“Listen my children and you shall hear…” Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

This week I’ve decided to give equal time to an art form I really enjoy but never have written about in the past: poetry! I guess that isn’t surprising; it seems to me that while poetry is certainly a very ancient form of artistic expression, it often garners a relatively low level of attention these days. Maybe that stems from the personal nature of poetry, but that could be said of many individual artistic undertakings. It just seems to me that poetry is the National Hockey League of the art world - enjoying a rabid but limited fan base, and only to be found in the public eye when the other major sports are in hiatus.

But poetry can be found thriving throughout the world. You can experience it in its purest forms, in poetry “slams” for the young and in more traditional “readings” for those a little longer in the tooth. At a more subliminal level, it is woven throughout both high and popular culture, often disguised as lyrics, jingles, or prose, but the broad range of what is considered poetry allows for a lot of variations. To me, the pervasive nature of rhythmic, cadenced writing and speech is a paradox to the minimal amount of attention poetry receives in our own culture.

I have a theory -which is just that, a completely uninformed theory - but I think that the way many of us were introduced to poetry as children has had a less than beneficial impact on our appreciation for the medium. Think about it - sometime in the third or fourth grade, you are assigned to memorize The Midnight Ride of Paul Revere by Longfellow, a daunting task to be sure. You do seem to have some advantages going in: it’s narrative in nature, it’s a story from American history full of action and suspense, it features famous refrains such as “One if by land, and two if by sea…”, and it has a pretty basic rhyming structure. But it is really long, and was written a long time ago, and then there’s all that goofy language like muffled oars and belfry tower and, worst of all, Middlesex- everyone snickers when you say that. No wonder you approach the experience with mounting anxiety until you pass out during the fourth stanza from hyperventilation!

I think a better approach can be offered, and much of it starts way before the third or fourth grade. Filling children’s earliest years with poetry is easy, and it doesn’t have to be limited to the great standards like Green Eggs and Ham. Seek out and read to the very young selected works from the poetry of Lewis Carroll, Percy Bysshe Shelly, A.A. Milne, Langston Hughes, or other names from classic and modern literature. Their stories are often vivid and playful and intelligent and come across almost as music to young ears. Expose children to classes that infuse rhythm and cadence into contexts they can understand, such as movement or volume or group play. The Music Settlement offers several classes that offer just such an experience in our homegrown Music and Movement program, and in general Dalcroze instruction. Identify with a child’s natural inclination to alliteration and rhyme in their own speech patterns, and help them recognize it in others. There are plenty of examples of enthralling orators out there - folks who understand and display the characteristics of poetry in everyday language and voice modulation. One of my favorites is Muhammad Ali, whose street-wise banter in his prime always sounded completely unrehearsed and spontaneous.

From iambic pentameter to haiku, from Irving Berlin to hip-hop, from Abraham Lincoln to Barack Obama, poetry infuses life and pulses to the rhythm of our collective hearts. The world that waits the next generation might be scary enough. Let’s not rob it of its most eloquent voice.

Art establishes the basic human truths which must serve as the touchstone of our judgment

“…Art establishes the basic human truths which must serve as the touchstone of our judgment.” John F. Kennedy

The arts are popping up all over the news these days, both locally and nationally. While the anxiety around our Cleveland Orchestra has died down for the moment, its example is hardly unique to Cleveland or even to America. Several large orchestras are facing similar challenges, and we are all aware of arts organizations, both large and small, that have had to make major sacrifices or are teetering on the brink of extinction. How is a concerned supporter/patron of the arts supposed to react to the ongoing issue of keeping our artistic and cultural heritage alive?

Some choose to decry that we are already on the path to ruin, or to claim an inevitable outcome: a community and nation bereft of original, time-honored, or expressive art. A world in which the vast majority is focused on pop culture geared towards a common denominator and indulging in offerings oriented for mass consumption, while only the ever-shrinking elite can afford and enjoy “high art”. This is a real Barbarians at the Gate mindset: an oft-cited example of the natural evolution of a truly open and free society, where all consumption is ultimately defined by the middle-focused masses. It’s used in tandem with a warning that we’re losing our way, and that in a world where American Idol is the ultimate definition of cultural expression, there’s no more room for Live from the Met.

I’m not ready to jump on the “end of the cultural world” bandwagon yet, however, just as I’m not going to say that everything’s fine and dandy in the creative world, thank you. To me, the key is to remain open to ever-changing definitions of what constitutes art while not abandoning that which has come before. It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to grasp that every generation will demand some leeway to define its own tastes and preferences, and that it’s in the natural order of things for those preferences to reject some of what was favored in the past. But there is also some obligation on the part of those of us who are no longer on the cutting edge of cultural definition to be open to that rejection, and to understand that over time some of it will gain a whiff of legitimacy. I struggle with this concept as much as anyone: I could not necessarily tell you what defines gallery-worthy visual art in 2010, but I can explain in great detail why the works of Renoir are considered masterpieces.

I used to take a group of 3rd through 5th graders to the Cleveland Museum of Art each year as part of an art class, and I always ended my tour in the contemporary art section. Invariably during that part of the tour, the kids would ask, “Why is this painting good enough to be in the museum?” They had no traditional reference for judgment, such as,”it’s a good drawing”, or “it looks just like a horsey”. I would tell them to pick out one piece of art in the room that they liked and “tell me why.” Once they did this, I would say to the group, “We live in a time when YOU determine what a work of art is. If you like this painting, it’s a good painting, and if you don’t, then it’s not.” Simplistic, yes, but it also gets to the message of our times. Contemporary art is often about a visceral connection, linked to color and method and composition that forego literal subjects or images. If it stirs you in some way, even if it agitates or puts you off balance, it can be considered successful.

Each of us has a vast amount of information at our fingertips to better comprehend creative efforts, and we also have a tremendous amount of control over what we choose to patronize or ignore. If the concept of Cleveland losing its orchestra bothers you, yet you have never attended a concert or performance, you are not exercising your power to influence the outcome. If you lament that pot-boiler, episodic, shallow thrillers are replacing great literature, look for the new works of authors who challenge and bedevil their readers. Better yet, take your children to a chamber music concert, or read to them from Wind in the Willows, or Rabbit Hill. I believe this world has room for both American Gothic and American Idol, but that there will always be a little effort expected from each of us to explore and celebrate the difference. Take some time this leaden winter to get the lead out and discover what YOU like.

Speaking of the Cleveland Museum of Art, I have a bit of Music Settlement news from one of our very active faculty members, Ida Mercer, Chair of Strings in the Department of Music. She writes: The Music Settlement Cello Ensemble made its debut at the Cleveland Museum of Art Monday as part of their Martin Luther King Day events. I was SO very proud of them! They played twice through their 30-minute set at a high level and with lots of energy and focus (my favorite combination). And the CMA was literally flooded with people. It was exciting for the kids to be part of such a populated affair.

Excitement, high energy, and a crowd of people - sounds like real art is happening!

If we had no winter, the spring would not be so pleasant

“If we had no winter, the spring would not be so pleasant: if we did not sometimes taste of adversity, prosperity would not be so welcome.” Anne Bradstreet

Is cabin fever beginning to set in? Despite just recently having some time off for the holidays, do you find yourself furtively Googling tropical escapes when no one is looking? Do you regularly check the weather forecast for Honolulu and sigh longingly? Does it completely freak you out when you realize that we aren’t even half way through January yet? Well, join the club.

I read with surprise last week that the first two weeks of January are consistently the most wintery in Northeast Ohio. Right now is traditionally when we get the most snow and face the most challenging driving and walking conditions. This completely surprised me: isn’t February usually the cruelest month? In Cleveland, doesn’t March traditionally come in like a lion and go out like a Tyrannosaurus? Isn’t there a week or two within those two months where we always have to hunker down and hibernate, or take 30 minutes to wrap ourselves in 20 layers just to get the newspaper out from under the porch where it was thrown the night before? I guess our memories are wrong because apparently those months are officially harbingers of spring’s eminent arrival!

Well, maybe that’s simplifying things a bit, but the fact remains that we went from the last whispers of a really nice autumn and into the deep freeze of the wonderful white world of winter in a little over three weeks. No wonder we’re all a bit edgy - it’s like a curtain fell, and it’s a bleak and chilly curtain at that!

But don’t despair, for if there is one thing we Ohioans are good at, it’s making the best of things. Every week, our University Circle area brings opportunities galore, inside or out, to embrace this time of year in creative and unique ways. For those who enjoy sitting in the dark and traveling far away this month, The Cleveland Cinematheque, located on the campus of the Cleveland Institute of Art’s East Boulevard campus, features the unique vision of the reclusive filmmaker, Terrence Malick. He is best known for stunning visuals and quirky characters set in a historical context. He hasn’t made many movies, but Badlands(1974), and Days of Heaven (1978) are two of my favorites. Check out www.cia.edu/cinematheque.com for show times and ticket prices.

If you’re seeking something more physical, return to the simple joys of youth and visit The Rink at Wade Oval, University Circle Inc.’s great new skating rink located on Wade Oval between the Museum of Natural History and the Cleveland Botanical Gardens. The skating is free and skate rentals are only $3.00! You don’t need to worry about a heat spell either, as it’s a polymer-based skating surface (not that we’re going to see a heat wave anytime soon). Find out more at www.universitycircle.org .

Here at The Music Settlement this month, we have several offerings to lift you out of the winter blahs. If you are a musician, you really should consider getting out and joining us in one of our monthly open ensemble events called Musical Mix and Mingle, which allows you to join other musicians in themed ensemble activities for a pleasant afternoon. The next scheduled meeting date is February 21st from 1:30 to 4:30pm; the theme is Chamber Music and includes a participation fee of $20.00. Reservations are required: call (216) 421-5806, ext. 109 to get on the list. If you prefer to listen, on January 22nd at 7pm we feature our piano students playing Bach, Handel, Pachelbel and others on both piano and harpsichord in Baroque Fest!, or take in our awesome Suzuki students at their recital on January 29th at 6pm. Both recitals are free of charge. Our campus always has lots of fun happening, even in the depths of winter, so why don’t you drop by and warm up to the joy of music?

All I know is just what I read in the papers…

As another decade dawns, I find that remarkably little has changed in my world to reflect this unstoppable march of time. My day and my week are made of routines that differ very little from five years ago, with the possible exception being that I rarely, if ever, use my land line telephone anymore. In fact, I don’t even know the number!

For the most part, I function just fine on 2005 mode, but I have been noticing (and fearing) a major shift on the horizon: the loss of my daily newspaper. You have to understand that I am a read-aholic; I need to indulge in the printed word at least three to four times a day. It goes something like this: wake up in the morning, walk the hound no matter what the weather, read the PD over breakfast, grunt sleepily at family members and trek off to the job. At lunchtime, hide away with some eats and whatever there is to read that’s handy. At bedtime, prop myself up with a few pillows, grab my latest book (The Steel Wave by Michael Shaara) and try to read without waking the spouse. Mr. Excitement, right?

Now, an essential piece of the routine outlined above (maybe THE essential piece) is the local newspaper. I’m a confessed newsie, but I have to read it in print - not on a monitor, Notebook, or a Kindle, but on good old cheap and greasy newsprint. I love the hassle of it…taking up half the table, knocking things over, losing my bagel under the Art & Leisure Section. I like to take my time, reading all from page A-1 all the way to G-12, enjoying the thrill of the hunt and the joy of discovery. Many are the times I have been late for something because I got caught up in an article on the capture of a giant squid in a far away sea, or reading the box score of yet another Indians loss, or checking out the latest exploits of Rat and Pig on Pearls Before Swine on the comics page. And don’t get me started on the crossword puzzles!

But I am not oblivious to the almost daily shrinking of both the text and the number of pages in the paper that is left in my front yard (or in my bushes, or on my roof) each morning by some mysterious pre-dawn visitor. Early in the week, when ad sales are low, the paper is barely thick enough to line a bird cage, let alone fill my brain with informational minutiae. Things get a little more promising as the week progresses, but today’s paper bears little resemblance even to the little local paper I enjoyed reading as a youth back in western New York. It will be a sad day indeed when it becomes impossible to support printing costs any longer and the real daily paper goes the way of the dodo.

I am saddened at the thought of what kind of world will be left behind when this is the case. Personally, I cannot imagine waking up to my laptop, silently scrolling my way through world, national, local and feature news. I know that I suffer from an information gap as a result of being a media dinosaur. I understand that while most everyone in the western world will know the timely details of some breaking story to the nth degree, I will probably just be made aware that there is a story. I’m fully aware that any weather forecast I may quote will be so horribly out of date as to be useless, and that I will have to wait two whole days to learn how well the orchestra played last night, but I’m OK with all that. For most of my life that kind of gap was perfectly acceptable, and life is a mystery anyway, so what’s the big fuss?

I’m trying not to sound like a cranky, Luddite geezer. I’m really not. I adapted to microwave ovens, I can adapt to anything. But in the meantime I will continue to bang the drum for the print media, and I will do my part to keep newspapers alive. And I will mourn deeply if they become a thing of the past. There is still great value in newspapers, magazines, and journals. If you feel the same, please continue your patronage of these media and their advertisers. There may still be life in the old rags yet!

Have a great week!