TRACY SILVERMAN - Some Thoughts About "On A Starry Night"

We decided to put together a collection of our favorite music and artists so that we could remain as happy as our children by the 61st playing. Our taste in music, as in food, includes many cultures, and we feel it's important to expose and accustom our children to music outside what is more readily available all around them as part of the American culture. We've never accepted the assumption that kids, (or adults) should tolerate or become accustomed to processed, or unhealthy food, which is so prevalent in our culture, and likewise for music.

Kids love repetition and our 4 year old, Louisa, got used to a few tapes of dopey bedtime stories and lullabies that are supposed to appeal to kids. I guess the thinking is that if it nauseates adults, kids will love it, (which reveals the underlying notion that kids are the opposite of adults, something we can't really agree with) so the idea was to put together a record we would love as much as she would so that bedtime would be something we would all look forward to. 50 or 60 playings of a recording you can barely stand to begin with can start to break down even the best of parental dispositions. (I think she could sense that there was something not quite right when I would ask her every time if she really wanted to hear "that one again.") We needed something that would hold up to lots of repetition for us -- it ends up being the music you listen to more than anything else in the house -- and something that would also have a peaceful mood for calming down and going to sleep.

As we got to thinking about what music to put on this record, we started to think about the music we play at home that our daughters are charmed by, which covers an awful lot of ground, geographically and chronologically, from Rumanian folk music to Bach to Santana and beyond. I noticed that exotic sounding Indonesian folk music was just as appealing to her as Buddy Holly and that she loved trying to pick out the instruments in bluegrass tapes as much as in Beethoven symphonies. We started researching and found that there is no shortage of beautiful and simple lullaby melodies that have come down over the years, rounded down to their essential beauty like stones in a stream. Melodies are the heart of it, and we found one achingly beautiful melody after the other, some well known, others not. We also realized that we know a lot of great musicians personally; many of who have families and kids of their own and could sympathize with the necessity for the record. We knew that if we enlisted the aid of these great performers in a project they could put their heart into; we would have something that would hold up through the heaviest bedtime play list rotation.

Kids know the difference between good and bad art. Because with real art, there's something there for them to play with. They make up stories about it or get absorbed into it. It engages them. Technical ability is not a priority for them in music. Children are sensitive to the deeper things: the honesty and the intent of it, the personality of it. Basically, they play with it just as they do with real people, because good art is real and alive. With poor art, there is a generic facelessness that doesn't really activate them; they need something else to do, and we want this record to hold not just our attention, but children's as well. Poor music is often just a bunch of disembodied notes meaning nothing. And that's the great thing about kids: they don't care about the notes. They care about the body playing them.

It has been speculated that lullabies are among the earliest forms of music. I love the fact that they are intimate and personal. They are often improvised to fit the need of the moment or culled from memories of the parent's own childhood or of other parents songs to their children. They are honest and they generally express comfort and love, sometimes hardship, sometimes exasperation; all the things parents feel about their child.

As we became more and more enchanted by the music, we realized there was something else there that was attracting us to the project. We started hearing not just achingly beautiful melodies, but the voices that have sung them over the years. We could see the faces of the mothers and fathers and grandparents and we recognized the look in their eyes; that look when their child does something indescribably beautiful and the parents just smile at each other. And we realized that a lullaby is much more than a song. The tune is just the tangible tip of the iceberg, just the part of that parent's love that others can hear. We redefined a lullaby as a way of loving, through holding, rocking and softly singing.

I am fascinated also by the strong connection between the musical and the physical. A lullaby is almost always accompanied by a rocking or swaying motion, because, instinctively, this lulls a child to sleep. This helps to prove, in my mind, the concept that music and movement are part of the same thing and that one should never be studied or dealt with completely apart from the other.

The love of a small child is a profound thing and it can change your life. We've all read books or seen movies where someone sacrifices their life for someone else. Have you ever wondered if you would have the courage to do that and for whom? If you have a child, you don't wonder anymore. Without even thinking, parents have this instinct to sacrifice themselves. It could be giving up sleep, a career, or even a divorce. We no longer come first.

Lullabies serve the very necessary function of putting a child to sleep, but they are also one of the most direct and natural ways for a parent to love a child. Parents from all over the globe have been inventing their own personal lullabies and passing along and thereby teaching this love since there were children to sing to. These folk tunes have traveled over oceans and mountains with the parents and have become more and more widely shared with different cultures. I can think of few things more needed in our present world than sharing our deepest and most honest expressions of love with other races across the planet, and so we hope to aid in that dissemination of that love. It is hard to imagine hating or warring with anyone if your impression is of a person, not of a member of a race or nationality, and is enlightened with an image of them loving their children.

There is something very comforting in knowing that a father in Africa or a mother in China feels just the same about their children. Israeli and Palestinian parents, Moslem and Serb parents, they all have the same selfless commitment to something more precious than their own lives. It is the one thing we can all agree on, our common thread. And in a world where kids pick up prejudices and racism all around them like the flu, it's good preventive medicine to start their journey in life knowing that black children get the same love as white children as oriental children as Latino children and on and on to the farthest corners of the first, second, and third worlds. It humanizes us. You can't hate someone once you see into his or her heart.

BELIEVE IT OR NOT: A CHILD WHO CAN SPEAK IS A CHILD WHO CAN SING!

by Paul Cuneo

Tone-deaf: a mistaken label
If your child has been labeled tone-deaf, there is a very good chance this label has been mistakenly attached. The purpose of this article is to shed some light on the shadowed topic of tone-deafness and to bring proper perspective to concerns you may have about your child's musical abilities and development.

Although there are some people in the world who have been clinically diagnosed as tone-deaf, psychologists see their condition as the result of neurological trauma or defect, which manifests itself in an inability to hear, and therefore reproduce, changes in pitch. This condition is very rare. Unfortunately, many misguided music teachers are too quick to label off-pitch singers as tone-deaf and to tell them not to sing at the holiday music program or to just mouth the words so that they don't ruin the songs.

What can parents do?
Some parents expect that singing is a case of either "you have it or you don't," when, in fact, making a better singer needs the same kind of attention given to making a better soccer player, ballet dancer, or painter. Because of this, I encourage parents not to make comments such as, "She's not a very good singer, but she is a great dancer."

In truth, if your child can speak, she can sing. That is to say, if your child can imitate the rise and fall in pitch of a spoken language, she can imitate the rise and fall of sung language. Let's prove it. Say the following phrase out loud:

"I'm going to the store."

Now, ask the following question, and sound really incredulous:

"You're going to the store!?"

When you spoke the first phrase, your voice fell in pitch at the end of the sentence, and it rose in pitch when you spoke the second phrase. If your child does the same thing when she speaks, it means she learned the natural inflections of language by listening to others and imitating what she heard. SHE COULD NOT DO THIS IF SHE WERE TONE-DEAF.

"Then why can't my child sing?"
Your child can sing, but only in what I call her "comfort zone." This zone may be only two pitches right now, but if you can find a two-note song in that zone, she can sing it. Am I referring to her range? No. Her range is huge. If you've been with her on the playground, you've heard her shriek really high and speak like a monster really low. But she's not comfortable singing in those areas. Her range is all the pitches she's capable of making; her comfort zone is only the pitches she's comfortable singing.

If a music teacher or parent can find the comfort zone of a singer - usually it is found in the same area as the singer's speaking voice - he can start there and gradually expand the comfort zone to the place where the singer is comfortable singing almost any song. I do this through imitation, ear training, and lots of encouragement. And in seven years of using my method, I have had great success in getting off-pitch singers to sing on pitch; it hasn't failed yet!

Give it some time
So don't be discouraged if you or your child has been told, "You're tone-deaf." The term is regrettably misapplied and overused. There's nothing wrong with you or your child.

Keep in mind that all children do not develop the same faculties at the same rate. If your child isn't singing on pitch now, she may simply need another year or two of development and experience, and then she'll have it. In any case, encourage your child to keep singing, and if your child's music teacher is open to help, share this article with him. Together, we can turn this planet into a world of singers!

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Paul Cuneo teaches privately in Los Angeles and offers professional clinics on working with off-pitch singers. Educators and parents may also schedule a private phone consultation with him by calling (818) 640-4165. A $30.00 per half-hour rate applies. For information about his teaching aide "Tone-deaf, Schmone-deaf: a guide for music educators" call (818) 640-4165 or send an e-mail to zzzuneo@yahoo.com.