Music Room Finished!

Finally, the vision has been realized! The new music room is fully functional. As one of my colleagues said, "There are very few music classrooms in Macedonia like this one." However, the music room isn't the only vision that is now a reality. Music classes have been reintroduced into the school's curriculum. Students are now learning the fundamentals of music and will be able to appreciate the entire experience that music has to offer.

Progress on the Music Room!

As mentioned before in a few of the previous posts, the music room is being renovated to house the new music instruments purchased through your contributions. Although the materials had been purchased during the summer, the custodians were too busy helping to renovate other parts of the school to get to the music room. Anyhow, it is being done now. Both music teachers and myself are very, very excited!

Side note: Life as a Peace Corps Volunteer can be a thankless endeavor as outward gratitude is viewed by some as putting oneself into a subjugated position (at least this is my read on the situation). I must say, this cannot be further from the truth at the school which serves as my primary site. My colleagues could not be more gracious and generous in their thanks. Yesterday the finance lady, who has grandchildren at the school, listed all the improvements undertaken during my Peace Corps service, with the Music Program Revitalization being the jewel in the crown, and gave me great praise. While I was flattered, I reminded her that it was not me who made this happen, but it was achieved through your generosity and contributions. Again, on behalf of everyone at the school and in the community, thank you!

USAID School Opening

This past week your contributions allowed for yet another successful music performance. This time some of the music students performed at a grand re-opening of a renovated school in one of Kratovo's village schools in Krilatica made possible through the United States Agency for International Development (USAID). The children dressed up in traditional clothing and danced centuries old dances while their classmates and music teacher played old Macedonian songs.

Some New Instruments & Egg Crates for Sound Proofing

OK, it's been way too long since the last post. This is mainly due to ordering problems with some music stores, but that is another story. The good news is twofold: new keyboards & recorders and egg crates for insulation.

Finally, the keyboards and recorders got here after three months of ordering them. Sadly, the xylophones were supposed to be with this order, but the store said "maybe" September. Ugh. I think we'll have to change the game plan.

As mentioned in the 3rd post of this blog, my director is awesome and is having us redesign the interior of the music room. No need to repeat why this is important (3rd blog entry), but I am excited.

First Concert w/ New Instruments!

Today the after-school band kids and the choir played a concert in a town about an hour away from Kratovo called Kumanovo. There were about 10 different schools that performed from the northeast region of Macedonia. Although most of these kids have little musical knowledge, I am impressed with their abilities to learn and Davor's to teach on these new instruments so quickly.

Writing the Thank You Letters & Orchestra Practice for Saturday Concert

Today my colleague Natasha and I taught a few classes where we worked 'Thank you" letters into the lesson. We introduced some new vocabulary (the musical instruments) and showed the students how to format the letter. I then read it aloud and then had the class read it chorally. After we read it as a class I had the students read it individually and tell me their favorite musical instrument that was purchased through this PCPP.

Two Examples of Success

Any Peace Corps Volunteer will tell you that the hardest part of our job is having projects we work on live outside of our own initiative and take off within the community. With this Music Program Revitalization I see the jet on the runway.

A few days ago I got two pieces of very good news. 1) Music teacher Davor Petkovsky informed me that the kids in the afterschool music program will be having their first performance with some of the new musical instruments. 2) The director of the school is planning on buying insulation and wood laminate flooring for the music room.

1) I have had a very great working and personal relationship with Davor. He is a musician to the core of his soul and truly enjoys his job as a music teacher. The other day when I was at the school, he informed me that he was planning on using the melodicas, the new accordion, and new percussion instruments in a musical performance that was already scheduled in another city. He then told me they would be practicing the next day and that I should come back at 3:00 PM.

The next day when I opened the door to the school, I could hear the waltzing beat of the new drum set, the “oompah oompah” draw of the accordion, and the clear notes of a melodica floating down the corridor. I then got to the music room and there was Davor playing the melody of the song on the melodica while two of the older kids were holding down the rhythm on the piano and accordion, and a prodigious 5^th grader was tapping away on the drum set. I could see a few of the kids holding up cell phones and recording the melody so they could learn it at home. I situated myself at the back of the room until the demonstration was over. Davor then proceeded to hand out the melodicas to some of the students and maracas, tambourines, and the agogo bell to others. He then instructed the older students to work with a few of the younger ones on pinning down the melody while he worked with a few and circulated around the room checking the overall progress. He then asked me if I would be in charge of the rhythm section. My group went into the hallway and practiced the crooked 1-2-3 waltz with the tambourines on the 1, the maracas on the 2-3, and the lower tone of the agogo bell mirroring the former while the higher tone mirrored the latter. Was it perfect? No. Did it sound good? Not really. However, the kids were having fun doing it and it gave them something to practice for when we meet again this week.

2) In the Peace Corps, many times getting even the simplest tasks done can be an arduous undertaking. This is not one of those stories. Conversely, this is a story of how my director took a real initiative to work on behalf of our students.

The classrooms in Macedonia tend to be extremely hard, concrete boxes where the amount of reverberation is, to say the least, undesirable. Every little whisper out of student’s mouth or tap of the pencil swells up into which amounts to be a tsunami of deafening white noise. The same is true with the music room. Furthermore, this effect is multiplied with musical instruments. Due to this, I twice casually suggested to the school director that we do something to insulate the room to provide for better acoustics. To be honest, both times were in passing and I didn’t expect any results. I was wrong.

One night as Jessica and I were on our way to eat some увијач (pronounced oo-vee-yach), we passed by my friend and school psychologist Ljupche. He broke the good news: My director had brokered a deal with a local company to sell us the insulation and wood laminate flooring for wholesale prices. I was impressed with my director’s willingness to go out of her way to do something a little extra for the students of our school and see it through. In fact, I was ecstatic! Perhaps A Message to Garcia had been translated into Macedonian after all!