STUDENTS GET READY FOR FIDELIO 10-16-2008 Each season, the Opera Company brings students from around the Delaware Valley and beyond to see an opera through its Sounds of Learning™ program. Originally designed as a literacy program, Sounds of Learning™ prepares students for operas by looking at its themes and cultural significance to teach lessons across the curriculum from Music and Art, to Language Arts, Social Studies, and more. This season students from Gettysburg to Emmaus to Cape May Court House and Princeton will participate in the program. In preparing for Sounds of Learning™ for the opera Fidelio, many teachers worked in teams to approach the opera from varying curricula. During the study process, the Opera Company visits classrooms to help with preparations, or give an insiders view into the production. Recently Fidelio Assistant Director Doris Buske, who hails from the Theatre of Regensburg in Germany, joined OCP Director of Community Programs Michael Bolton to visit Mrs. Donna Bridy’s 6th grade art class at the St. Mary Interparochial School, where students had been preparing for four weeks to attend the opera. Doris wanted to experience the American school system. While at St. Mary’s, Doris gave students an impromptu German lesson and worked with students to act out Fidelio’s dramatic Act II quartet, “Er sterbe!” The St. Mary Interparochial School has participated in Sounds of Learning™ for almost 10 years. Each season its students create imaginative and stimulating art that has been inspired by the opera they have studied. This fall students listened to Fidelio excerpts on CD while interpreting the music in the style of production designer Jun Kaneko. Mrs. Bridy commented on the program saying, " Sounds of Learning™ is multi-dimensional. For each opera a workbook is created that is specific to that opera. It is not until the teacher's meeting that I start to have an idea as to what direction I will take the students to best appreciate and understand the opera. Looking through the workbook for the first time is like going on a treasure hunt. For Fidelio, the treasure I found was the art of Jun Kaneko. It was the perfect opportunity for the students to hear and feel the music through the vision of an abstract artist and to find their own "voice". A likeness to one of Kaneko's ceramic heads was used as the canvas. The students were asked to listen to key arias from Fidelio and draw what they were feeling as they listened. The result, as you can see, is a patchwork of design and emotion." Mrs. Bridy has loaned these creative pieces to the Opera Company and they are now on display in the Company’s rehearsal space in the Academy of Music inspiring the muscians just as the students were inspired by Beethoven’s monumental score. Michael Bolton also visited the Alternative Middle Years School at James Martin and enthusiastic teacher Mrs. Marlene Cooper as her students passionately discussed issues integral to Fidelio. A.M.Y.’s students brought up questions about imprisonment and capital punishment which led to a discussion on mercy killing and more. Then Michael Bolton answered questions about opera, the production, and played several video excerpts from the opera. Through Sounds of Learning™, almost 1400 students from 38 schools and organizations attended the Fidelio Final Dress rehearsal on October 8, 2008. For more information on the program, or to learn how you can bring your students to an upcoming opera, please visit http://operaphila.org/community/sounds-of-learning.shtml.
Each season, the Opera Company brings students from around the Delaware Valley and beyond to see an opera through its Sounds of Learning™ program. Originally designed as a literacy program, Sounds of Learning™ prepares students for operas by looking at its themes and cultural significance to teach lessons across the curriculum from Music and Art, to Language Arts, Social Studies, and more. This season students from Gettysburg to Emmaus to Cape May Court House and Princeton will participate in the program.
In preparing for Sounds of Learning™ for the opera Fidelio, many teachers worked in teams to approach the opera from varying curricula. During the study process, the Opera Company visits classrooms to help with preparations, or give an insiders view into the production.
Recently Fidelio Assistant Director Doris Buske, who hails from the Theatre of Regensburg in Germany, joined OCP Director of Community Programs Michael Bolton to visit Mrs. Donna Bridy’s 6th grade art class at the St. Mary Interparochial School, where students had been preparing for four weeks to attend the opera. Doris wanted to experience the American school system. While at St. Mary’s, Doris gave students an impromptu German lesson and worked with students to act out Fidelio’s dramatic Act II quartet, “Er sterbe!”
The St. Mary Interparochial School has participated in Sounds of Learning™ for almost 10 years. Each season its students create imaginative and stimulating art that has been inspired by the opera they have studied. This fall students listened to Fidelio excerpts on CD while interpreting the music in the style of production designer Jun Kaneko. Mrs. Bridy commented on the program saying, " Sounds of Learning™ is multi-dimensional. For each opera a workbook is created that is specific to that opera. It is not until the teacher's meeting that I start to have an idea as to what direction I will take the students to best appreciate and understand the opera. Looking through the workbook for the first time is like going on a treasure hunt. For Fidelio, the treasure I found was the art of Jun Kaneko. It was the perfect opportunity for the students to hear and feel the music through the vision of an abstract artist and to find their own "voice". A likeness to one of Kaneko's ceramic heads was used as the canvas. The students were asked to listen to key arias from Fidelio and draw what they were feeling as they listened. The result, as you can see, is a patchwork of design and emotion." Mrs. Bridy has loaned these creative pieces to the Opera Company and they are now on display in the Company’s rehearsal space in the Academy of Music inspiring the muscians just as the students were inspired by Beethoven’s monumental score. Michael Bolton also visited the Alternative Middle Years School at James Martin and enthusiastic teacher Mrs. Marlene Cooper as her students passionately discussed issues integral to Fidelio. A.M.Y.’s students brought up questions about imprisonment and capital punishment which led to a discussion on mercy killing and more. Then Michael Bolton answered questions about opera, the production, and played several video excerpts from the opera.
Through Sounds of Learning™, almost 1400 students from 38 schools and organizations attended the Fidelio Final Dress rehearsal on October 8, 2008. For more information on the program, or to learn how you can bring your students to an upcoming opera, please visit http://operaphila.org/community/sounds-of-learning.shtml.
