I have heard the mermaids singing, each to each. I do not think that they will sing to me.”
T.S. Eliot, The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock
When I was in grade school, back in the day they still had art classes—art and music—I always looked forward to the music classes. Sure, we had to sing what the teacher gave us, and it was never a modern rock piece. My music classes were more like chorus sessions since there was an entire classroom of students in one place. And depending on the teacher, the music could range from folk to spirituals to, well, sometimes I didn’t know what it was.
We were taught, not only how to sing the song, but the fundamentals of music, which, unfortunately, I found really boring. The difference between a half note and a whole note required math skills, my worst subject. Or we would clap to get a handle on the beats per measure, and I didn’t have the best rhythm.
These classes were a part of the curriculum for the day, so we didn’t have a choice as to whether we wanted to take them or not. Despite my lack of rhythm or the fact I didn’t always enjoy the song we had to learn, I did love music. And it was a class that excited me.
Although I didn’t fully appreciate the gift I was immersed in during those early years, when I look back (especially after training as a classical pianist and as a dramatic soprano a few years later), what I was taught then has stuck with me and nurtured my love of music, art appreciation, and creativity to this day. We don’t understand, until we’re adults, how much our adulthood is shaped by our childhood environment. When we begin reading at an early age, it shapes us later; it shapes our love and appreciation for reading.
As writers, we write because we love to create stories, which we owe to the very stories we came to adore as children. And we understand that the fundamentals of writing—story structure, outlines, character development, theme, grammar—are equally important to create the product, a story we are proud to call our own. When our work is published, it is as if all the hard labor and nitpicky editing frustrations are forgotten.
At my sixth-grade graduation, our class sung “We Are the World,” by Michael Jackson and Lionel Richie. For us, that graduation was pivotal. We had been together for seven years, and dealt with the usual angsts of childhood. Frankly, we were a bit too comfortable with one another. In a few months, we would see each other again at a new school, with new fellow students, teachers we’d never seen, and more changes than we could have possibly understood. The weeks we had spent preparing our song were filled with anxieties, drama, stress (mainly for the teacher), and fear the piece would never happen. But it did happen, and we sung for our proud parents and guardians. It was as if all that led to that moment was forgotten. We sang that song and finished with tears.
When I hear that song today, it’s hard for me to not think about those early years with my fellow students. And I sometimes wonder what feelings I would have if we had chosen a different song. Because, somehow, “We Are the World” seemed right at the time. Music, like stories, brings people together and no matter where we come from or where we are going, we share a commonality in words whether sung or spoken or read.
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