Today was the last class for this session and also the last class before Grace and Pei Hsuan return home to Taiwan. It turns out that only Grace had time for the class today -- the other students had too much end-of-session work to take care of.
So Grace and I just chatted a bit in general. At some point she said she would like to hear some songs that are not in English so I played some songs by Manu Chao (bio, website) for her. I played:
* "Clandestino" (video)
* "Me Gustas Tu" (video)
* "Bongo Bong/Je ne t'aime plus" (video)
Grace was impressed how he switches languages randomly in the middle of songs.
She asked me to play her a song in German and the only thing I could think of was to search for a video by a band I know by name in Germany, but who's music I don't really like: Sportfreunde Stiller. I played the song "Ein Kompliment" (video) just because the description says it is their biggest hit.
With that, class was over for the day and for the session. I am planning on changing things up a bit for next session, making the class only once per week instead of twice, but then make it 90 minutes (possibly even 2 hours) rather than just one hour. And since I had so few students from ACE, I want to open the class to international students from Seattle Pacific University, too.
In any case, there will now be a break of a couple weeks before the next session starts, in whichever form it takes.
Only two students again, Grace and Noriko.
We started by looking at Grace's blog, "To Find Where I Belong" again. She had recently posted the lyrics to the song "Irresistible" (lyrics, video) by Jessica Simpson (bio). Grace is not really a fan of Jessica Simpson, Grace had just seen an interview with Jessica on TV and was curious about her and found the lyrics to this song.
Grace asked if I like the song and I said, "Truthfully, not really: it's too generic. There's nothing special about the song."
However, I noted that sometimes a song can be a favorite because it reminds a person of a time or a memory. So an otherwise uninteresting song can have a positive connection to a person if it reminds them of something they enjoyed.
To illustrate this idea I showed Grace the video to the song "Word Up" (video) by Cameo (bio) which is not really a great song, but every time I hear it I think about the student parties at the University of Mainz when I was studying there in 1986/87.
I asked Noriko which song reminds her most of her previous stay in Seattle, when she was here for 11 months. She says it is "Beautiful" (video, lyrics) by Christina Aguilera (bio) because it was so popular at that time.
Another song Noriko identifies with her previous US trip is "Sakura" (video with subtitles) by Naotaro Moriyama (bio, website). It is traditionally a song sung for graduation from school (which happens in March in Japan), but somehow it became the soundtrack to her roadtrip from California to Las Vegas with her friend. So it also reminds her of the American landscape and scenery down in the desert.
Another pick for Grace of a song which is rooted in a time is "Only Time" (video, lyrics) by Enya (bio): it reminds Grace of the air conditioner in her classroom when she was a kid and the English teacher explaining the lyrics to the song. The teacher is/was from Seattle (he still teaches in Taipei).
With that, class ended.
Later in the evening I went to see the Children of the Revolution flamenco show at the Capitol Club; it was a special show and very full because it was the last performance before the two main players go to Spain for 6 weeks to study flamenco more. Pei Hsuan liked it so much last week that she came to this show again, her last chance before she leaves back to Taiwan on Sunday.
Only two students again today, Grace and Pei Hsuan :-( . I taught those two the word "slacker".
But we were dealt a poor hand of cards today: the computer in the room we were in didn't have speakers attached! So we couldn't use the classroom computer. But my laptop, which *does* have speakers, doesn't connect to the Seattle Pacific University network, so I couldn't use their internet access on my laptop. Fortunately I have about 47GB of music on my laptop, so we had a pretty good choice of music to listen to...
We started with listening to a couple of songs by a Seattle singer named Carrie Akre (bio, website). I had been listening to one of her albums the previous evenings so it was loaded up in my mp3 player on my computer. The songs we listened to were "The River" (lyrics) and "Humdrum" (lyrics). Sorry, I can only find links to some samples of her songs on Amazon.
I mentioned that I like the melodies of these songs a lot, but the subjects are very sad. This is typical Seattle, in my view. I can't think of a single light-hearted Seattle band; they do aggression and depression best.
We moved on to a random list of mp3's on my hard drive. One is "Wash" (lyrics), which is one of my favorite Pearl Jam songs and one I had talked previously in the last session.
But I don't think the style of this song appealed to my students much, as they prefer much mellower songs. So I looked for something mellower in my collection and came up with "Andromeda & The Milky Way" (lyrics) by Me'Shell Ndegeocello (bio, website). This is one of my favorite songs, such passion!
Today's class only had 2 students.
I asked if either of them had been to the Bumbershoot festival on the weekend. Yumi went with her host family to see Steve Miller and the Pacific Northwest Ballet performances. She rated Steve Miller as a little bit of an oldie and I concur completely.
Last week I had suggested that I take the class to the weekly Children of the Revolution flamenco concert at the Capitol Club tonight. All students were non-commital about going and we planned to check in with each other in the evening to see if they could break away from their homework.
At this point Grace asked "What is the difference between flamenco and salsa?" (first we worked through mispronunciation of "flamenco" versus "flamingo"). An excellent question! The basic difference that I can discern is that flamenco is a very structured dance which requires extensive training, even from the beginning whereas salsa is more of "general public" dance, i.e. it has steps, but the form of the dance is more free and can be learned and put into practice more quickly. I found this article about flamenco versus "Latin music" and while it's tone sounds more like an explanation for why flamenco is cooler and superior to other forms of dance, reading between the lines gives insight to the differences.
Here are the Wikipedia entries about the two types of dances: Flamenco | Salsa
I illustrated the differences between the two types of dance using the Children of the Revolution concert at Seattle City Hall from August 22nd since the band features both types of dancing in their show. Unfortunately I can't bookmark straight to the parts of the concert where the dancing takes place, but you can forward to them yourself: flamenco starts at about 25 minutes and 46 minutes; salsa starts at around 1hour, 2minutes.
If that is too much work, naturally YouTube has lots of videos of flamenco and salsa dancing. Knock yourself out!
The only "song" we talked about today was "Hips Don't Lie" (video) by Shakira. Grace said that she likes how Shakira sings. I mentioned that we have talked about Shakira previously in the class, too. Seems she is the most popular artist among my students so far.
In the evening I did go to the flamenco show and it was excellent!! Only one student came with me and she was enamored with it. She and I agreed that the other students really missed out on a great show. Well, there will be more chances for them from November on (the musicians are going to Spain for 6 weeks to study flamenco).
A note to my students: Next week, Tuesday the 5th and Thursday the 7th class will be in Bertona 4. Also, don't forget about the option to come with me to see the flamenco show at the Capitol Club Tuesday evening!
Today I had three students. Kumi was gone, but in her place Maggie, from Taiwan, attended.
As custom, I brought the current week's editions of The Stranger and The Seattle Weekly. Noriko had somehow never seen them before so I gave her a quick introduction to the newspapers.
As we leafed through the concert listings I saw that British band Starsailor (bio, website)will play the tiny Crocodile Cafe (website) on September 25th.
Starsailor have had quite a bit of success in Europe and I am surprised they are playing such a small club in Seattle -- on a Monday no less! I muttered that this would be a good show for "girls to go see" and Noriko asked "Why?" In a muddled fashion I said it's a bunch of cute boys who sing about feelings and that I know a few women who like them. I pulled up the video to "Silence Is Easy" and let it play. But none of my students seemed impressed. Nonetheless I imagine the show will sell out since it's in such a small, intimate venue. I saw the band on their first tour in Paris in a similarly tiny place and while I enjoyed the show, that one time is enough for me...
We moved on to learn more about Grace's taste in music. Grace has her own blog "To Find Where I Belong" where she posts lyrics to her favorite songs. So this was a natural place to talk about the music she likes.
We started at the top, where she had posted the lyrics to the Muse (bio, website) song "Unintended" (video). She likes this song for its melody, but had never really analyzed the lyrics. We analyzed them are came up with the interpretation that the singer has had his heart broken but has just met a new girl who "could be" the one he will always love. But before he can fall in love with the new girl he has to heal his broken heart.
The next song on Grace's blog is "Overprotected" (video, lyrics) by Britney Spears (bio). Grace particularly likes the lyrics and identifies with them because she is young and is going out on her own, making her own decisions about which direction to go in life.
As for the music, even though it is kind of abrupt and nervous, everything will be ok in the end.
Noriko also likes Britney Spears because of the uptempo music, though she doesn't listen closely to the lyrics. Maggie is ambivalent towards Ms. Spears.
The last song we had time for was "Everytime We Touch" by Cascada. Both Grace and Maggie love this song! It is taken from the Final Fantasy 2 video game. It seems that a lot of YouTubers have created their own videos for this song, though the real video is here.
It is quite marketing savvy to place a song in a video game to attract young people and, further, to inspire people to make their own videos to the music!
