Week 1: FIRST SONG

Jean Ritchie, Viper, Kentucky (Appalachia), photo from 1940s

WEEK I:  FIRST SONG

Reading: Read the initial S&P blog posts carefully (thoughtfully). see the territory of the course

Downloads: S&P CD / Extras / Supplements   (3 download links).
You can find all downloads in the archive folder labelled Downloads Berkeley Box
Download the files, listen and  and LISTEN & SING ALONG and LEARN!

Project: FIRST SONG
Here's what I told you in class:
A person singing (not a recording)  -- authenticity
Someone personal (grandparent, lullaby, camp song or...
What was the situation ("context")
Associations (A personal Song Trail)
Distance from now   (this quality)

Make this your first notebook post--by way of introduction
with image of your project
let the work speak

Additional notes to help you get started: See if you can bring to mind an image of the first song you remember hearing--sung by a person, not something recorded  (maybe a lullaby, or a song from a parent or relative?). A song where you feel the immediate connection through listening to someone sing. Make your project from this--a visual response--drawing, painting, collage or combination image--media open, but what you make should have something of your hand in it. Expressive, that is. We'll pin these up in 170 at beginning of next week's class.

Think of FIRST SONG as a kind of introduction--to your own world, the world you come from. See if you can get this quality into the image. Also, make this the first post on your personal "online notebook"--the blog I'm asking you to keep for the semester. On which you'll post your projects (week by week) along with notes on reading and class themes--the songs we're doing.

If you don't have one (a First Song), go back in time--your parents, grandparents--and make the connection through an earlier generation.

Note: Please use Blogspot.com,  one of their simple (straightforward) formats. Send me an ACTIVE LINK before next class meeting so that I can make up a post with links to everyone's notebook. Not last minute, Get the URL to me by Wednesday.

There's a certain irony here in that I'm introducing the notion of synesthesia--that is, letting one form of expression demonstrate another--the visual representing the experience of listening. As in the R.B. Kitaj painting, The Singers (one of my favorites) which we can talk about next week.

R.B. Kitaj, To Live in Peace (The Singers, 1973-74

Kitaj was an American painter, born in Ohio, who spent much of his working life in London. We can talk about this as well... emigration, exile. And about Jean Ritchie (a wonderful singer and dulcimer player) source of top photo, who left Kentucky for New York, spent most of her life there.  Reasons why. Two extremes of experience?

IMPORTANT -- Do for Next Week:
Send me CONFIRMATION (I will send you CEC as soon as I have them from office)
Blogsites--send me active URL
Reader next week -- bring $25 CASH
Project to pin up - First Song
Bring your small notebook for in class... for names and places