On Thursday, May 14th I visited the Joli Ann Leichtag Elementary School as a guest of the Museum of Making Music (MoMM) in their partnership with music teacher Philip Rowley and two big groups of enthusiastic students. The first group was Kindergarten thru 3rd grade and the second group was 4th and 5th-graders.
The next night, after the show, Mr. Rowley handed me a big pile of Thank You letters and drawings from students and teachers. I LOVED all of them!
These are some of the drawings the students created – wow!
I loved how enthusiastic the students were and how much they knew about music. It was so much fun Mr. Rowley came on stage to play a tune with me. I was so impressed with the students and how engaged they were, and how much they knew about music and instruments!
When we played a song together where they played imaginary instruments from each musical family, they all knew what the families were. Most grownups don’t know that!
Most of them knew what Centaurs were, too, when I said I am a kind of musical Centaur wearing my harp.
AND … because of their partnership with the MoMM, almost every student in the audience had touched or played a harp before!
Thank you to all the students, to teacher Philip Rowley and to the Museum of Making Music and NAMM for making a day like this possible. I had SOOO much fun and the students were SOOO great to play for – and to play WITH!
Loved your May 15th concert at MoMM. You are an amazing performer and you grab the audience immediately. Thank you for reaching out to a California school with your talent. Our schools have lost classroom music for the most part and that is so sad. I speak as a retired classroom music teacher and harpist. Again, thank you and thanks for coming to the west coast!!!!!! Warmly, Joan Sweet CMP
Thanks for your note, Joan! And you can thank the Museum of Making Music for making this event possible – and for making the whole PROJECT at the school possible – it’s their project and it’s such a wonderful one. I hope to be back to the West Coast soon!