On CPTV, when they need money, they make an appeal on the air. Then some big donor promises to give a big chunk of money, but only if other donors make contributions to match their promise.
I have found it interesting that some politicians seem to think that money in the form of tax breaks is good, but money spent on government programs is a black hole. News flash--probably more of the goverment spending goes back into the economy. Government workers pay mortages and purchase groceries, all the paper for the paperwork has to be bought, which helps employ paper mill workers, lumberjacks, truck drivers, etc. So, both tax cuts and government spending stimulate the economy.
However, at this point we all probably recognise that the government is in bad shape--almost as bad as the recent unemployed college graduate who has acquired $100K plus in student loans in hopes of enhanced future earnings. If, as a country, we don't learn to match expenditures with revenues, we are in for major troubles in the future. Denial is not just a river in Egypt (and look what's happening there).
On one of my visits to my wife's homeland, Greece, I visited a small village on the Mani peninsula. One morning, while enjoying a coffee at the zaharoplastion, I observed a shopkeeper sweeping up in front of his store. She swept up all the dire and garbage . . . and then swept it in front of the shop next door and went inside for a day of business. About 20 minutes later the adjacent shopkeeper came out with a broom and swept up all the dirt and garbage and deposited it back in front of the original shopkeepers storefront. I suspect that these people might have a rosy future in American politics (if they could get a visa).
Our "shopkeepers" in Washington behave in a similar manner. Republicans want to "put more money in the pockets of the people" (with the people with the biggest pockets getting the most money) by cutting taxes (reducing government revenues) and getting back to even by cutting spending (which takes money out of the pockets of people and reduces important services). Democrats want to increase (restore) taxes and pay lip service to spending cuts. They argue back and forth about which approach is right and get nothing done.
So, here's the pitch. Create a matching program. Every dollar saved by a spending cut has to be matched by a dollar of increased tax revenues. Everybody gets to feel the pain of coming to terms with our profligate ways. Both actions are deflationary, so we need to exercise caution about how rapidly we proceed, but proceed we must. Both shopkeepers have to dispose of the garbage--not just sweep it to the other side of the isle.
This idea probably makes too much sense to work in Washington, though how we keep electing fools who won't pick up the garbage is beyond me.
Sunday, January 30, 2011
Wednesday, January 5, 2011
The Road Not Taken
The Road Not Taken – A Disciplinary Journey
by Curtis Brand
A weary traveler, clothing torn and legs bleeding from the thorns and thistles encountered in the disciplinary wilderness, stumbles along the road. Overwhelmed by the challenges of unruly students, the traveler wanders the world in search of effective techniques that he can use to instill discipline in his charges.
On his journey, he has sat in the presence of many self-proclaimed prophets and listened to their alluring words. Alas, they have all been false prophets, for, despite following their teachings, his disciplinary problems still remain problematic and his quest unfulfilled. His quest is to find the True Prophet of Discipline, to sit at the feet of the Prophet, and to learn the secrets of taming the souls of children.
By the side of the road, dressed in a robe of regal blue, eyes concealed behind dark glasses and fingers drawing soulful music from the strings of a guitar, sits an older man. His eyes are dim and sightless, but his hands nimble. As the traveler approaches, his spirits lift, for finally, he believes, he is in the presence of the Prophet.
"Are you, good sir," the traveler asks, "the True Prophet of Discipline, for I have roamed many a mile to find you?"
"Well," replies the elderly sage, "I am a blues singer. I guess that kind of makes me a prophet. 'Round here I'm known as 'Blind Discipline'."
"But are you the True Prophet of Discipline?" questions the traveler.
"Close as anyone's ever going to get," responds the Prophet, striking a few minor cords.
"At last!" exclaims the weary wayfarer with jubilation. "I once was lost but now am found! Please, Master, answer for me these nagging questions."
"I suppose," replies the Prophet, his fingers deftly executing pentatonic scale arpeggios as he sits, blind and knowing, before the expectant traveler.
The wanderer begins. "When I am trying to teach a lesson to my class, some of my students don't pay attention.
Blind Discipline raises his hand, motioning to the traveler to stop. "Perhaps this describes your situation," he says. He lays down a lick and then begins to sing:
My whole class
Got no motivation,
Driving me crazy
With the things that they do.
Teach me some techniques
That will be my salvation.
Come on, Oh Prophet
I'm depending on you.
When I hear the school bell ringing
My hands begin to sweat,
But the promise of discipline has my heart singing.
I'll master those street imps yet.
"Yes, Master, that's it exactly" exclaims the traveler, feeling both validated and understood. "Let me repeat the question. When I am trying to teach a lesson to my class, some of my students don't pay attention. They will pass notes among themselves, whisper, and fool around. I can't get them to do what I want them to do? What am I to do?"
The Prophet pauses for a moment, gazes unseeingly skyward, and then speaks in a knowing voice. "This is what we call the do-do question. Making students do what you want them to do but what they don't want to do is as simple as pushing a rope."
The prophet reaches within his flowing robe and draws forth a length of rope. With a supple flick of his wrist, he lays the rope out on the ground before the traveler. "Just grasp this rope and push it across the road," he instructs.
The traveler takes hold of the rope with both hands and, as instructed, attempts to push the rope. He pushes this way and he pushes that, grunting and groaning and toiling with such energy that he works up quite a sweat.
"Well?" the Prophet asks. "How's it going?"
"I am not encountering success, master," the disciple responds in a halting voice, ashamed by his lack of accomplishment. He changes his grip and tries one last time. He sighs, and his shoulders slump in defeat. "No matter how hard I try, I end up with the same results. When I try to push the rope, it simply folds up and goes nowhere."
"You must be holding the rope incorrectly," states the Prophet, mildly exasperated at his new disciple's incompetence. "Unfortunately, since I am blind, I cannot provide you with specific corrections required to improve your rope pushing technique. But trust me, with intensive training, regular practice, escallating effort, the appropriate state certification,and a lengthy, unpaid supervised internship, you will learn to master the pushing of the rope. Let us move on to the next question."
The traveler, unenlightened but nevertheless still in awe in the presence of the Prophet, produces the next question. "Why are children so much more difficult today than they were when we were in school?"
"Again, allow me to rephrase the question in a song."
Why . . . can't the children
Be the way I used to be,
Because, when I was a children,
I did everything my teacher asked of me.
I did my homework all night long,
Knew all the words to the school song,
And only spoke when I was spoken to.
I sat quietly upon my chair,
And never whined when things weren't fair,
And even cleaned the lunchroom table, too.
"And the answer, Master?" the traveler inquires expectantly.
"Sometimes, my son, the best answer is a good question", responds the Prophet. He tilts his head, turning his ear skyward, and listens intently, remaining silent and prophetically inscrutable. Returning his attention to the wanderer, he says, "Now that you understand the importance of a good question, let me test your learning and ask a question of you."
"I hope I am worthy, Master," humbly demurs the disciple.
"If you have a student who is defiant and disrespectful every time you try to make demands upon him, what should you do?" the Prophet queries, and suggests three possible choices.
The disciple, brow knotted in deep thought, reviews all he has learned from the Master. Finally, his face brightens. "C?" he responds hopefully.
"C is correct," the prophet glows. "Don't you just love multiple choice exams?" The Prophet gives his disciple a supportive touch on the arm and remarks supportively, "You have proven yourself worthy to become a Prophet of Discipline yourself."
Drawing a blue robe from his gig bag, the Prophet ceremoniously drapes it over his disciple's shoulders. "Walk with me and join me in imparting the techinques of True Discipline to the weary world."
As they start down the road, the blind prophet leading, the disciple inquires, "So master, using these techniques will help teachers to better impart learning to their students?"
"Learning?" The blind Prophet gives his disciple a blind quizical look as they walk toward the setting sun. "You didn't say anything about learning. I thought you just wanted them to behave. . . ."
Learning and Behaving
In this day and age, we have no shortage of Prophets of Discipline. A vast array of articles, books, and monographs describing disciplinary techniques in a variety of scholarly, authoritative, or down-to-earth manners are available to anyone who feels lost and is looking for guidance. Without intending to be disrespectful to any of the purveyors of behavioral techniques, I strongly believe that before we start applying techniques, we need to think about exactly what we are trying to accomplish in our schools. Before we decide how we are going to deal with our students, we need to ask some basic questions regarding the purpose of our schools and what sorts of lessons we are trying to impart to our students:
· Are our schools centers for learning or are they correctional facilities?
· Are we teaching children to learn or are we civilizing the little guys?
· Are we teaching them good judgment or are we teaching blind obedience?
By not making up our minds, by not making a clear choice about the purpose of public education, we risk condemning our schools to be not particularly good at either correction or learning. In our large and often unwieldy public schools, I am struck by the amount of time and energy that is invested in crowd control. Is an orderly and regimented environment most conducive to effective learning, producing problem solvers who are creative, persistent and effective, efficiently turning out energetic learners like so many Big Macs? Or, do effective learners, like good food, require something more than mass production techniques?
Could regimentation evolve more from the needs of the institution than from the needs of the learner? Perhaps we should consider that the drive for quiet and order comes not from the demands of the learning process, but from the group based, one size fits all, mass production model of education. These children become masters of the Internet without the benefit of carefully structured lesson plans. They learn to please or aggravate adults without an approved formal curriculum. They learn about subjects they think are important in an effective and energetic manner. Perhaps we need to examine the structure of our instruction and consider that teacher dominated lesson plans, by focusing on the "what" of learning rather than on the "how," may actually interfere with the process of learning.
In the forward march of public education, many students are left out of the parade, dissatisfied, disinterested, disaffected, and often disrespectful. From disaffected students' perspective, teacher attempts to manipulate and control them are not viewed appreciatively as efforts to facilitate the learning process. Rather, these efforts are viewed and reacted to as acts of repression.
Can we be surprised that students react to this perceived repression with resentment? Can we be surprised when their resentment becomes retribution, transforming the student into an academic terrorist? Disillusioned with teachers, disconnected from schools, and disenfranchised from the learning process, caught in a cycle of repression and resentment, they have given up on getting ahead and have become satisfied with getting even.
Getting students interested in what we, as educators, think is important, is not an impossible task. If we want our students to walk faster, we can harangue them, verbally pushing them to pick up the pace. Or, we might firmly grasp them by the ear and march along faster, making it very uncomfortable for their bodies not to keep up with their ears. We can expect neither of these interventions to be particularly joyfully received, and both are almost sure to initiate a resentment-resistance cycle.
If we wish to be more effective at increasing their speed, we can simply walk along beside them, carrying on a pleasant and engaging conversation and adjusting our pace to match theirs. Then, very gradually, we can increase our pace, making each step a little more rapid than the previous one. Without applying pressure and without encountering resistance, the students will walk more rapidly. Go out and try it with a student or a colleague. It works every time. In hypnotherapy, this technique is called "Pace and Lead." First, join with the individual, meeting her at her level, and then gradually shift, bringing the person along to the desired condition. This instructional process can be applied to an endless variety of topics and lessons.
Educationally, the principle of pace and lead suggests that, in order to move children along, we first need to meet them where they are. Stated in another fashion, we need to begin instruction with subject material that is highly interesting to them and gradually move them to an investigation and awareness of the material we think they should know. We must learn how to give them enough of what they want so we can, at the same time, give them what we think they need.
What's the catch? The catch is that we need to know our students well enough to know what they want. We need to know about their world – indeed we need to participate in their world -- in order to get them to connect to ours.
I would ask you to consider the notion that effective discipline does not rely upon the external application of consequences designed to elicit compliance. We don't need to make students do something that they want to do. We need to figure out how to get them to want to do it. When desire drives activity and discipline comes from within, when good judgment is valued over blind obedience, the students develop a self-dedication that allows them to forego short-term pleasures in the pursuit of loftier goals, goals which are more difficult and distant. Viola, the self-motivated learner!
Or we can just keep pushing the rope.
by Curtis Brand
A weary traveler, clothing torn and legs bleeding from the thorns and thistles encountered in the disciplinary wilderness, stumbles along the road. Overwhelmed by the challenges of unruly students, the traveler wanders the world in search of effective techniques that he can use to instill discipline in his charges.
On his journey, he has sat in the presence of many self-proclaimed prophets and listened to their alluring words. Alas, they have all been false prophets, for, despite following their teachings, his disciplinary problems still remain problematic and his quest unfulfilled. His quest is to find the True Prophet of Discipline, to sit at the feet of the Prophet, and to learn the secrets of taming the souls of children.
By the side of the road, dressed in a robe of regal blue, eyes concealed behind dark glasses and fingers drawing soulful music from the strings of a guitar, sits an older man. His eyes are dim and sightless, but his hands nimble. As the traveler approaches, his spirits lift, for finally, he believes, he is in the presence of the Prophet.
"Are you, good sir," the traveler asks, "the True Prophet of Discipline, for I have roamed many a mile to find you?"
"Well," replies the elderly sage, "I am a blues singer. I guess that kind of makes me a prophet. 'Round here I'm known as 'Blind Discipline'."
"But are you the True Prophet of Discipline?" questions the traveler.
"Close as anyone's ever going to get," responds the Prophet, striking a few minor cords.
"At last!" exclaims the weary wayfarer with jubilation. "I once was lost but now am found! Please, Master, answer for me these nagging questions."
"I suppose," replies the Prophet, his fingers deftly executing pentatonic scale arpeggios as he sits, blind and knowing, before the expectant traveler.
The wanderer begins. "When I am trying to teach a lesson to my class, some of my students don't pay attention.
Blind Discipline raises his hand, motioning to the traveler to stop. "Perhaps this describes your situation," he says. He lays down a lick and then begins to sing:
My whole class
Got no motivation,
Driving me crazy
With the things that they do.
Teach me some techniques
That will be my salvation.
Come on, Oh Prophet
I'm depending on you.
When I hear the school bell ringing
My hands begin to sweat,
But the promise of discipline has my heart singing.
I'll master those street imps yet.
"Yes, Master, that's it exactly" exclaims the traveler, feeling both validated and understood. "Let me repeat the question. When I am trying to teach a lesson to my class, some of my students don't pay attention. They will pass notes among themselves, whisper, and fool around. I can't get them to do what I want them to do? What am I to do?"
The Prophet pauses for a moment, gazes unseeingly skyward, and then speaks in a knowing voice. "This is what we call the do-do question. Making students do what you want them to do but what they don't want to do is as simple as pushing a rope."
The prophet reaches within his flowing robe and draws forth a length of rope. With a supple flick of his wrist, he lays the rope out on the ground before the traveler. "Just grasp this rope and push it across the road," he instructs.
The traveler takes hold of the rope with both hands and, as instructed, attempts to push the rope. He pushes this way and he pushes that, grunting and groaning and toiling with such energy that he works up quite a sweat.
"Well?" the Prophet asks. "How's it going?"
"I am not encountering success, master," the disciple responds in a halting voice, ashamed by his lack of accomplishment. He changes his grip and tries one last time. He sighs, and his shoulders slump in defeat. "No matter how hard I try, I end up with the same results. When I try to push the rope, it simply folds up and goes nowhere."
"You must be holding the rope incorrectly," states the Prophet, mildly exasperated at his new disciple's incompetence. "Unfortunately, since I am blind, I cannot provide you with specific corrections required to improve your rope pushing technique. But trust me, with intensive training, regular practice, escallating effort, the appropriate state certification,and a lengthy, unpaid supervised internship, you will learn to master the pushing of the rope. Let us move on to the next question."
The traveler, unenlightened but nevertheless still in awe in the presence of the Prophet, produces the next question. "Why are children so much more difficult today than they were when we were in school?"
"Again, allow me to rephrase the question in a song."
Why . . . can't the children
Be the way I used to be,
Because, when I was a children,
I did everything my teacher asked of me.
I did my homework all night long,
Knew all the words to the school song,
And only spoke when I was spoken to.
I sat quietly upon my chair,
And never whined when things weren't fair,
And even cleaned the lunchroom table, too.
"And the answer, Master?" the traveler inquires expectantly.
"Sometimes, my son, the best answer is a good question", responds the Prophet. He tilts his head, turning his ear skyward, and listens intently, remaining silent and prophetically inscrutable. Returning his attention to the wanderer, he says, "Now that you understand the importance of a good question, let me test your learning and ask a question of you."
"I hope I am worthy, Master," humbly demurs the disciple.
"If you have a student who is defiant and disrespectful every time you try to make demands upon him, what should you do?" the Prophet queries, and suggests three possible choices.
The disciple, brow knotted in deep thought, reviews all he has learned from the Master. Finally, his face brightens. "C?" he responds hopefully.
"C is correct," the prophet glows. "Don't you just love multiple choice exams?" The Prophet gives his disciple a supportive touch on the arm and remarks supportively, "You have proven yourself worthy to become a Prophet of Discipline yourself."
Drawing a blue robe from his gig bag, the Prophet ceremoniously drapes it over his disciple's shoulders. "Walk with me and join me in imparting the techinques of True Discipline to the weary world."
As they start down the road, the blind prophet leading, the disciple inquires, "So master, using these techniques will help teachers to better impart learning to their students?"
"Learning?" The blind Prophet gives his disciple a blind quizical look as they walk toward the setting sun. "You didn't say anything about learning. I thought you just wanted them to behave. . . ."
Learning and Behaving
In this day and age, we have no shortage of Prophets of Discipline. A vast array of articles, books, and monographs describing disciplinary techniques in a variety of scholarly, authoritative, or down-to-earth manners are available to anyone who feels lost and is looking for guidance. Without intending to be disrespectful to any of the purveyors of behavioral techniques, I strongly believe that before we start applying techniques, we need to think about exactly what we are trying to accomplish in our schools. Before we decide how we are going to deal with our students, we need to ask some basic questions regarding the purpose of our schools and what sorts of lessons we are trying to impart to our students:
· Are our schools centers for learning or are they correctional facilities?
· Are we teaching children to learn or are we civilizing the little guys?
· Are we teaching them good judgment or are we teaching blind obedience?
By not making up our minds, by not making a clear choice about the purpose of public education, we risk condemning our schools to be not particularly good at either correction or learning. In our large and often unwieldy public schools, I am struck by the amount of time and energy that is invested in crowd control. Is an orderly and regimented environment most conducive to effective learning, producing problem solvers who are creative, persistent and effective, efficiently turning out energetic learners like so many Big Macs? Or, do effective learners, like good food, require something more than mass production techniques?
Could regimentation evolve more from the needs of the institution than from the needs of the learner? Perhaps we should consider that the drive for quiet and order comes not from the demands of the learning process, but from the group based, one size fits all, mass production model of education. These children become masters of the Internet without the benefit of carefully structured lesson plans. They learn to please or aggravate adults without an approved formal curriculum. They learn about subjects they think are important in an effective and energetic manner. Perhaps we need to examine the structure of our instruction and consider that teacher dominated lesson plans, by focusing on the "what" of learning rather than on the "how," may actually interfere with the process of learning.
In the forward march of public education, many students are left out of the parade, dissatisfied, disinterested, disaffected, and often disrespectful. From disaffected students' perspective, teacher attempts to manipulate and control them are not viewed appreciatively as efforts to facilitate the learning process. Rather, these efforts are viewed and reacted to as acts of repression.
Can we be surprised that students react to this perceived repression with resentment? Can we be surprised when their resentment becomes retribution, transforming the student into an academic terrorist? Disillusioned with teachers, disconnected from schools, and disenfranchised from the learning process, caught in a cycle of repression and resentment, they have given up on getting ahead and have become satisfied with getting even.
Getting students interested in what we, as educators, think is important, is not an impossible task. If we want our students to walk faster, we can harangue them, verbally pushing them to pick up the pace. Or, we might firmly grasp them by the ear and march along faster, making it very uncomfortable for their bodies not to keep up with their ears. We can expect neither of these interventions to be particularly joyfully received, and both are almost sure to initiate a resentment-resistance cycle.
If we wish to be more effective at increasing their speed, we can simply walk along beside them, carrying on a pleasant and engaging conversation and adjusting our pace to match theirs. Then, very gradually, we can increase our pace, making each step a little more rapid than the previous one. Without applying pressure and without encountering resistance, the students will walk more rapidly. Go out and try it with a student or a colleague. It works every time. In hypnotherapy, this technique is called "Pace and Lead." First, join with the individual, meeting her at her level, and then gradually shift, bringing the person along to the desired condition. This instructional process can be applied to an endless variety of topics and lessons.
Educationally, the principle of pace and lead suggests that, in order to move children along, we first need to meet them where they are. Stated in another fashion, we need to begin instruction with subject material that is highly interesting to them and gradually move them to an investigation and awareness of the material we think they should know. We must learn how to give them enough of what they want so we can, at the same time, give them what we think they need.
What's the catch? The catch is that we need to know our students well enough to know what they want. We need to know about their world – indeed we need to participate in their world -- in order to get them to connect to ours.
I would ask you to consider the notion that effective discipline does not rely upon the external application of consequences designed to elicit compliance. We don't need to make students do something that they want to do. We need to figure out how to get them to want to do it. When desire drives activity and discipline comes from within, when good judgment is valued over blind obedience, the students develop a self-dedication that allows them to forego short-term pleasures in the pursuit of loftier goals, goals which are more difficult and distant. Viola, the self-motivated learner!
Or we can just keep pushing the rope.
Friday, November 12, 2010
Horatius at the Bridge, Canaries in the Coal Mines, and the Assault on American Education
Among member nations of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development, the US High School graduation rate is near the bottom. Assessment of academic proficiency American secondary student’s performance varies from mediocre to poor. If you read the newspapers or watch television, you may be getting the impression that American education is sliding into the toilet and that bad teachers are the primary reason for slippage.
News flash #1. Bad teachers are not a 21st century invention. We likely had as many bad teachers way back when the US was still number one in education. Teachers, like everything else, are distributed on the bell curve. Some are inspirational, some are competent, some are adequate, and some are just using up oxygen. Before we hold bad teachers responsible for the decline of American intellectual achievement, someone has to prove that our nation currently has a higher percentage of incompetent teachers than during previous decades. A thoughtful investigation might actually demonstrate that, on the average, teachers are better these days than ever. While bad teachers may impede the cure for our educational achievement decline, no clear evidence exists that they are the cause of our current educational decline.
Think for a minute:
Are teachers responsible for the current mindless approach to political campaigns, where ads filled with emotionally driven slander replace thoughtful discussion of issues?
Are teachers responsible for the mindless content of most TV programs, movies, and video games?
Are teachers responsible for the chronic substance abuse by middle and high school students which undermines their education?
Are teachers responsible for . . . well, you get the idea. Could the decline in education be the reflection rather than the cause of our societal slippage
One thing teachers teach is that if we forget history, we are doomed to repeat it, so I will start with historical example #1:
Horatius Cocles was in command of the Pons Sublicius, the principal bridge across the Tiber River to Rome, when the Etruscan army routed the Roman forces outside the city. Horatius and two comrades stood firm as the rest of the Roman army retreated across the bridge. Horatius ordered the bridge destroyed behind him and held off the onrushing Etruscan army until the bridge was destroyed. Horatius held, the bridge across the river razed, the Etruscan army held at bay, and Rome saved. As for Horatius, he received an Etruscan spear in the buttocks and had to swim back across the Tiber, wounded, in full armor, and without assistance. Meanwhile, with the bridge demolished and the Etruscan army blocked by the river, the population of Rome sat snug behind the walls of the city.
I would like you to consider that teachers are not the villain in today’s societal slippage. Rather they are Horatius at the bridge, trying to fend off the damaging onrush of a self-absorbed, materially obsessed society, which appears to have minimal interest in critical thinking. Dispassionate observation would seem to indicate that, on the average, teachers appear to be performing far better than your average congressman or congresswoman. Perhaps unions do keep some bad teachers from being fired, but we have nothing but our own collective idiocy to blame for the current crop in congress.
Historical example #2:
Early coal mines lacked ventilation systems, making the miners particularly vulnerable to the build-up of methane gas and carbon monoxide. Canaries had the unfortunate (for them) heightened sensitivity to these gasses, making them ideal early warning systems. As long as the canary was singing, the mine was safe. A dead canary was cause for immediate evacuation.
I would submit that public education is American society’s current canary. Unfortunately, the chosen solution for the problem of the dying educational canary seems to be an intense program focused on developing bigger, stronger canaries, rather than worrying about improving mine safety.
News flash #2. The problem in the coal mines was not the canary.
So, what’s the answer? I lack the hubris to believe I have special insights, but I do have a suggestion. Perhaps the answer lies, at least in part, in establishing a society in which intelligent thought is both demanded and rewarded. Where does math and science achievement fit in with TV’s “Jersey Shore”? Our entertainment and our political campaigns are clearly based upon the premise that most people are idiots. Do we live in a society that refuses to take responsibility for its excesses and is searching madly for a whipping boy to punish for its misdeeds? I fear the answer is yes, and that teachers, at least for now, have become America’s whipping boy.
America is not failing because of the lack of good teachers. We are failing because of, among other things, rampant drug abuse, dissolving families, the corrupting influence of special interest money on politicians, a decline is real wages for the majority of Americans, an increasing imbalance in the distribution of wealth, global warming, the national debt, and the globalization of a life style that the resources of our planet cannot support. I suspect that you may have your own additions to this list.
Old Joke #1
A guy comes across a drunk crawling around on his hands and knees on the sidewalk underneath a street light.
“What’s the matter, buddy?” he asks.
“I lost my keys,” the drunk responds.
“Well, let me help.”
The guy looks around for a few minutes and, finding nothing, asks, “Are you sure you dropped them here?”
“No,” says the drunk. “I dropped them down the block.”
“Then,” questions the helpful but puzzled fellow, “Why are we looking here?”
“Well,” says the drunk, “the light is better under the street lamp.”
Right now the street light is pointed at teachers, but—sorry to disappoint you—the light may be brighter and teachers may make an easier target, but they don’t have the keys. They can, however, teach you to read the manual.
So, what’s a teacher supposed to do? The true task of a teacher, in my humble opinion, is to engage the students and make them curious. The children do not need to be driven, they do not need to be entertained—they need to be engaged and involved. William Butler Yeats once said, “Education is not filling a bucket, but lighting a fire.” The focus upon standardized student testing as a measure of teacher proficiency is an attempt to turn American teachers into a dutiful educational bucket brigade, making sure that kids learn what someone at a desk somewhere says they “need to know.”
What the path to excellence? Are hard skills like science and math important? Of course. An artist must have knowledge of the use of brushes in order to paint. Are soft skills, like creativity and independence important? Of course. Will a standardized, paint by numbers curriculum and frequent standardized testing result in more proficient and creative painters? I doubt it. We need a society that both values and demands intelligent thought and well developed skills. We need to recognize that only a small part of education occurs within public school walls. Yes, we need to demand more from our schools and teachers, but we also need to demand more from parents, from the media, from politicians, and from corporations. All are to blame, and those who are not part of the solution are part of the problem.
While teachers, even the bad ones, are not to blame for American society’s declining interest in intelligent discourse and thoughtful action, can teachers be a major part of the solution for declining achievement? Absolutely, but I suspect that we are unlikely to gain their full and enthusiastic cooperation by sticking spears in their butts.
Curtis Brand, Ph.D.
Storrs, Connecticut
News flash #1. Bad teachers are not a 21st century invention. We likely had as many bad teachers way back when the US was still number one in education. Teachers, like everything else, are distributed on the bell curve. Some are inspirational, some are competent, some are adequate, and some are just using up oxygen. Before we hold bad teachers responsible for the decline of American intellectual achievement, someone has to prove that our nation currently has a higher percentage of incompetent teachers than during previous decades. A thoughtful investigation might actually demonstrate that, on the average, teachers are better these days than ever. While bad teachers may impede the cure for our educational achievement decline, no clear evidence exists that they are the cause of our current educational decline.
Think for a minute:
Are teachers responsible for the current mindless approach to political campaigns, where ads filled with emotionally driven slander replace thoughtful discussion of issues?
Are teachers responsible for the mindless content of most TV programs, movies, and video games?
Are teachers responsible for the chronic substance abuse by middle and high school students which undermines their education?
Are teachers responsible for . . . well, you get the idea. Could the decline in education be the reflection rather than the cause of our societal slippage
One thing teachers teach is that if we forget history, we are doomed to repeat it, so I will start with historical example #1:
Horatius Cocles was in command of the Pons Sublicius, the principal bridge across the Tiber River to Rome, when the Etruscan army routed the Roman forces outside the city. Horatius and two comrades stood firm as the rest of the Roman army retreated across the bridge. Horatius ordered the bridge destroyed behind him and held off the onrushing Etruscan army until the bridge was destroyed. Horatius held, the bridge across the river razed, the Etruscan army held at bay, and Rome saved. As for Horatius, he received an Etruscan spear in the buttocks and had to swim back across the Tiber, wounded, in full armor, and without assistance. Meanwhile, with the bridge demolished and the Etruscan army blocked by the river, the population of Rome sat snug behind the walls of the city.
I would like you to consider that teachers are not the villain in today’s societal slippage. Rather they are Horatius at the bridge, trying to fend off the damaging onrush of a self-absorbed, materially obsessed society, which appears to have minimal interest in critical thinking. Dispassionate observation would seem to indicate that, on the average, teachers appear to be performing far better than your average congressman or congresswoman. Perhaps unions do keep some bad teachers from being fired, but we have nothing but our own collective idiocy to blame for the current crop in congress.
Historical example #2:
Early coal mines lacked ventilation systems, making the miners particularly vulnerable to the build-up of methane gas and carbon monoxide. Canaries had the unfortunate (for them) heightened sensitivity to these gasses, making them ideal early warning systems. As long as the canary was singing, the mine was safe. A dead canary was cause for immediate evacuation.
I would submit that public education is American society’s current canary. Unfortunately, the chosen solution for the problem of the dying educational canary seems to be an intense program focused on developing bigger, stronger canaries, rather than worrying about improving mine safety.
News flash #2. The problem in the coal mines was not the canary.
So, what’s the answer? I lack the hubris to believe I have special insights, but I do have a suggestion. Perhaps the answer lies, at least in part, in establishing a society in which intelligent thought is both demanded and rewarded. Where does math and science achievement fit in with TV’s “Jersey Shore”? Our entertainment and our political campaigns are clearly based upon the premise that most people are idiots. Do we live in a society that refuses to take responsibility for its excesses and is searching madly for a whipping boy to punish for its misdeeds? I fear the answer is yes, and that teachers, at least for now, have become America’s whipping boy.
America is not failing because of the lack of good teachers. We are failing because of, among other things, rampant drug abuse, dissolving families, the corrupting influence of special interest money on politicians, a decline is real wages for the majority of Americans, an increasing imbalance in the distribution of wealth, global warming, the national debt, and the globalization of a life style that the resources of our planet cannot support. I suspect that you may have your own additions to this list.
Old Joke #1
A guy comes across a drunk crawling around on his hands and knees on the sidewalk underneath a street light.
“What’s the matter, buddy?” he asks.
“I lost my keys,” the drunk responds.
“Well, let me help.”
The guy looks around for a few minutes and, finding nothing, asks, “Are you sure you dropped them here?”
“No,” says the drunk. “I dropped them down the block.”
“Then,” questions the helpful but puzzled fellow, “Why are we looking here?”
“Well,” says the drunk, “the light is better under the street lamp.”
Right now the street light is pointed at teachers, but—sorry to disappoint you—the light may be brighter and teachers may make an easier target, but they don’t have the keys. They can, however, teach you to read the manual.
So, what’s a teacher supposed to do? The true task of a teacher, in my humble opinion, is to engage the students and make them curious. The children do not need to be driven, they do not need to be entertained—they need to be engaged and involved. William Butler Yeats once said, “Education is not filling a bucket, but lighting a fire.” The focus upon standardized student testing as a measure of teacher proficiency is an attempt to turn American teachers into a dutiful educational bucket brigade, making sure that kids learn what someone at a desk somewhere says they “need to know.”
What the path to excellence? Are hard skills like science and math important? Of course. An artist must have knowledge of the use of brushes in order to paint. Are soft skills, like creativity and independence important? Of course. Will a standardized, paint by numbers curriculum and frequent standardized testing result in more proficient and creative painters? I doubt it. We need a society that both values and demands intelligent thought and well developed skills. We need to recognize that only a small part of education occurs within public school walls. Yes, we need to demand more from our schools and teachers, but we also need to demand more from parents, from the media, from politicians, and from corporations. All are to blame, and those who are not part of the solution are part of the problem.
While teachers, even the bad ones, are not to blame for American society’s declining interest in intelligent discourse and thoughtful action, can teachers be a major part of the solution for declining achievement? Absolutely, but I suspect that we are unlikely to gain their full and enthusiastic cooperation by sticking spears in their butts.
Curtis Brand, Ph.D.
Storrs, Connecticut
Monday, December 7, 2009
Martyn Joseph Review (a review to die for)
October 28
Martyn JOSEPH at De Fagot in Ingelmunster (West Flanders, Belgium) on Monday October 19th 2009. By Antoine Légat (October 27th 2009)
Martyn Joseph, singer-songwriter from Wales, master in every aspect of his craft but even more importantly, a tunesmith with many a moving story to tell, with a passionate and compassionate view on how man forged (t)his world, a vision on how to tackle the wrongs, or at least trying to understand them, and a big beating heart for every man's deeper longings and aspirations.
It's hard to present a phenomenon like Martyn Joseph in a few lines. Stating he's a professional and experienced singer-songwriter from Wales is arguably objective information. Proclaiming he's one of the very best in his trade, a master in every aspect of the craft, respected worldwide, a tunesmith with many a moving story to tell, with a passionate and compassionate view on how man forged his world, a vision on how to tackle the wrongs, or at least trying to understand them, and a big beating heart for every man's deeper longings and aspirations, well that's already more of a personal opinion, needing some corroboration and confirmation. What better then than a concert in a familiar surrounding to stake Mr. Joseph's case? So we went to De Fagot in Ingelmunster, the unlikely surrounding for a concert by a world star. So...This is it!
Martyn Joseph reminded us during the concert of his ties with Belgium. These go a long way back: halfway the nineties he did two supports in Belgium, the first one being for Céline Dion, the other for Art Garfunkel in 1995. If the combination of these names strikes you as 'totally unexpected' and 'fire and water', then you are absolutely right. We actually assisted the concert at the PSK (Paleis voor Schone Kunsten, also known in French as Palais des Beaux Arts...In Brussels everything has two names) where Martyn, armed only with his guitar, managed in dwarfing huge Art and his band to a mere after party...With all due respect to the great songs high pitched Garfunkel has assembled over the years and the fine band he mustered for that tour. In our piece for national so-called 'quality' newspaper De Standaard we simply had to come to that conclusion. And we were not alone to do so. Poor Garf!
Over the years Joseph established firm contacts with our country, always playing just well enough to come back to the same spots almost every year. 'Just well enough' to exhaust our stock of cans with 'fresh superlatives for use in reviews', because each last concert, each last tour seemed to top the one before and meant a new high in his performances, always renewing himself and constantly adding new songs to the old favourites. At present he can practically fill a whole week of concerts, never playing twice the same song and not giving in on the quality of the gigs either. One spot where he's practically at home is De Fagot in Ingelmunster, deep in the heart of Flanders (to avoid all misunderstandings: a fagot is Dutch for a bassoon) JP Deven and his wife Carine made him feel comfy from his first visit on. ,,I remember entering this tiny club the first time with all these old musical instruments hanging in the back of the stage. It looked like the torture room!'' How he has come to love the torture room over the years!
By now he obviously has got a lot of memories connected with the club...and with the yearly Labadoux Festival, first organised by De Fagot in 1988, by the same people who started it all. Although remaining a relatively small scale family affair and nominally being a folk festival, Labadoux succeeded year after year in bringing quality acts, not only in international folk, but also in blues, rock and world music (see www.labadoux.be !) It's moreover a festival with lots of activities on the side. They're still proud to have had Warren Zevon as headliner in 2000. Martyn Joseph was at Labadoux in 2004 and 2007, always with smashing success, so the reviews tell us. So it was no surprise to find him on the billboard again this year, alongside luminaries the likes of Watermelon Slim, Maggie Reilly, The Hothouse Flowers, Garland Jeffreys, The Easy Star All-Stars, Chris Jagger and many, many more. This time finally we managed to go and see Martyn at the festival (in the past years we only saw him perform in clubs) We witnessed him tackling the audience in the big, crowded tent with guts and daring, sounding like a complete orchestra on his guitar, singing with his big, compelling voice, playing one gem after the other, including brand new songs, some not even entirely finished yet, getting everyone to sing in the end. Three quarters of an hour quality time and an audience that roared and cheered as never before, an unbelievable experience if you weren't there.
So on Monday 19th October it was a more than full house at De Fagot for Martyn: the people present at the festival and having discovered Martyn in that tent, added to the usual crowd of supporters and believers, coming from near and very far. Coming late and not having reserved, confident we could easily fit in, we had to stand in the kitchen with a limited view on the artist, but we didn't mind (and that's not because of the scampi's that were in the kitchen for the taking!) There's no place in the world we'd rather have been that night, because Martyn, although subject to a terrible cold, a non-Mexican flu, once more gave it all before this ever more enthusiastic gathering.
A gathering, that's the word, brothers and sisters, although believing in Martyn is a question of free will. How many singer-songwriters get their audience to sing from the first song? Only Martyn Joseph manages this. Mind you, we're not into crowd singing, on the contrary, as this tends to detract seriously from the songs. Loss of concentration and momentum are the sad result. And then we don't even talk about the poor level of 'artistry' of these singalong obligations... But with Martyn, it's different. That has all and everything to do with the meaning of the verses sung. He gets the singing along to add to the song, and that's quite unique.
One might expect Martyn to take the easy road on such a familiar spot, but it's the last thing he will do. Instead of playing a kind of best of, he brings a mix of the expected and familiar (with a slight predominance of tracks from Vegas) with a whole bunch of new tunes, some of them still under construction, as with the Labadoux concert. He just gets away with that. After opening fiercely with I Have Come To Sing, out of the Vegas album, and getting us all to warble, twitter of even sing, playing on that old and small four string guitar with the poweful sound he discovered a few years ago, he gets into Lonely Like America, a brand new song that's a free download on his site, with a bout of Bruce Springsteen's Dancing In The Dark, fitting like a glove, at the end of the song. After this lively start, the volume drops suddenly, unexpectedly early in the set. We're entitled to two simply magical moments, Can't Breathe and Turn Me Tender, both stemming from the Deep Blue album, but also on the latest CD Evolved, fifteen songs Martyn has singled out for re-recording, claiming these are the ones that best define his artistic identity. The songs go right into the soul of all present: during Can't Breathe and Turn Me Tender a kind holy silence reigns in the room, where people indeed stop breathing, overwhelmed by the heavenly lyrics: ,,Turn me tender again, fold me into you, turn me tender again and mold me to new. Faith lost its promise and bruised me deep blue, turn me tender again through union with you...''
Things That We Have Carried Here, again from Vegas, engenders a spontaneous choir on the ,,beautiful...beautiful...'' line. Despite the solemnity of the moment, Martyn adds between the singing that ,,I stole this line from Bono'': humour is never far away in his overall approach. Martyn might be a spoft spoken man in the matters of the heart, but he sure knows who and what governs this planet and it isn't ,,peace, love and understanding'' as yet. At New Year he saw, as probably everyone else did, the appaling images of a father in Ghaza talking to the world's reporters, having just lost his five daughters when Israeli rockets missed their aim (a mosque!) and hit his home. What strikes Martyn is that this man wasn't keen on revenge, which in this case would be a very understandable reaction (think of If I Had A Rocket Launcher by Canadian bard Bruce Cockburn), but bore his lost with utmost dignity. Joseph's Five Sisters aren't even so much social comment as a homage to this courageous former father, who far more deserves the Nobel Prize for Peace than some presidents.
The ,,peace and justice in our time'' at the end has a bitter ring to it, for doesn't it recall the famous 'reassurance' of Prime Minister Chamberlain in 1938? But Martyn's an optimist, against all odds, and believes that the good will prevail. It isn't a naive stance, mind you. It is possible, but we'll have to carve it with our own bare hands. It's a people's thing, not something achieved through dogma's, doctrines, systems or politics. Five Sisters can be downloaded freely and in two versions on www.martynjoseph.com. He then brings Walk Down The Mountain by request, though he hasn't played the song for so long. The words come nevertheless, with a little help from the friends. But even the lapsus linguae are an opportunity to entertain his audience. It doesn't undermine his artistry, it underlines his confidence. Another old tune People Crazy As Me and the more recent Invisible Angel (from Vegas, once more) create a light-hearted atmosphere, an ideal introduction for the closing song of the first part. In 1996 he wrote a song for the InBetween Rounds Girl, whose ,,task'' it is to let the boxing fans know what round is coming next... Actually, we can't think of another rôle these ladies might have as this is already hard work. Martyn shows himself at his most compassionate.
After the break, Rooms For Love and Weight Of The World leads to a funny intermezzo about the ,,funk folk'' label that was invented especially for him in Canada, as they could not find a suitable tag to classify his music. Journalists over there have more bright ideas, but it seems they were misled, in their endeavour to prepare the interviews thoroughly, by a friend of Martyn's son who added a few ,,facts and figures'' to the Wikipedia article on 'Martyn Joseph'. So he had to endure questions about his ,,famous horsemanship'' and his ,,black belt in karate''. We knew he has had other sports ambition in his younger years, but... Horses? Karate? It is only fitting that he played a funky, soulful and utterly funny version of Wake Me Up, although he ends it up in a spectacular way, looping his guitar and voice until he has a whole orchestra behind him. A great guitar solo ensues after which the song dies down, leaving us all astonished by so much dexterity and musicality.
The totally new and fresh You're The Moment gives him the chance to tell us that a song should, ideally, be played some two years before recording it, as during this period a song evolves all the time before it finds its final form, the reason why Evolved was conceived in the first place. A highlight on Vegas is no doubt Kindness, written in Toronto when it was 22° below zero and all sorts of weird scenes were taking place in Young Street. Suddenly, Martyn tells us, he was engulfed by a deep longing for home and his beloved ones and was sensing the energy that good people, in whatever condition, can generate. It's all of this in just one song, pointing at Martyns ability to put a wealth of facts, thoughts and feelings in one song, without crushing the listeners under an avalanch of information and without disturbing the unity a song must have to be comprehensible. Between The Raindrops is next, the first tune he sang as support to Art Garfunkel in '95, as he reminded us. The ,,peace in the world tonight'' still rings while the song is mutating, so slowly than you don't even notice, into Thunder And Rainbows, the title song of a double, well compiled ,,best of'' album, that sadly isn't available anymore, and a fine catalogue of opposites all the way down the Yellow Brick Road.
Proud Valley Boy recounts the memories of a Welsh miner who saw The Dragon coming over from America to support these men suffering humiliations on top of bad working conditions. This ,,David and Goliath in one frame'' is none less than Paul Robeson, black singer who proudly fronted segregation in his own country and even ,,exported'' his pride and self-respect to all who needed it, while continuously being harassed and discredited at home. Martyn confronts Kanye West and Tiger Woods with this pioneer and advocate of equal rights and human dignity. In Change Your World, Martyn begins to rap in the best funk folk tradition and tells us what good medecine is sold in Belgium (his cold didn't audibly affect his voice) and as for the chocolates, they are verrry good. The rapping continues jumping from one topic to the other, not forgetting JP's birthday just the day before. The happy birthday cheers transcend into the praising of Carine's food and the fact that's he's brought along a few CD's for selling and so on, anything springing in mind, finally returning to the prime funky message ,,change the world...YES WE CAN!''. It probably spounds boring, as one reads this, but it is in fact sparkling, utterly droll, funny, witty, and really funky too. De Fagot close to delirium.
But in the encores, Martyn shows even more aspects of his multi-facetted talents. The best is yet to come! Title tune Vegas, with its great story about the eighty year old taxi driver who's having the time of his life driving through the street (no S!) of Las Vegas (a true story, as almost always), gives the Welshman the opportunity to do a prolonged Elvis Presley routine. We've heard these before by others, but never this hilarious and at the same time so true to the original. Well, this man would win every Elvis soundalike contest with the greatest ease! What the crowd couldn't possibly known, is that before the concert, when someone in the kitchen (also backstage!) requested Turn Me Tender but erroneously said Love Me Tender, he sang the entire Elvis classic like we never heard before. From earlier concerts we recall other vocal imitations by Martyn, and good ones too. Cardiff Bay is next, arguably the archetypical Martyn Joseph song, on the surface just an endearing memory of a day in Cardiff, but on a deeper level dealing with a wealth of inner feelings, engendered by the father-son relationship, thus by far transcending the mere ,,sung postcard'' of a nice city. No wonder Cardiff Bay is requested time and again.
But Martyn always has something up his sleeve for the grand finale. He conjures up the song he sang at Labadoux Festival in May, then a totally new one, I'm On My Way. With its simple melody and its easy, but meaningful words he got the whole tent singing. People present at the festival still remembered this particular song as it had had the same amazing impact, and now sing with him, from the first time on, as if they had never stopped singing it: ,,I'm on my way, I'm on my way, everyday a little closer on my way. I'm on my way, I'm on my way, I'm running, I'm loving, I'm stumbling on my way''. For minutes on end they keep singing it. Even after he has fittingly ended the show and greeted and thanked everyone, the audience begins again, singing these lines lustily, seemingly unable to stop the routine. It's something we never experienced before at a concert, not in 38 years of approximately 200 concerts a year on average! A fourth encore, the requited Sing To My Soul, finally has to send us to bed (no other way to put an end to the impromptu choir), or whereever we are heading to, still floating on air, the end of a gig you wish would never end. But Martyn will return in 2010 and we will duely and timely remind him of the promise he made, somewhere during the concert, to finally come over with his full band, if possible next spring. Wouldn't that make a nice headliner for Labadoux?
Martyn JOSEPH at De Fagot in Ingelmunster (West Flanders, Belgium) on Monday October 19th 2009. By Antoine Légat (October 27th 2009)
Martyn Joseph, singer-songwriter from Wales, master in every aspect of his craft but even more importantly, a tunesmith with many a moving story to tell, with a passionate and compassionate view on how man forged (t)his world, a vision on how to tackle the wrongs, or at least trying to understand them, and a big beating heart for every man's deeper longings and aspirations.
It's hard to present a phenomenon like Martyn Joseph in a few lines. Stating he's a professional and experienced singer-songwriter from Wales is arguably objective information. Proclaiming he's one of the very best in his trade, a master in every aspect of the craft, respected worldwide, a tunesmith with many a moving story to tell, with a passionate and compassionate view on how man forged his world, a vision on how to tackle the wrongs, or at least trying to understand them, and a big beating heart for every man's deeper longings and aspirations, well that's already more of a personal opinion, needing some corroboration and confirmation. What better then than a concert in a familiar surrounding to stake Mr. Joseph's case? So we went to De Fagot in Ingelmunster, the unlikely surrounding for a concert by a world star. So...This is it!
Martyn Joseph reminded us during the concert of his ties with Belgium. These go a long way back: halfway the nineties he did two supports in Belgium, the first one being for Céline Dion, the other for Art Garfunkel in 1995. If the combination of these names strikes you as 'totally unexpected' and 'fire and water', then you are absolutely right. We actually assisted the concert at the PSK (Paleis voor Schone Kunsten, also known in French as Palais des Beaux Arts...In Brussels everything has two names) where Martyn, armed only with his guitar, managed in dwarfing huge Art and his band to a mere after party...With all due respect to the great songs high pitched Garfunkel has assembled over the years and the fine band he mustered for that tour. In our piece for national so-called 'quality' newspaper De Standaard we simply had to come to that conclusion. And we were not alone to do so. Poor Garf!
Over the years Joseph established firm contacts with our country, always playing just well enough to come back to the same spots almost every year. 'Just well enough' to exhaust our stock of cans with 'fresh superlatives for use in reviews', because each last concert, each last tour seemed to top the one before and meant a new high in his performances, always renewing himself and constantly adding new songs to the old favourites. At present he can practically fill a whole week of concerts, never playing twice the same song and not giving in on the quality of the gigs either. One spot where he's practically at home is De Fagot in Ingelmunster, deep in the heart of Flanders (to avoid all misunderstandings: a fagot is Dutch for a bassoon) JP Deven and his wife Carine made him feel comfy from his first visit on. ,,I remember entering this tiny club the first time with all these old musical instruments hanging in the back of the stage. It looked like the torture room!'' How he has come to love the torture room over the years!
By now he obviously has got a lot of memories connected with the club...and with the yearly Labadoux Festival, first organised by De Fagot in 1988, by the same people who started it all. Although remaining a relatively small scale family affair and nominally being a folk festival, Labadoux succeeded year after year in bringing quality acts, not only in international folk, but also in blues, rock and world music (see www.labadoux.be !) It's moreover a festival with lots of activities on the side. They're still proud to have had Warren Zevon as headliner in 2000. Martyn Joseph was at Labadoux in 2004 and 2007, always with smashing success, so the reviews tell us. So it was no surprise to find him on the billboard again this year, alongside luminaries the likes of Watermelon Slim, Maggie Reilly, The Hothouse Flowers, Garland Jeffreys, The Easy Star All-Stars, Chris Jagger and many, many more. This time finally we managed to go and see Martyn at the festival (in the past years we only saw him perform in clubs) We witnessed him tackling the audience in the big, crowded tent with guts and daring, sounding like a complete orchestra on his guitar, singing with his big, compelling voice, playing one gem after the other, including brand new songs, some not even entirely finished yet, getting everyone to sing in the end. Three quarters of an hour quality time and an audience that roared and cheered as never before, an unbelievable experience if you weren't there.
So on Monday 19th October it was a more than full house at De Fagot for Martyn: the people present at the festival and having discovered Martyn in that tent, added to the usual crowd of supporters and believers, coming from near and very far. Coming late and not having reserved, confident we could easily fit in, we had to stand in the kitchen with a limited view on the artist, but we didn't mind (and that's not because of the scampi's that were in the kitchen for the taking!) There's no place in the world we'd rather have been that night, because Martyn, although subject to a terrible cold, a non-Mexican flu, once more gave it all before this ever more enthusiastic gathering.
A gathering, that's the word, brothers and sisters, although believing in Martyn is a question of free will. How many singer-songwriters get their audience to sing from the first song? Only Martyn Joseph manages this. Mind you, we're not into crowd singing, on the contrary, as this tends to detract seriously from the songs. Loss of concentration and momentum are the sad result. And then we don't even talk about the poor level of 'artistry' of these singalong obligations... But with Martyn, it's different. That has all and everything to do with the meaning of the verses sung. He gets the singing along to add to the song, and that's quite unique.
One might expect Martyn to take the easy road on such a familiar spot, but it's the last thing he will do. Instead of playing a kind of best of, he brings a mix of the expected and familiar (with a slight predominance of tracks from Vegas) with a whole bunch of new tunes, some of them still under construction, as with the Labadoux concert. He just gets away with that. After opening fiercely with I Have Come To Sing, out of the Vegas album, and getting us all to warble, twitter of even sing, playing on that old and small four string guitar with the poweful sound he discovered a few years ago, he gets into Lonely Like America, a brand new song that's a free download on his site, with a bout of Bruce Springsteen's Dancing In The Dark, fitting like a glove, at the end of the song. After this lively start, the volume drops suddenly, unexpectedly early in the set. We're entitled to two simply magical moments, Can't Breathe and Turn Me Tender, both stemming from the Deep Blue album, but also on the latest CD Evolved, fifteen songs Martyn has singled out for re-recording, claiming these are the ones that best define his artistic identity. The songs go right into the soul of all present: during Can't Breathe and Turn Me Tender a kind holy silence reigns in the room, where people indeed stop breathing, overwhelmed by the heavenly lyrics: ,,Turn me tender again, fold me into you, turn me tender again and mold me to new. Faith lost its promise and bruised me deep blue, turn me tender again through union with you...''
Things That We Have Carried Here, again from Vegas, engenders a spontaneous choir on the ,,beautiful...beautiful...'' line. Despite the solemnity of the moment, Martyn adds between the singing that ,,I stole this line from Bono'': humour is never far away in his overall approach. Martyn might be a spoft spoken man in the matters of the heart, but he sure knows who and what governs this planet and it isn't ,,peace, love and understanding'' as yet. At New Year he saw, as probably everyone else did, the appaling images of a father in Ghaza talking to the world's reporters, having just lost his five daughters when Israeli rockets missed their aim (a mosque!) and hit his home. What strikes Martyn is that this man wasn't keen on revenge, which in this case would be a very understandable reaction (think of If I Had A Rocket Launcher by Canadian bard Bruce Cockburn), but bore his lost with utmost dignity. Joseph's Five Sisters aren't even so much social comment as a homage to this courageous former father, who far more deserves the Nobel Prize for Peace than some presidents.
The ,,peace and justice in our time'' at the end has a bitter ring to it, for doesn't it recall the famous 'reassurance' of Prime Minister Chamberlain in 1938? But Martyn's an optimist, against all odds, and believes that the good will prevail. It isn't a naive stance, mind you. It is possible, but we'll have to carve it with our own bare hands. It's a people's thing, not something achieved through dogma's, doctrines, systems or politics. Five Sisters can be downloaded freely and in two versions on www.martynjoseph.com. He then brings Walk Down The Mountain by request, though he hasn't played the song for so long. The words come nevertheless, with a little help from the friends. But even the lapsus linguae are an opportunity to entertain his audience. It doesn't undermine his artistry, it underlines his confidence. Another old tune People Crazy As Me and the more recent Invisible Angel (from Vegas, once more) create a light-hearted atmosphere, an ideal introduction for the closing song of the first part. In 1996 he wrote a song for the InBetween Rounds Girl, whose ,,task'' it is to let the boxing fans know what round is coming next... Actually, we can't think of another rôle these ladies might have as this is already hard work. Martyn shows himself at his most compassionate.
After the break, Rooms For Love and Weight Of The World leads to a funny intermezzo about the ,,funk folk'' label that was invented especially for him in Canada, as they could not find a suitable tag to classify his music. Journalists over there have more bright ideas, but it seems they were misled, in their endeavour to prepare the interviews thoroughly, by a friend of Martyn's son who added a few ,,facts and figures'' to the Wikipedia article on 'Martyn Joseph'. So he had to endure questions about his ,,famous horsemanship'' and his ,,black belt in karate''. We knew he has had other sports ambition in his younger years, but... Horses? Karate? It is only fitting that he played a funky, soulful and utterly funny version of Wake Me Up, although he ends it up in a spectacular way, looping his guitar and voice until he has a whole orchestra behind him. A great guitar solo ensues after which the song dies down, leaving us all astonished by so much dexterity and musicality.
The totally new and fresh You're The Moment gives him the chance to tell us that a song should, ideally, be played some two years before recording it, as during this period a song evolves all the time before it finds its final form, the reason why Evolved was conceived in the first place. A highlight on Vegas is no doubt Kindness, written in Toronto when it was 22° below zero and all sorts of weird scenes were taking place in Young Street. Suddenly, Martyn tells us, he was engulfed by a deep longing for home and his beloved ones and was sensing the energy that good people, in whatever condition, can generate. It's all of this in just one song, pointing at Martyns ability to put a wealth of facts, thoughts and feelings in one song, without crushing the listeners under an avalanch of information and without disturbing the unity a song must have to be comprehensible. Between The Raindrops is next, the first tune he sang as support to Art Garfunkel in '95, as he reminded us. The ,,peace in the world tonight'' still rings while the song is mutating, so slowly than you don't even notice, into Thunder And Rainbows, the title song of a double, well compiled ,,best of'' album, that sadly isn't available anymore, and a fine catalogue of opposites all the way down the Yellow Brick Road.
Proud Valley Boy recounts the memories of a Welsh miner who saw The Dragon coming over from America to support these men suffering humiliations on top of bad working conditions. This ,,David and Goliath in one frame'' is none less than Paul Robeson, black singer who proudly fronted segregation in his own country and even ,,exported'' his pride and self-respect to all who needed it, while continuously being harassed and discredited at home. Martyn confronts Kanye West and Tiger Woods with this pioneer and advocate of equal rights and human dignity. In Change Your World, Martyn begins to rap in the best funk folk tradition and tells us what good medecine is sold in Belgium (his cold didn't audibly affect his voice) and as for the chocolates, they are verrry good. The rapping continues jumping from one topic to the other, not forgetting JP's birthday just the day before. The happy birthday cheers transcend into the praising of Carine's food and the fact that's he's brought along a few CD's for selling and so on, anything springing in mind, finally returning to the prime funky message ,,change the world...YES WE CAN!''. It probably spounds boring, as one reads this, but it is in fact sparkling, utterly droll, funny, witty, and really funky too. De Fagot close to delirium.
But in the encores, Martyn shows even more aspects of his multi-facetted talents. The best is yet to come! Title tune Vegas, with its great story about the eighty year old taxi driver who's having the time of his life driving through the street (no S!) of Las Vegas (a true story, as almost always), gives the Welshman the opportunity to do a prolonged Elvis Presley routine. We've heard these before by others, but never this hilarious and at the same time so true to the original. Well, this man would win every Elvis soundalike contest with the greatest ease! What the crowd couldn't possibly known, is that before the concert, when someone in the kitchen (also backstage!) requested Turn Me Tender but erroneously said Love Me Tender, he sang the entire Elvis classic like we never heard before. From earlier concerts we recall other vocal imitations by Martyn, and good ones too. Cardiff Bay is next, arguably the archetypical Martyn Joseph song, on the surface just an endearing memory of a day in Cardiff, but on a deeper level dealing with a wealth of inner feelings, engendered by the father-son relationship, thus by far transcending the mere ,,sung postcard'' of a nice city. No wonder Cardiff Bay is requested time and again.
But Martyn always has something up his sleeve for the grand finale. He conjures up the song he sang at Labadoux Festival in May, then a totally new one, I'm On My Way. With its simple melody and its easy, but meaningful words he got the whole tent singing. People present at the festival still remembered this particular song as it had had the same amazing impact, and now sing with him, from the first time on, as if they had never stopped singing it: ,,I'm on my way, I'm on my way, everyday a little closer on my way. I'm on my way, I'm on my way, I'm running, I'm loving, I'm stumbling on my way''. For minutes on end they keep singing it. Even after he has fittingly ended the show and greeted and thanked everyone, the audience begins again, singing these lines lustily, seemingly unable to stop the routine. It's something we never experienced before at a concert, not in 38 years of approximately 200 concerts a year on average! A fourth encore, the requited Sing To My Soul, finally has to send us to bed (no other way to put an end to the impromptu choir), or whereever we are heading to, still floating on air, the end of a gig you wish would never end. But Martyn will return in 2010 and we will duely and timely remind him of the promise he made, somewhere during the concert, to finally come over with his full band, if possible next spring. Wouldn't that make a nice headliner for Labadoux?
Saturday, November 7, 2009
Vanilla Bean 11/6/09
The Vanilla Bean is one of the best venues around for the singer/songwriter. They provide the opportunity for acoustic musicians to perform in an intimate and welcoming setting before an audience that comes to listen. I love the gigs there as the featured performer. The evening was embellished by a brief performance by ilyaimy, an acoustic duo that hits the folk stage like a lightening strike. Check them out at www.ilyaimi.com or see them tonight at Victoria Station in Putnam. Willi Larsen (www.willilarsen.com)also added some great fingerpicking sound.
A great evening with an appreciative crowd. Kudos to Barry and Maria for their ongoing support of original music, and Bonnie and Shane for the great job they do running the show.. The Vanilla Bean--great food and music. Go there!
A great evening with an appreciative crowd. Kudos to Barry and Maria for their ongoing support of original music, and Bonnie and Shane for the great job they do running the show.. The Vanilla Bean--great food and music. Go there!
Tuesday, October 27, 2009
Older that Dirt Reviews
Hope you enjoyed the music. Please post your reviews and let others know what you think.
Tuesday, October 6, 2009
Data Driven Education (or is it Drivel driven?)
We are being told that we must use standardized tests to guarantee that school children are learning. Data driven decsionmaking is the new intellectual hemline in the educational fashion world.
There is, of course, the over told story of the man who comes across a drunk who is crawling around on his knees beneath a street light.
“You OK?” he asks.
“Yea. I’m looking for my car keys.”
Being a kind individual by nature, the man helps the drunk look for his keys. After looking for 10 minutes and not finding anything, he asks, “Are you sure you dropped them here.”
“No,” said the drunk. “I dropped them down the block.”
“Then why,” ask the man, “are you looking for them here?”
“Because here the light is better.”
As Warwick writes, “It seems to me that ushering it away to the central office to worry over data as an educational concern may actually be detrimental to the learning our students need to be engaged in. Limited resources will cause us put undue emphasis on what can be easily measured at the expense of those important skills and knowledge that can’t.”
Wiley adds, “The data that we, educators, gather and utilize is all but garbage. What passes for data for practicing educators? An aggregate score in a column in a gradebook. A massive, course-grained rolling up of dozens or hundreds of items into a single, collapsed, almost meaningless score.”
Having suffered through several graduate courses in statistical analysis, the words, “Garbage in, garbage out” echo in my head. In the same what that the destruction of the rain forest threatens biodiversity, the lock step adherence to test driven curriculum threatens edudiversity. We need to be taking many approaches to teaching and focusing on different information so when the unexpected situations occur, we have somebody that knows how to deal with it effectively.
Wall street and business got turned over to the number crunchers and bean counters. Are we hoping for a similar outcome?
Do teachers, as a group, have the courage to stand up and decry the McDonaldization of education? Perhaps Nancy Reagan was right. We should just say no.
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