One of the things we love about MacPhail, and one of the things that we hope make the expense and the commute worthwhile, is the extra programs they provide for music education and enrichment. Katy usually has a monthly group class, but this month, they flew in a guest instructor, Michele Horner, from NYC for "an interactive Journey through Art and Music". It was great content teaching the kids the main characteristics of Western art and music from the Middle Ages to Classical times.
Michele had the kids enact and embody the characteristics, so for example, the music and art of the middle ages was flat and linear...
Michele was quite a character and told great stories - when she was explaining how Renaissance artists would steal cadavers and disect them, she warned the kids that they should cover their ears if they did not want to hear a gross story. She had them use their hands to represent the Renaissance period's emphasis on a central focus with balance and symmetry.
She also related the characteristics of each art and musical era to their hairstyles and had the kids fly streamers representing the different melodies in baroque music. So, she showed Bach's wig with its flowing motion and layers, as well as Beethoven's wig with its stiff curls giving form and structure.
We had to help the kids finish off by building columns to represent the "form and structure" of classical music - the string quartet, the four sections of symphony orchestras, and the four movements of a symphony.
It was a slighty manic class, but great fun for the kids and really great content.
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