For whom the bell tolls...

Well, here it is the next day. Great record so far. And a great day. I taught a good voice lesson today. My student is doing a recital Sunday, so we've started rehearsing with her accompanist, an excellent Organist friend of mine. She (the student) is doing really well, so if she's reading this, fret not! You are not the direct inspiration. He (the accompanist) is also doing a fabulous job. (This means, essentially, that they more or less do what I want. And since I'm in charge...)

In addition to being really good, they are both really young. Which is the direct inspiration for this-- or at least the trigger that reminded me of a past "rant." Most of my students are college-aged or slightly beyond. Meaning that they are significantly younger than I. Basically, the next generation (as odd as that is to say). And I find, as I discuss with my friends who are old farts like me, that all of the technological advances we are witnessing are not being met by similar advances in what we used to call general/common knowledge. The bottom is dropping out!

My students and their contemporaries can tell me lots about IMing, HTML, blogs, music downloading, CG movie and game technology, but they can't tell me a story.

Once upon a time, a bear family lived in the woods. There was a Daddy Bear, a Mommmy Bear and Baby Bear...

Story-telling used to be something everyone did and everyone knew. Our parents told us stories, their parents told them stories. I know some of us tell our kids stories. But the kids I teach don't seem to know how to tell them. Sure, they've heard them, but they can't tell them.

Why is this important to a single chick who sings? As I tell my old fart civilian (i.e. non-musician-- actually in this case, non-singing) friends, story-telling is what separates singers from every other musician on the planet, at least technically. All musicians share notes, rhythms, lines, phrases, form. But only singers tell stories. Once upon a time, that was imprinted on our cultural DNA. You didn't have to teach that part in a lesson. But now upon a time, along with the nuts and bolts, I find myself teaching cadence, pacing, timing-- when and how to deliver a punchline.

Along the same lines, another of our lost cultural genes is the canon of great literature. My wonderful student (who I repeat, is doing a great job) is singing a Poulenc set this weekend. Both she while learning it and her accompanist today required an explanation about Jason, the Argonauts and the Golden Fleece. Another student had no idea who Anansi the Spider was. And I finally had to go out and buy Harold and the Purple Crayon for my studio because NOT ONE of my students had ever heard of or read one of the greatest stories about creativity and imagination that exists today. This is, lamentably, not a new thing for me.

Actually, just yesterday I was in a very tall, large chair in a doctor's office and I mentioned to the phlebotomist that I felt like Lily Tomlin's Edith Ann. She looked at me like I had two heads. "You don't know who that is, do you?" I said. "No," she replied blankly. I just sighed deeply and felt a sudden communion with my elders who probably had similar conversations with me about Milton Berle, or someone similarly iconic.

Sigh. Verrrrrry deep sigh. For whom does the bell toll? Cultural literacy, it tolls for thee.