician, the Cite de la Musique is an imperative stop on your Paris journey!  I hope you get to see it someday.

I understand that even if we all recycled, it still wouldn’t be enough — we need to drastically curb, if not stop, our consumption of one-time-use goods.

I understand that we should be moving toward beverages that come from rivers and fruit trees and herbs, not bottles and chemicals and processing plants.

But I can’t see something like this and not be encouraged.  An Austin architectural firm has found a way to make recycling entertaining, and to help concertgoers work together to create a temporary thing of beauty, all while calling attention to a problem most people just don’t want to think about — the incredible amount of trash we generate and the lack of options about what to do with it.

Cup City, you just made my day.

What do you teach, and how long have you been teaching it?

Currently, I’m the director of Art Education at the university, which means I only teach a few classes.  I have two undergraduate methods classes and a graduate class called Art Forms, which integrates music, theater, dance and visual arts with academics.  I also volunteer at an inner-city school program, teaching art to middle schoolers.

[Editor’s Note: “Miss K” also taught a variety of art techniques to her Sunday School and Bible School classes.  I remember lots of wearable art – tie-dying, of course, but also a really lovely technique involving oil-based dyes that we used to marbleize scarves.  She always tied this in with a Scripture verse or concept we’d been learning about in school, so it was relevant as well as fun!]

Who or what inspired you to teach?

I’ve always loved children. Even when I was a little kid, I liked littler kids, and I still prefer young people to my own age group.  I find them refreshing.  The great thing about children is that they’re sponges.  They absorb everything.  Adult learners aren’t good sponges; they just want to share everything they know.  I would prefer someone who would listen to everything *I* know and repeat it back to me.

What’s the toughest thing about teaching?

When you have a discipline problem, a student who honestly doesn’t care – who has become hardened to adults or to respecting others.  That’s very difficult; having one really difficult student can ruin an entire teaching experience.  It just discourages the whole rest of the class.  The kids who want to learn became afraid of the negative force.

When do you have the most fun while teaching?

When there’s the element of “Wow!” or the element of surprise in a lesson – an experience where the kids can’t figure out how you did that, or you have something new to give them.  Even better is when a student will “Wow!” you with a response to something you’ve taught.  I also love when a student will come and share something meaningful and personal to them.  It shows me that they trust me, and that’s when I know it’s all worth it.  I’m benefiting from the experience as much as they are.

What one thing do you try to teach all of your students — the one thing that would enable you to say, “I was a good teacher“?

Respect.  I work with inner-city children, and I start by saying, “I have great respect for you, and I’m going to show respect for you: when you’re talking to me, when you’re doing your artwork.  In return, my expectation is that you’re going to show respect for me.”  I think if you establish that at the beginning of class – that you’ll respect each other no matter what, even if you disagree – you’ll really be able to learn.  Sometimes I’ll have to stop the class and say, “I can see that we’ve got some people who aren’t remembering to respect one another, so I think we’ll just have to put away the materials and sit here.  I’m sorry.”

Another important thing is resilience – to keep going back, no matter what, keep at it – and this applies to everything in life, not just art.

Any final thoughts?

I want my students to think deeply and be intentional about their artwork, so it has true meaning for them.  Usually artwork does have meaning, which is what I love about it.  It’s like an elegant problem that has more than one correct answer – in math or grammar, there may be a “right” answer, but in art, you can give a problem or question and have a multitude of correct answers.

So says the incredibly imaginative Maira Kalman, writing about history, heritage and home in a fanciful mix of photography, painting and chalkboards.  Seriously, you need to see this.

Link from my dad (my DAD?!) who never ceases to surprise me.

The first year I taught Creative Writing, the wonderful movie Stranger than Fiction came out.  I happened to see it with Rob, and we both agreed that if ever there were a movie that young writers needed to watch, this was it.  So I made an impassioned plea to the principal.  The movie’s PG-13, and I thought I remembered most of the reasons for that rating, which I explained to her in detail.  For instance, the protagonist gets together with a girl and there’s a shot of the two of them lying half-asleep in bed together.  I thought this was actually pretty tame, considering it’s a monogamous relationship and the thrust of the whole movie is decidedly pro-life and positive.

The principal, an optimistic and wise leader, told me it sounded like a great idea.  So another teacher and I piled students into our cars and left school a couple of hours early to catch a matinee.  (As you can imagine, the students loved this.  And, since I had underestimated the amount of time it takes a dozen high-school seniors to decide on and order lunch, we also had to sneak food into the theater.  That won me street credit for a week.)

Watching the movie with the students, however, I noticed all kinds of things I hadn’t when I’d watched it with Rob.  Every curse word made me flinch.  When the camera panned over a couple of naked rear ends in a locker room, I was mortified.  A scene where the main character fantasizes about the girl he likes (no pictures, just voiced-over thoughts) was almost unbearable.  Despite the fact that the students loved the movie and got a lot out of it, I left feeling exhausted and defeated.  I wanted to teach them something, but I couldn’t filter out all the junk.

So, I’m sympathetic to my professor.  He probably remembers watching the movie, the cheesy acting and the didactic satire and all the great shots of Baltimore.  If he’s like me, he’s blocked the memory of the more unseemly bits.  But still, a warning would have been nice, especially before I told my mom to watch.

Has everyone seen this movie but me?  I had to watch it for my summer class, “Dynamic of the City.”  Here’s why you should watch it too:

• Lush, defiant, sprawling urban murals. Or, if you prefer, graffiti.  I’ve never seen anything like it.  Regardless of your personal preference, you have to admit it’s refreshingly beautiful.

• Old-school hip-hop. Before it was all about drugs, misogyny and cop-killing, it was about style.  Several students agreed that if rap still sounded like this, we’d be listening.  Many of the tracks are spliced with footage of break-dancers, another lost art form that has disintegrated into sex and violence.  (And the deadpan voice-over about “rocking your body” is priceless.)

• A sense of loss. I felt slighted that this movement had come and gone before I was even born (or at least old enough to appreciate it.)  I’m not sure how it ended except by a crackdown of security on the train yards.  The saddest part was watching the taggers turn into entrepreneurs, searching for a way to prolong their creativity — they suggested a supervised program of train murals with the public voting on which designs it preferred.  It was a great idea, but the MTA scoffed at it and the two retreated to their opposite corners to gear up for the next fight.

Every once in awhile we have a chance to reconcile opponents, to de-polarize opinions, to hold up what we have in common instead of what we disagree about.  Shame on us for looking the other way.

Asperatus, New Zealand (South Island.) Photo by Tanis Danielson.

Think before you click — you could lose an hour in the gallery — but it will be a lovely hour.

The crane’s ethereal beauty has inspired countless artists, poets and performers. Its dances are spectacular; the birds bow and bob, throw their heads back and trumpet, throw grass, stones and feathers into the air, leap up and parachute back down on their broad wings, seeming to jump for joy.  It flies in a V formation with its neck outstretched, blessing the world with the sight of its long, elegant body soaring through the air. Gregarious and social, it congregates whenever possible in large, noisy flocks.  Although it can be found on five different continents, it is increasingly rare today, as many of its habitats are under attack.  Cranes are also loyal; they mate for life, and when they lay eggs – usually two – both parents help to bring the chicks to adulthood.  Pliny the Elder wrote that cranes would appoint one of their number to stand guard while they slept. The sentry would hold a stone in its claw, so that if it fell asleep it would drop the stone and awaken.

In Japan, the crane is representative of longevity and luck, and also associated with the number one thousand, a number that often represents infinity.  Legend holds it that the crane’s lifespan is a thousand years.  Further, the bird is believed to be able to grant a wish to whomever amasses a thousand cranes folded according to the ancient art of origami.

(Here I asked my incredibly courageous friend, who was decked out in pink and sporting a wig that looked for all the world like her natural hair, to stand.  And at the same time, two of our students pulled this mobile from its box to gasps and a thunderous applause that lasted for several minutes before I could continue.)

Two students presenting the cranes to their teacher.

Like the crane, you are rare and beautiful.  You fly at the front of the flock with your neck outstretched, embracing suffering without shame, blessing each one of us with your ability to bear trials that we all wish you did not have to bear.  You are a devoted teacher, wife and mother to your two – chicks – and you work tirelessly to ensure that each of them, along with each of the students in your extended “family,” have the most and best opportunities possible.

Although most of us have not been witness to your trumpeting dance, we know that you radiate joy with your love for life and thirst for knowledge.  And we know that you like to congregate in the large, noisy flocks of a different type of bird – the raven.*

Your students and colleagues have missed you so very much this year, and we wanted to do something to show you how often you are in our thoughts while you’re at home getting your strength back.  We don’t believe in legends, but we do believe in the healing power of Christ.  We believe that He watches over His children with a love which none of us can comprehend.  And we believe in the power of prayer to heal.  It is with this prayer that we present you with one thousand origami cranes, folded by many of the people gathered here today.  We love you and can’t wait to have you back here with us.

*This amazing woman’s only flaw may be that she’s a professional football fanatic.  Can you spot the Ravens-themed strand in the mobile?