“Leila-sama! We got another e-mail question from my super-neat Jessie’s Letters page!”
“It is a question with profound meaning?”
“Uh uh.”
“It is a question that seeks the deepest mysteries of the universe?”
“Nope.”
“It is a question that will challenge our understanding of our existence?”
“It’s a question about being a drummer in marching band.”
“Oh, that’s easy.”
“Sometimes Leila frightens me.”
“Heheee… okay. The question says ‘In your story you said the drummers play a cadence. What’s a cadence?’”
“Cake question.”
“Cadence is when the drum section plays a rythym so the rest of the formation can keep time with their steps. We have four cadences in the Lions Band. The first two are full cadences.”
“That’s the one you start!”
“Yeah. Full Cadence Green starts with a roto-tom solo.”
“The other one is our ‘good morning’ cadence.”
“Full Cadence Gold starts with a full section downbeat and cymbal crash.”
“Good morning cadence?”
“We like to play Full Cadence Gold on Collins Circle over behind the school so if anyone in the neighborhood across the street didn’t hear their alarm clock we help them wake up.”
“Yay! Ohayo minna! It’s a bright sunshiney day!”
“Well, except for that one guy who stood in his driveway yelling at us that one day last year.”
“I think he thought we were trying to annoy everyone. Until we marched past his house in parade formation and played ‘National Emblem’ during after-school practice. His wife baked cookies for all of us the next day and brought them to the band room. She said he was so proud to have a parade in front of his house he almost cried. What a nice old couple too.”
“That’s cool. What are the other two cadences?”
“We have one called a ‘Silent Cadence’ if we’re marching up to a performance area at parades. There’s a couple hundred yards where bands aren’t allowed to make a lot of noise because it disrupts the bands in the performance area, so we play that cadence on the rims of our drums.”
“That’s the tick-tock cadence. All drum rims, traps and glockenspiels.”
“That’s the one that sounds like a carnival! I like the tick-tock cadence best.”
“The fourth one is a simple corps cadence. One snare plays the measure downbeats. We use that for starting formations on the field.”
“Now which one do we play in the tunnel at Brown Stadium?”
“Full Cadence Gold, baby.”
“Yeah!”
“Maximum volume. Maximum power.”
“Yay! Arigato minna-san! If you got a question or a comment or just wanna say ‘hi!’ you can send me e-mail on my Jessie’s Letters page and we might even get to answer your question right here on our site! Ja ne!”
We have just returned home from a week in London, exploring the city to dropping point! One place we visited was the National Gallery, where we followed the Chinese Zodiac Trail. We knew which animals to look for from retellings of the legendary selection process, such as The Great Race: The Story of the Chinese Zodiac. While looking at the paintings, we learnt a great deal about the differences and similarities in the symbolism attached to the animals in Chinese and Western cultures; and Little Brother, who is passionate about dragons, was overjoyed to discover that his birth sign, the Snake, is also known as the Little Dragon!
In the gallery shop afterwards, we found a delightful picture-book called Pablo the Artist by Satoshi Kitamura, which is an enigmatic exploration of the artistic process and where inspiration comes from – I agree with The Magic of Books‘ review, where PJ Librarian says “you really aren’t sure at this point if Pablo is dreaming or if these landscape characters are actually real” – it’s one of those books which grows with each re-reading as new details are discovered and absorbed. We especially loved the glimpse of infinity provided at the end, having read The Mouse and His Child so recently, where the picture of the dog carrying a tray with a tin of dog food with the picture of the dog carrying a tray etc. etc. was such a recurrent and pivotal theme.
Not Just for Kids recommends Pablo the Artist and some other picture-books which “introduce young readers to some of the world’s masterpieces”, as does Rhyming Mom.
Who am I and how do I look to others? Bob Raczka’s Here’s Looking at Me: How Artists See Themselves, an American Library Association Notable Book for middle readers, stimulates children to explore these two fascinating and important human questions. Fourteen artists’ self portraits, from Velasquez to Harlem painter Jacob Lawrence, introduce children to the many ways that visual artists portray themselves.
Parents and teachers who want kids to explore art on its own terms will find this primer on self-portraits much to their liking. In addition, check out Just Like Me, a multicultural collection of artist self portraits–along with artists’ statements and their childhood photographs–and this art workshop, based on Just Like Me. For some great online ideas about kids’ self-portraits, click here.
Finally, following up on my series of posts on spiritual literacy, here’s Concord Magazine’s gallery of spiritual self portraits by children.
Buddhists add a sixth sense to the five we ordinarily think of, and it’s thinking itself; to the Buddhist, thoughts impinge on the mind just the way sights, for example, impress the eye. It’s the vibrant interplay of sense organ, sense object, and consciousness that make up our experience of self.
The concept of Bob Raczka’s More Than Meets the Eye, part of his Adventures in Art picture book series, treats only the five conventional senses, but he engages the mind as a sixth sense in the process. “Have you ever tasted a painting?” he asks, illustrating with Vermeer’s milk jug, Cassatt’s cup of tea, and of course Thiebaud’s frosted cakes. Hockney’s splashing diver, Jamie Wyeth’s stinky pig and Rivera’s tortillas, among others, point out sound, smell, and touch respectively. Works by Vasarely and Chuck Close demonstrate the art of really looking at pictures.
We don’t get Raczka’s charming rhymes in this book, but there is plenty of art food for thought for children and parents alike. Raczka understands that art is an experience, and he serves it up deliciously. In crossing senses, he also crosses cultures. The images and the senses he evokes and inspires are universal.
Patricia Stohr-Hunt’s blog, The Miss Rumphius Effect (where she’s known as Tricia) has a wonderful list of sense-evoking books for kids.
Art is an especially direct path to multicultural consciousness: the stretch an artist challenges us with is very like the stretch of seeing another culture afresh. Yet while there are wonderful art project books and books that present ideas about art, surprisingly few present actual works of art in a way that children can relate to directly. Bob Raczka’s Adventures in Art series, published by Lerner Publishing’s Millbrook Press imprint, does a great job of this, presenting real works of art with simple, often rhyming text. “Art is draped, art is chiseled, art is pasted, art is drizzled,” he explains in his 2002 Art Is. It features 27 works of art spanning the spectrum of time and genre from Bridget Riley and Christo to the Lascaux cave paintings and a mask from the Cameroon and concludes, “Art is an island surrounded by pink. Art is how artists get you to think.” Brief notes on each artist follow.
Raczka goes well beyond depicting famous works of art in an accessible context; his imagination and respect for kids make his series a work of art itself. Tune in again soon for more on good art books for kids, including more Bob Raczka books.
