I had the pleasure of attending a Hong Kong Chinese Orchestra Concert last night. It was called "The Soaring Dragon: Celebrating the 60th Anniversary of the People's Republic of China." I was curious about how the concert would be organized. Would politics or propaganda play any role in the concert? It didn't feel that way at all. It appeared to simply be musicians from Hong Kong and Mainland China coming together to present an energizing concert celebrating chinese music and the art of drumming.

The concert opened in a spectacular fashion. Young students from local primary schools performed a mass drum piece. There were about 60 drummers on stage. I was impressed with the amount of communication going on in order to keep the large group together. I was also impressed with the energy given off by the students (approximately 7-17 years old) as they played complex rhythms and single stroke rolls. BAM! It reminded me of the potential of young people and the vast amounts of knowledge and skills their young brains can process. Despite all of the bad news we tend to hear about "young people these days," the performers really brought some good back into this world through their music.

It takes me about 30 minutes to get to work. I leave my building and hop on a mini-bus, ride it to the MTR (mass transit railway) station, board a train to Kowloon Tong, and walk about 10 minutes to school. There are some mornings when everything seems to run smoothly and then there are those mornings when the timing of buses and trains seem to be off and people conspire against me to walk right in my path. As I impatiently stumbled through the Kowloon Tong MTR station this morning, I recognized a familiar piece of music playing over the public speakers. It was Beethoven's Fur Elise. I've heard this tune before in the MTR along with some of Bach's Cello Suites. I finally asked myself why these classical pieces are being played in the MTR. BAM! I wonder if there is a conscious effort to play this music because it can have a calming effect, therefore calming the people's emotions as they struggle to navigate their way through the busy station. Instead of a dose of high art, could it all be a mind game to help control the masses? What do you think?

As a music teacher, ear training is an essential skill you must develop. I am certainly better at listening to sounds and determining intervals or rhythms now than when I was a young teacher. I still have work to do in this area of my musicianship and always will.

There are so many sounds in Hong Kong. The atmosphere lends itself well to ear training practice on the go. The elevator (or lift) in my building makes bell sounds when it arrives on your floor, as most do. I decided to finally analyze the four sounds it makes and BAM! determined that it was playing so, do, re, me. This was a relatively easy example, but I felt pretty good after figuring this out. Going up?

In music technology class we are starting the year by exploring sound production, sound waves, frequency, etc. The first project is one I began last year, but love it so much that I had to bring it back. The purpose of the project is to give students a chance to experiment with the Garageband computer program and to have students demonstrate that they can split, move, and connect tracks. In order to accomplish this, the students complete the project "What Did He Say?" in which they manipulate a recording of me talking about my past teaching experiences, education, and current classroom rules. The recording is rather boring, but the students get to change it anyway they want to make it more "interesting."

I really enjoy watching the students work on this project because I rarely see students work so diligently. It gives the students a chance to learn without knowing it and allows for some very creative ideas to take shape. BAM! They look as if they are deeply engaged in the assignment; nothing else matters at that moment. It's a great feeling to be able to create a project that accomplishes my teaching objectives and also engages the students creative minds at the same time!

The project is due next week. I'm looking forward to the final results. Who knows what I'll say?

Update: Check out a few examples on my YouTube page.

Today was the first day of Cantonese class. A friend sent me information about the class and I decided to join because I've been living in Hong Kong for one year and still know very little Cantonese; it's a bit embarrassing. I think it would be rude to not, at least, learn the basics. I've been apprehensive about trying up to this point because Chinese is very different from English. There is no alphabet and pitch directions play a significant role in proper pronunciation. Since I am a music teacher, I feel that I should be able to grasp these pitch directions a bit better, but it is still difficult. In class, I took notes as fast as I could and even brought a voice recorder so that I could practice throughout the week.

One of the first phrases we learned was "Lay ho ma^" (How are you?). It was explained to me that "ma" is an expressive word that has no meaning, but is placed at the end of some phrases. When saying the entire phrase, the pitch direction of "ma" should go up. After listening to and repeating the teacher, it occurred to me that these three syllables sound like the first three pitches of the song "Dona Nobis Pacem" (Grant us Peace). BAM! When I was able to relate this new phrase to a melody I was already familiar with, I felt connected to the inherent musicality of the Cantonese language. I knew that Cantonese was very melodic, but this was the first time I experienced it through my own voice.

As I practice throughout the week and attend classes every Sunday through December, I hope to more closely experience the musicality and beauty of the Cantonese language.