| Here's part of a letter
we received from a music teacher: "I'm not musically timid! I passed over your
catalogs for years, thinking your stuff would be of low quality (like new lyrics to 'Row
Your Boat.') But when I actually saw and heard the shows I was amazed. Don't sell
yourselves short: Your work is great. Music teachers will find it great too." We apologize about the "musically timid" slogan. It's just that 90%
of our plays are purchased by non-music teachers and we're trying not to scare them.
We package and present our plays differently from the big
publishers. For a start, our basic book/cd set does not include any musical
notation! (Don't worry, the complete piano/vocal scores for mostl of our shows
are available; our most recent shows have lead sheet notation)
Here are some other issues that you might want to know about:
The vocal range of almost all our songs is one
octave. This is usually pitched from B to B, or B flat to B flat. But there are
some exceptions, so please phone or email if you want to know about specific shows.
The CD included with the plays has the songs both with and without
singing. The composer sings all of the songs on some of the shows; on
other plays there are a number of other performers.
We know that many of you would prefer the recordings to have
children, but we much prefer to hear adults. Why? Because in every recording of
children demonstrating songs that we've ever heard the
kids sound like singing robots. We want our song demonstrations to be full of
emotions and this can better be demonstrated by an adult who completely understands the
character, the humor, (and occasionally the tragedy.) This gives the kids something to
mimic instead of robot children.
The CDs for the first several shows we published have piano accompiaments.
Gradually we have added more instruments. Please contact
us if you want more details.
How about musical style? We are quite eclectic.
Folk, rock, jazz, salsa, bluegrass, country, reggae, western swing, and Dixieland are just
a few of the styles that we've done. We find that most students really enjoy the variety
and hope you will too.
Standardized testing has become a huge part of education. Many music
teachers have discovered that they can support the rest of the staff by programming
musical plays that are connected to the school's curriculum. Our shows
are built around curriculum such as history, science and math, literature and folk-tales,
social studies and holidays. Try showing our list of topics to classroom teachers and see
where they would like reinforcement from the music department.
A final quote (from a music teacher who asked not to have her name
used): "Your joy of learning and singing came across so clearly in your work. The
kids are drawn in immediately. The parents loved the humor. The classroom teachers loved
the social studies. I laughed, I cried. It was better than Cats!" |
