A Tribute to "Mr. K"

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An article forwarded to the Moderated Classical Music List (MCML) describes how the author joined several generations of students in a New Jersey suburb, in a musical performance in homage to their music teacher who had just passed away.

I myself have never played in an orchestra, but I have sung in choirs (much to their regret), and know a little of the feeling.  A couple of times a year, our own choir here in Pennsylvania gives a performance for the alumni --this means, the choir alumni, now-- and at the end of it, all alums are invited on stage: potentially nearly a thousand, but not all can make it every year, obviously, and they sing some favorite, in fifty different sharps and flats.  (Actually, they sing quite well; I was just kidding.)

Making music together is a strange thing.  You don't have to be a professional to enjoy it; in fact I would venture to suggest that it is only as an amateur that one can enjoy it all the way to the soles of one's feet.  There is an ethereal moment when it all comes together, and for that instant you're taken out of your body, and you can't believe it was you.  (It is harder with singers, because when you sing it's just a tiny bit difficult to hear everyone else.)  No matter how much you may despise your fellow orchestra members, but when you meet each other again, there is that delight in shared achievement (and shared suffering), and I believe this carries over into every thing you do.

This is my inspiration for supporting music education.  It is amazing that the richest country on Earth, the most decadent society that ever existed, finds it difficult to budget funds for this most valuable of educational ideas: music education.

It doesn't matter that orchestras consist often of pretty quarrelsome individuals, poorly paid, for the most part, each one convinced that the rest of them are a bunch of no-talent nothings.  But an amateur orchestra is a place where you see glimpses of genius, and we need more than ever to be shown those glimpses of genius regularly, and so do our children.  It's worth an enormous amount of money to have children feel this good about each other, even if for just a couple of times a week.

Apropos of very little, here is a Bach Cantata being sung by the Tolzer Boy's Choir.  This is cantata no. 148, the opening chorus.  It simply radiates glee, and the kids do a great job of singing it.




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