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Nothing more than music can go straight to the point of one's philosophy (I took a workshop with Bobby McFerrin, one of the most amazing musical experiences of my life!)

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Bobby McFerrin Demonstrates the Power of the Pentatonic Scale | World Science Festival

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Love (2019) posits that the arts are “one of the ingredients to a better world. . . Social justice movements move people because they ignite the spirit of freedom, justice, love, and joy in all who engage with the work. Art helps people remember their dreams, hopes, and desires for a new world” (p. 99).

At the end of my curricula/units/school years I strive to make sure that my students participate in original artwork (whether it's original music or visual art inspired by famous songs). Oftentimes, we publish their songs on Soundcloud, so they will create THEIR own mixtapes/playlists!
My philosophy is "imbued with a profound trust in people and their creative power” (Freire, 1984, p. 75). Many of the creative projects are inspired by social justice topics through a problem-posing approach that "strives for the emergence of consciousness and critical intervention in reality" (p. 81).

How satisfying is to say, "That's my song!" when they actually produce their music!

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The original title of my curriculum statement was "Would you listen?". I changed it into, "Shall we listen to one another?" to underline the importance of community and mutual respect and acknowledgement.

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Welcome to the GUGMS Music Page!

"Music is the one thing that brings people together" (6th grader in 2019)

"Music teaches you about many other things, too" (6th grader in 2015)

At GUGMS, we experience music as a way to get know ourselves, to share our cultures, to collaborate and welcome new ideas, to express our beliefs, to practice activism.

Our GUGMS music program includes coursework throughout the grades, as well as a school band and school chorus.

Our cultural and historical units often culminate with special musician guests from the New York City and international music communities, reminding us of the unity and the enduring understandings that music gifts us with.

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Welcome to the GUGMS Music Page! "Music is the one thing that brings people together" (6th grader in 2019) "Music teaches you about many other things, too" (6th grader in 2015) At GUGMS, we experience music as a way to get know ourselves, to share our cultures, to collaborate and welcome new ideas, to express our beliefs, to practice activism.

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Orchestra di Piazza Vittorio is a well-known Italian multi-ethnic orchestra that was created in Rome in 2002. The orchestra takes its name after Piazza Vittorio Emanuele (former king of Italy) in the multi-ethnic neighbor of Esquilino, near the main train station.

The orchestra was supported by Italian musicians and intellectuals with the aim of celebrating the neighborhood diversity, grounded in the firm belief that cultural exchange can bring about Beauty. The sound of the Orchestra di Piazza Vittorio is the reflection of today's international communities living in our metropolis across continents.

The experiment of this orchestra reminds me of Biesta's democratic experiment "understood as a process of transformation" (p. 7). There is nothing more public than a piazza in Italian culture, a place of exchange, of protest, of encounters, of community. In this piazza, in the music of this orchestra, the metaphor of the democratic process remains "open towards the possibility not only of more democracy but also of different democracy, of a different distribution of parts and places and of a reconfiguration of democratic identities and subjectivities" (p. 6).

In 2020 the orchestra reinterpreted the immortal 1800's aria "Va' Pensiero" by Giuseppe Verdi. The aria used to be sang by Lega, a separatist party with racist stances towards immigrants and Southern Italians.

The orchestra exhibited the potential to challenge racism, sexism, classism, and other forms of subordination; it also created an oppositional language to challenge societal discourses (Yosso) on immigration. The sons and daughters of these musicians and their communities are attending Italian public schools as we speak. Can an open orchestra be considered a music "public space"?

The experiment of the Orchestra di Piazza Vittorio can inspire music educators to acts as "critical agents who can move between theory and practice in order to take risks, refine their visions, and make a difference for both their students and the world in which they live" (Giroux, p. 38).

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Orchestra di Piazza Vittorio in concerto | Trailer

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Translation of the title: "The Navel of the World".
This song was published in the late 1990's when the word "globalization" used to carry a positive meaning.

"This is the naval of the world, here there is a well of imagination, where experiences converge and become expression, where life becomes precious and our love becomes action, where there are no rules but only exceptions".

This song talks about the imminent cultural revolution coming from the "provinces of the empire". It's about the importance of being "able to recognize other epistemologies" (Díaz Beltrán, p. 285). At the turn of the millennium, a "nation state model based on Eurocentric imaginations of the world is limited to understanding global/transational migration in the present and the different ways in which people are connected to different political communities" (p. 288).

I am fascinated by the drum, an instrument that can be found across cultures. The one in the video reminds me of planet earth but also of sleeping vulcano. I am drawn to the circle that surrounds the instrument, a metaphor for this planet. It reminds me of some Native-American cultures where the word "drum" means both the instrument and the people that surround it. Different cultures join the circle and perform movements that carry centuries of meanings and stories. This is the visual (and musical) representation of the "experiment of democracy" (Biesta) I described in the first post.

Curriculum can also mean space and architecture (Biesta himself argues that "the question of architecture is definitely not insignificant" (p. 11).
What buildings are chosen as school buildings? What colors are used and how do they influence our moods and focus? What furniture is picked and how is it arranged? How do we relate to each other's bodies and presence?
Yosso reminds us that curriculum also "includes the structure of the class and the processes by which students are placed in the class" (p. 93). Even though she refers to knowledge and systemic decisions being taken, I could not help but look at the words "structure" and "placed" as spatial vocabulary.
In my curriculum design I would like to emphasize the importance of space and the way students inhabit it and interact within it. In my classroom I have been using yoga cushions and keyboard benches and have been started each class in a circle before students can choose their collaboration partners and preferred instruments.

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L'ombelico del mondo - Lorenzo Jovanotti Cherubini

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"Girl, put your records on, tell me your favorite song, you go ahead, let your hair down".
Guitarist Brandon Ross, member of the Brooklyn power trio "Harriet Tubman Band", once told me that the first quality a good musician must possess is the ability to listen. Small (1998) agrees with him when he argued that musicking is a process where performers and listeners partake in a community ritual.
As a music educator the first step I always take with my students is to ask them their definition of music, no matter their age. It allows me to see what music means for them, personally and culturally. It informs me on the direction that the music program can take, with the hope that I can contribute to recreating and maintaining those meanings on a daily basis through lesson plans, projects, collaborations, fields trips, and guest musicians.
This first interaction is followed by personal research projects that encourage students to share "their" music and the "songs that make them" with the rest of the school community. Students are invited to contribute to the creation of a sonic and cultural exchange where they can get to know (and respect) each other's tastes and identities. Before I even begin to teach skills, songs, instruments, etc. it is the community that takes the stage, one act at a time.
In facilitating this interaction, I attempt to model that kind of dialogue and "mutual humanization" that a humanist educator can offer to their students as recommended by Freire (1984).

I have always connected to this song by Corinne Bailey-Rae and the joy she is able to express. Each one of us has a song, a core, something intimate and special that needs to be welcome and acknowledged.
I see music as an essential expression of the political identity Biesta talks about: "In the political understanding of citizenship. . . plurality and difference are seen as the very raison d'être of democratic processes and practices and therefore as what needs to be protected and cultivated" (p. 2).
What is "your song" or the music that makes you? What are those songs that make you say, "That's my song!"?

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Corinne Bailey Rae - Put Your Records On