Color, and light, and motion.
Warm, crisp, Shattering the ice in your heart. And picking up the pieces, You find they all fit together, When they didn’t before. You are steady; Enjoying the unknown. The warmth spreads. From the top of your head, to the tips of your fingers, Passing your newly assembled heart with a cry of Freedom. Suddenly, there is perspective. Vision is clean, clear. You hadn’t taken the time to notice every color before. It is bright; Beams of pure energy flood the room. Just for you, it seems, For all the world to see! It is a fire, you think, And once, it was burning within. It’s chaos. A purpose. You don’t mind. By: Violet Woundy Staff Writer While the rest of the city was inundated with clearing roads and shoveling sidewalks, Marlborough High students went on a journey to the African country of Mali, where music supersedes all troubles. Returning to school after two snow days, MHS art, music and gym students spent Feb. 12 and 13 learning how to drum and dance during a residency program called “African Arts in Education” provided by Crocodile River Music, a professional African drumming group in partnership with the Gallery of African Art in Clinton, MA. Instead of attending their regularly scheduled art, music or gym classes, participating students took drumming or dancing classes with Crocodile River members Zach Combs and Issa Coulibaly, a Master Drummer who hails from Mali, Africa. Drumming classes took place on Thursday in the auditorium, where groups of 30 students sat in a circle of chairs onstage and learn how to play one of three instruments: a dundun, kashishi or djembe. Issa and Zach went over basic techniques for each instrument, then began to work with the students on Malian rhythms, gradually increasing their speed and complexity. At the end of each drumming class, students watched a video showing how African peoples incorporate music and rhythm into their everyday lives, and how a djembe is made. Students exiting the class could be heard tapping and speaking the various rhythms they learned throughout the rest of the school day.
The dancing classes took place on Friday in the MHS Field House. These classes were much larger, consisting of over 100 students and teachers apiece. Issa led the charge during these classes, while Zach and the other members of Crocodile River served as accompanists. Issa took the same approach he took in the drumming classes in teaching the students a traditional harvest dance from his homeland: he warmed the students up, then taught the movements one at a time. After he showed the students a sequence of step in, he would have them repeat that one sequence for minutes on end. The students learned five unique sequences by the end of the dance class and did the whole routine multiple times, the musicians gradually increasing their speed to Issa’s liking. The students who participated in the dance workshops were invited down to the floor to dance during a school-wide concert at the end of the day. Crocodile River played not only the traditional Malian harvest song at the concert, but played a set of pieces entitled “Trinidad to Timbuktu”. Each song in the series was from a different part of the globe, and the performers took turns explaining the importance of the pieces to their respective places of origin. Many of the pieces are still played in their respective cultures today. Students clapped along with the familiar rhythms, cheering especially when the group played the Samba, Brazil’s national dance. For more information on Crocodile River Music, visit the “African Arts in Education” website at http://africanartsineducation.org/. By: Jennie O’Leary -Staff Writer On Friday Jan 30 and Saturday Jan 31, Marlborough High School’s contemporary a cappella group, Voices ReChoired, attended the annual New England Voices Festival in Wilmington, Massachusetts. N.E. Voices brings together the state’s high school a cappella community for a weekend of competitions, concerts and workshops with the hope of inspiring young musicians to continue singing. Marlborough has been attending N.E. Voices for years, but this year, after months of hard work and preparation, the group walked away as one of the top three high school a cappella groups in the state.
Work really began for the group’s sixteen members in April of 2014 when they auditioned for a spot in the MHS A Cappella program. A Cappella was a class that met during the school day. The coed group had a dual function as the elite choral ensemble in the MHS Music department and as a “moonlight” contemporary group. But the makeup of the 2014 audition pool and an increased interest in contemporary a cappella music among the auditionees led director Shannon McNulty to take the group in a new direction for the 2014-2015 school year. McNulty decided to make MHS A Cappella twofold: a treble (primarily female) choir would meet during the school day and focus on classical repertoire, while a co-ed, contemporary group would meet after school. The after school group, under the name Voices ReChoired, met many logistical challenges in trying to implement this new rehearsal schedule, and lost a few members at the beginning of the year because of its demand on afterschool time. But the group remained optimistic, learned a wide variety of contemporary pieces and sent in an audition tape for N.E. Voices. Groups who made it through the audition process had to prepare a three-song set for competition. Voices ReChoired chose to perform “The Walker” by Fitz and the Tantrums, “Islands” by Sarah Bareillis and “Yellow Flicker Beat” by Lorde. “Yellow Flicker Beat” was specially arranged for the group by Jon Smith, a well-known arranger within the a cappella community. The group worked with Smith and Beejul Khatri, a member of the Nor’easters, Northeastern University’s a cappella group who mentors VRC, to perfect their set. Khatri and Smith encouraged the group to engage with their songs’ lyrics and make a personal connection to the songs. The week of NE Voices, the blizzard Juno hit Massachusetts, dumping over three feet of snow on the region and jeopardizing the N.E. Voices festival. Luckily the road were clear enough by the 30th for the festival to occur. The group arrived at Wilmington Middle School ready to compete against seven other semi-finalists from towns such as Chelmsford and Plymouth. At the end of the performances, the judges gave out superlatives and announced the top three scoring groups. Voices ReChoired received a superlative for “Best Choreography” and placed among the top three! Their prize was a chance to open for a professional male a cappella group, The Edge Effect, at N.E. Voices’ Saturday night concert. The group’s student leader, Lauren Fay, said about the experience “I think we’ve come really far since our first rehearsal.” In addition to having a great sound, the group is also very modest about their achievements. Voices ReChoired plans to showcase their hard work at their annual Spring Sing concert on March 6. VRC will be joined by The Thursdays and Northern Lights, two high school a cappella groups who also competed at NE Voices, as well as the Nor’easters from Northeastern University. This event, supported in part by the Marlborough Cultural Council, a local agency supported by the Massachusetts Cultural Council, is open to the public. For more information on ticket sales and to learn more about Voices ReChoired, like them on Facebook at MHS Voices ReChoired and follow them on Twitter at @VoicesReChoired. By: Jennie O’Leary -Staff Writer |
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June 2019
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