I love music from India. Okay, not really. But I love the idea of me loving music from India. Especially in small doses. Especially live. So I was pretty excited when I found out that our middle school music teacher Mike Ross had invited Sandip Burman to our school to put on a presentation for our middle schoolers.
I think that it is important for us teachers to get out of our little grottos and let our kids see that we are truly interested in the things we want them to be interested in. I could enjoy myself and do Mike and this visiting musician a favor by supporting their efforts with my presence.
I cajoled my team of eighth-grade teachers into cutting short our weekly meeting so that those of us who were interested could go check out Sandip Burman. (Turns out, I was the only one. Go figure.)
Because of my meeting, I got to the music room a few minutes late. I quietly slipped in so as not to disturbed the performance in progress. Sandip was playing the sitar; the room was in a trance. I have never seen fifty middle schoolers so rapt. Sandip sat on a rug and had all the students sitting on the floor gathered around him in a tight circle. Nobody moved. All eyes and ears were on Sandip and his sitar.
As unobtrusively as possible, I slipped into the classroom and quiet stood at the back of the circle of students.
It was amazing. The haunting Indian music flowed from the sitar. Seriously, it sounded like a person weeping. Sandip looked as if the music was being extricated from someplace deep within him. He would close his eyes, grimace, and then suddenly he would open his eyes and lift his face heaven-ward. He would look down at his instrument and suddenly thrust his wide-eyed glance at a student and momentarily lock eyes. It was incredibly intimate. But it was also intense bordering on intimidating. This is what they mean by the power of music.
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