24 February 2011 (Thursday)

The weather today was very cold with the threat of snow.  Only four students showed up.

As we waited to see if more people would come we watched the video for the Beyonce (bio) song Halo (video, lyrics).  I explained what a halo is and how to pronounce the world.  I asked the student who chose the song why she likes it. She said she likes it because it's about love.

One of the students asked me to remind her where the dance lessons in the area are.  They are 1/2 block from where we do the conversation class, at the Century Ballroom (website, map)!  We looked at the schedule of dance classes offered and watched some videos of the types of dances: Lindy Hop, Samba. 

I then showed the salsa dancing part of the song Isla Margarita (video) by my friends Children Of The Revolution (website).

Now we moved from talking about dancing back to music. The song was Uncle Kracker (bio) "Oh You Make Me Smile" (video, lyrics, song info).  The video we watched for this song is not the official video, but the student it because she likes horses and the video is all about riding.

Somehow we got onto the subject of the Muslim tradition of the Hajj (info), but I can't remember anymore how we go onto that topic.  But I enjoy discussions about other cultures and traditions.

By now we had talked a lot in the class but hadn't watched very many videos.  The last video of the day was "Erdene" (video) by Bold, featuring Oyun.  The song means "I love you" in Mongolian.

17 February 2011 (Thursday)

8 students today, two of whom were new!

As I chatted with the new students at the beginning of class I asked if they have very many interactions with Americans.  Basically they do not: they live with friends from their home country, or alone, and are among the other international students all day at Seattle Central.  It's a shame that they are here in America, but have so little contact with Americans!

I know from my own experience living abroad how hard it can be to integrate with local people.  In the past I have tried to give my Language Of Music students a taste of local culture and I will do the same with this group.  I like the personalities I have in the class and I am sure I will find some fun things for the group to do.

One student wants to learn to dance Salsa.  In the building attached to where our class is The Century Ballroom (website), which has dance classes of all types throughout the week.

The theme for today's discussion was "love songs" in honor of Valentine's Day earlier in the week.  But before we started with love songs I asked the two new students to pick a song from their home country.

Sabine, from Cameroon started and chose Ca La (video) by Lady Ponce.  The style of music is "Bikutsi" (info) which is the most popular musical style in Cameroon.  Lady Ponce is a new singer on the scene and a rising star.

I asked what the song is about.  Sabine said it's Lady Ponce beckoning a man to be with her.  I asked Sabine if the men in Cameroon are good and she replied only about 20% of them are good.  So I guess Lady Ponce has to do a lot of beckoning ;-) .

Next Mohanned, from Saudi Arabia, chose a song.  Fortunately it was also in the theme of "love": "The Wedding" (video) by Qusai and Jeddah Legend (info) which is a Saudi rap song about getting married. It is interesting to hear the mix of English and Arabic and the mix of rap and traditional in the song and video.

At this point I asked the class how long wedding celebrations typically last in their home countries.  It was interesting to hear about the traditions.  Some places celebrate just for one day, other places for three days.

While we were talking about weddings I thought to ask the class if men are "romantic" in their culture.  I was asked to define "romantic";  I said "giving flowers to a woman" is gave an example of a man being romantic.  

We talked about in which ways men are romantic in different cultures for a while and then I asked everyone to say "I love you" in their own language so we could hear it.  Then we talked about whether a person says "I love you" to his/her husband/wife or to his/her parents in their cultures.

I found the whole conversation fascinating, but we weren't actually watching any music videos.  But that was fine: the point of the class is to practice speaking English and everyone was talking :-) .

Now I suggested we listen to a song.  Togtuun, one of the students from Mongolia, wanted to hear the song "Patient" (video, lyrics) by a rapper named Tulgat.  The interesting thing is that this rapper is from Mongolia but moved to the States -- to Seattle! -- as a teenager.  He has quite a story and is a good rapper -- listen to the song!

Haili, the other student from Mongolia, had brought with her a traditional Mongolian stringed instrument, a "morin khuur" (info).  She played two songs for us.  It was great!  How kind of her to bring the instrument and play for us!!  These kinds of experiences are why I love hosting this class!  Here is an example of a morin khuur being played.

I asked if there are any examples of songs where the morin khuur is combined with modern music.  Haili showed us the song "Mongolz" (video) by Jonon.  Very cool mix of traditional and modern!  I am intrigued to learn more about Mongolian music and culture!

This reminded me of when I learned about the Yoshida Brothers (吉田兄弟) (info) from one of my Japanese students when I first started leading this class almost 5 years ago; she had wanted to show me how a traditional Japanese instrument, the shamisen, was being played in a modern context.  I quickly showed the class two Yoshida Brothers videos: "Kodo" (video) and "Rising" (video) (which has a full rock band behind the brothers!). 

I would have never discovered the Yoshida Brothers if not for this class.  And I had the good fortune to see them in a small club in Seattle with my student when they came on tour in the US.  This was a special treat for her, as the Yoshida Brothers normally only play big halls in Japan.

By now we had been talking for more than 90 minutes and I hadn't been able to hear many picks of love songs.  It was time to close the class for this week, but we will continue with the theme of love songs next week.

10 February 2011 (Thursday)

First thing: in honor of Valentine's Day the theme for Thursday's (17 Feb) class is "your favorite love songs".  Students, please think of your favorite love songs (in any language, not just English) and we will listen to them on Thursday.

On 10 February, eleven students showed up!

We did a round of introductions, which included name, country of origin and favorite music. 

For the first time I have students from Mongolia and also Russian students from the Russian Far East.  I was surprised to learn that their city, Khabarovsk (map, info), is only 30km from China! 

I mentioned that I dream of visiting Lake Baikal (map, info) and one of my students said she spent a summer -- 3 months! -- there.  I had to teach the class the word "envious" (it is like "jealous") at this point.  I imagine Lake Baikal to be very beautiful and magical.  One day I must go there!

Back to music: It seems to me that R&B and hip-hop are particularly well liked.  I look forward to learning more about the students' taste in music over the coming weeks.

I asked the class if they know any music or bands from Seattle.  Blank looks.  So I showed them the video to the most famous song from Seattle ever: "Smells Like Teen Spirit" (video, lyrics) by Nirvana (bio).  As soon as the song started half the class nodded in recognition of the song.

Since so many people in the class said they like hip-hop, I mentioned that Seattle has some hip-hop bands that are getting nationwide attention.  The most well known one is Shabazz Palaces (bio).  I don't know their music well myself, so I just picked the song on YouTube with the most views "Belhaven Meridian" (video).

Coincidentally, in the Seattle Times newspaper this week there was an article about a local rapper named Macklemore.  He has sold out three nights at the Showbox (my favorite live music venue in the world) and is going out on a national tour.  Here you can read the article and see some of his videos.

To see what kind of music the students like I asked for someone to pick a song.  First choice was "Who's That Chick" (song, lyrics) by Rihanna (bio).  As we watched the song and read the lyrics I explained what the word "tipsy" means (it means to have feel that you have drunk some alcohol, but you are not yet drunk).

The next song chosen was "Take Your Shirt Off" (video, lyrics) by T-Pain (bio).  After we watched it I asked the student who picked the song why she likes that song.  She answered that when she is sad, it makes her happy.  She doesn't pay attention to the lyrics, she just likes the energy of the song.

But she did mention that she is getting bored of the song.  At this point I explained the different forms of using the word "bored" and "boring".  For example, you can say:

"That song is boring."

"That song bores me."

"That song is boring to me."

But you *cannot* say "I am boring" if you mean to say "That is boring" -- the two sentences have very different meanings!

Speaking of club music like T-Pain, one of the students says he has been to the Seattle club "Trinity" but hasn't yet been to "Venom".  He said Trinity was ok but nothing special.

Another student had an example of a song which she likes to listen to when she feels pressure: "Kurenai" (video) by X-Japan (bio).  It was interesting to me to hear that the lyrics are a mix of English and Japanese.

This video was taken at their last concert, before they broke up.  The band actually got back together for reunion concerts, but the original guitarist had died during the time between, so they had a special place for him on the stage.

I mentioned that a Seattle band, Alice In Chains (bio) has a similar situation: The original singer died a few years ago and when the band plays the song "Black Gives Way To Blue" (video, lyrics), which is dedicated to him, they put a microphone on the stage where he would have stood.

Someone in the class mentioned at this point that Seattle songs seem to be pretty depressing.  I guess there's truth to that observation.  I motioned to the window and said, "With this kind of weather, what do you expect?!?"

I asked one of the students who hadn't been talking very much to choose a song.  He chose "No Promises" (video, lyrics) by Shayne Ward (bio).

Now one of the Russian students introduced us to a Russian rapper, Timati (bio), which features Snoop Dogg (bio), "Groove On" (video, lyrics).

Next song was a switch back to mellow: "I Believe I Can Fly" (video, lyrics) by Ronan Keating (bio).

The last song of the day was a perfect example of why I love doing this class.  It is a video with all the Mongolian music stars -- of every genre -- singing together: "Ugluu shig eh oron" (video). What a great way to learn about Mongolian music in one song/video!  (It's a long song and worth watching all the way through!)

With that everyone went home for the day.  I hope the students enjoyed the music and the conversation and will come back again on Thursday the 17th.

3 February 2011 (Thursday)

Today was the first day of class for the quarter, and the first class I have done in nearly two years(!!).  

I was curious to see how many students would show up, especially since this was the first time I am doing the class at Seattle Central in years; usually once I have established the class at a college, there are at least a few people who continue from one quarter to the next and they bring their friends.

In this case, it was a completely fresh start and I was curious to see how many students would show up.

I arrived at the classroom at 5pm. The clock continued to roll and no one showed up.

As I waited I made the plan to email my contacts at Seattle Central the next day (Friday) and suggest that next week I visit the English classes in person to promote the class.

By 5:10pm, it was clear no one was going to come so I started packing my things.  Suddenly one of the ESL teachers showed up with 6 students!  My face brightened.  

We did some quick introductions, but it was clear that most of the students had not actually planned on staying late after school this evening, so four of the six left shortly after the introductions.  Nonetheless two stayed and we had a great conversation for over an hour. :-)

We started by talking about where they are from.  Deniz is from Turkey and Helga is from Taiwan.

Deniz is especially interested in dance so showed them a clip of my friend, Encarna, doing one of her flamenco performances (video).

We continued talking about theatrical/dance performances.  I told them there is this great cabaret in Seattle called Teatro Zinzanni (website).  It has fantastic performances, but is expensive.  It's worth the money, if you can afford it, though!

I also mentioned that Cirque Du Soleil (website) is coming to Everett (20 minutes drive north of Seattle) March 16 - 20.  They were not familiar with Cirque Du Soleil, so we watched a performance clip (video) so they could see what it's about.  I have long wanted to see Cirque Du Soleil and might finally go.

We started talking about other cultural things to do Seattle besides just music-related ones.  I told them there are some great place up on Capitol Hill, right around Seattle Central:

• Town Hall (website, map) has very interesting presentations and lectures. They usually cost about $5 to attend.
• Elliott Bay Books (events, map) is around the corner from SCCC and is the best bookstore in Seattle and has many interesting presentaions by authors.
• The first Thursday of every month the art galleries in Pioneer Square are open late and lots of people go look at what is on offer (information). 

The return of the Language of Music conversation group!

I never anticipated the break for the Language of Music conversation group would be so long, but the break is over -- starting Thursday, 3 February, I will be hosting the class again every week.  

Since I am working in Seattle (as opposed to Redmond, as previously), the group will meet at Seattle Central Community College.

I look forward to meeting the new group of students and I look forward to learning about the music they like!

Notice: No more Language Of Music meetings for a while!

Thank you to all my students at BCC for coming to the Language Of Music English conversation group each week; I have enjoyed very much learning about you and the music you like.

Unfortunately I have started a new job which will not allow me to regularly come to BCC Thursday afternoons. Until I find a new solution (ex. a new time/day of the week to meet or if someone else will host the conversation on Thursday afternoons), there will be no more meetings.

I will stay in touch! And feel free to contact me any time if you have questions about musical or cultural events in Seattle.

22 January 2009 (Thursday)

After last week's small turnout I was curious to see how many showed up for the next class... Eight students came, four of whom were new. This quarter is starting off so differently from other quarters! But of course I am enjoying the class, as always!

I asked one of the new students to pick a song. He choose "Take Me To Your Heart" (video, lyrics) by Michael Learns To Rock (bio).







Another new student chose the next song: Celine Dion (bio) "A New Day Has Come" (video, lyrics).








Somehow we started talking about the theme music to the old TV comedy "Friends" (info). We listened to the theme song "I'll Be There For You" (video, lyrics) and I explained what "DOA" means in the lyrics (it's short for "dead on arrival", i.e. the lyric "your love life's DOA" means "you love life is totally dead.")

Speaking of tv comedies, I mentioned that my favorite comedy is "My Name Is Earl" (info) which is one at 8pm on Thursdays. But it is so full of references to American culture that I doubt my students would think it's actually very funny...

I also told the class about another US cultural phenomenon: The late night talk shows that start at 11.30pm after the news. On Channel 5 is "The Tonight Show With Jay Leno" (info) and on Channel 7 is "Late Night With David Letterman" (info). For millions of Americans every evening ends watching the news, then falling asleep watching Leno or Letterman.


Another Celine Dion song was chosen and I had to tell the class that the late night comedians often make jokes about how over-dramatic Ms. Dion can be. But there's no denying she is extremely popular!

We watched Celine Dion duet with Il Divo (bio) on "I Believe In You" (video, lyrics). Actually, we were looking for the song she duets where the guy sings in Italian, but now I've forgotten which song we found...




At this point we all agreed we needed something non-Celine Dion, something heavier. "Crawling" (video, lyrics) by Linkin Park (bio) was suggested and watched.

Um, that was a bit *too* heavy for most of the class!...



We settled on something in the middle of Linkin Park and Celine Dion: Rihanna (bio) "Umbrella" (video, lyrics).





Rihanna is friends with Chris Brown (bio), so we watched his song "With You" (video, lyrics).

One of the new students, Vu, likes the dancing in Chris's song "Say Goodbye" (video, lyrics), so we watched that as the last song of the day.

I noted that the lyrics of "Say Goodbye" are almost exactly opposite of those of "With You" -- girls, beware of that guy! ;-)

15 January 2009 (Thursday)

The Language Of Music conversation class is back! After December holidays and snowstorms the first class of the 2009 Winter Quarter! Normally the first class of a quarter is overflowing with new students who show up to check out what the class is about. I was surprised that this time only five students showed up! Not only that, but four of the five were students from last quarter; the only new student was a Colombian friend of Diego's.

While such a low turnout was surprising, it was also just fine as it let me catch up with my old students about how their holidays were. For most of the class time we just caught up with each other, telling what we did through December rather than particularly talking about music! Aoi was back in Japan for the holidays and told us about the tradition of watching "Kohaku" (紅白歌合戦) (info). She told us how two teams, one which is women in red and one which is men in white, do a competition. We didn't find any clips from this year's Kohaku on YouTube, but watched this one as an example of the program.

Later, when we did talk about music a bit, Hyeijin mentioned that she is not a big fan of Jason Mraz (bio), an artist she discovered in this class! Her favorite song by him is "If It Kills Me" (video, lyrics).





I don't remember exactly how the next song came up but we watched "So Sick" (video, lyrics) by Ne-Yo (bio). The winter theme of the video fits Winter Quarter!

There is a "female perspective/answer" to Ne-Yo's song (song with lyrics).



It was great to see the familiar faces again, but that's all the music we talked about today. :-)

25 November 2008 (Tuesday) -- Flamenco Performance!

I have told my students countless times about the great flamenco show my friends Eric and Encarna do every Tuesday evening at the Capitol Club (website) in Seattle. I convinced a group of students to trek over to Seattle for the evening of the 25th to see it for themselves. About 20 (including friends and boyfriends) showed up -- we filled the club! And Eric and Encarna (with a special guest appearance by Vassili) played a *great* show!!

A lot of pictures were taken during the performance, but the only one that I have from my camera is the one above (students, please send me your favorite pictures so I can post them!).

If you liked that show, I highly recommend that you get tickets to see their full band (Children Of The Revolution) on January 16th at the Triple Door. They will play two sets: one which is open to all ages (7.30pm) and one which is 21 and over (10pm). Get tickets here (buy tickets early -- both shows will sell out!!).

By the way, I go to the Capitol Club very often on Tuesday evenings to see Eric and Encarna play -- if any of you ever want to go again, just let me know!

20 November 2008 (Thursday)

Today was the last class of the quarter! :-((

9 students attended.

I started class with a non-music topic: I know that a lot of my students like shopping at the outlet malls and I mentioned that close to BCC there are a couple of places to shop for fashionable clothes cheaply:

• Nordstrom Rack (map Bellevue store, map Seattle store) is where they bring all the clothes that didn't sell in the regular Nordstrom stores. But most students seem to already know about The Rack...
  
• Loehmann's (website, map) is very close the Nordstrom Rack at Factoria Mall and has even more high-end fashion labels, but a smaller selection. But I find some pretty unique stuff here.
  

Ok, now on to the regular topic of our conversation, music! Everyone was pretty tired today, so we needed some energetic music. Nayoung had an excellent suggestion: The Extreme Crew Show (video). The dance is super modern, but includes some traditional parts to it, like the flute player. Wow, what athleticism!! I've never seen someone do one-arm push ups supporting their whole body weight! A very impressive spectacle! No wonder they won the Battle Of The Year breakdancing competition (info). Here's another video where you can see their amazing moves more closely. Check out their website or their MySpace page for tons more videos.

Nayoung knows these guys personally. She says they are nice guys and they have great bodies. She said they are performing in New York right now -- they should stop by Seattle and perform on their way back to Korea!

I don't remember anymore exactly how we got from Extreme Crew to Nil Karaibrahimgil (bio), but next we watched her song "Pirlanta" (video). Nil is a big star in Turkey and Ozlem likes her especially for her feminist attitude.




Next we watched a song "Muhabbet Bağına Girdim Bu Gece" (video) by another Turkish singer, Pamela (bio). (Actually, if you read her bio, she's not really fully Turkish, rather British/American/Turkish born in Germany...)

Then Ozlem told us that the Pamela version is an update to a more traditional Turkish song. We compared it to the traditional version (video). I love comparing different versions of songs!


We still needed upbeat music to raise the energy level in the room. So we watched The Peace (video) by a "band" called Morning Musume (モーニング娘。) (bio).

But Morning Musume isn't isn't really a band, rather it's a "brand" where the members change regularly; it's part of the "Hello Project" (bio) which creates the music and directs all the activities. The girls are all under 20 until they "graduate" to other projects under the Hello Project umbrella. (It's fascinating to me to learn about these Asian groups that I had no idea existed!)

Apparently there is a similar group in Korea: Girls' Generation (소녀시대) (bio). We watched their song "Kissing You" (video).





Surprise!, there's *another* Korean girl group!! Wonder Girls (원더걸스) (bio). We watched "Tell Me" (video) which features one of the members turning into Wonderwoman (info) to scare away a flasher.



All this talk of manufactured groups reminded me that New Kids On The Block (bio), a boy-band from the 80's, is doing a big reunion tour (coming to Seattle this weekend) that is a big nostalgia trip for a lot of people my age. However, most of my students weren't even born when the band was popular so I didn't think they would know any NKOTB songs. I tried out "Step By Step" (video, lyrics) on them. Nayoung recognized the song, because it was remade this year by a Korean band boy band called Battle (배틀) (bio) (video).

Last week Hugo had gone to see High School Musical On Ice (info). He said it was good and that he is a fan of Vanessa Hudgens (bio), who sang in the original High School Musical. We listened to her song "Committed" (video, lyrics).

This inspired a bunch of songs related to musicals for the rest of the class. First was "All That Jazz" (video, lyrics) from the movie "Chicago" (info).







Next we played "El Tango De Roxanne" (video, lyrics) from the 2001 movie "Moulin Rouge" (info). This is an excellent, creative version of the song "Roxanne"! I don't think most of the class knows the origin of the song "Roxanne", so I played a clip of the original version (from 1978!) by The Police (bio) [featuring a very young, not-yet-famous singer named Sting (bio)].

Back to the Moulin Rouge film (which I have actually never seen!), I played another song from the soundtrack that I like "Lady Marmalade" (video, lyrics).

Someone asked if I like the song itself or if I like the video and I replied that I have been a fan of that song since the 70's! I showed how old the song is with a clip from the 70's by original singer Patti Labelle (bio). I like both the old and the new versions!


Still on film music, remembered that I had watched the film "O Brother Where Art Thou" (info) this weekend and I decided to play a song I was sure my students had never heard: "I Am A Man Of Constant Sorrow" (video, lyrics). Note the singer is George Clooney (bio)! (The song is a traditional American folk song, but I can't find a link to the original version.)


The last song of the day -- and therefore the quarter! -- was "Falling Slowly" (video, lyrics) from the movie "Once" (info).



With that we all went our separate ways for a few weeks. Well, the students will still see each other at their regular BCC classes until the end of the quarter. And some of us will go see the flamenco performance in Seattle on Tuesday night. And we plan on doing another dinner together (Japanese?) in December, so hopefully we will gather again before January.

Upcoming event: Flamenco performance evening of Tuesday, 25 November

For those of you 21 years old or over, a group of us will go to the Capitol Club in Seattle next Tuesday evening (25 November) to see the flamenco performance. Here are the details:

Where: Capitol Club in Seattle. 414 E. Pine Street, Seattle, WA 98122. Here's a map.

When: Tuesday, 25 November. The show starts at 9pm. It ends about 11pm.

Cost: Entry is free, but you are expected to buy two drinks (drinks can be cola or coffe or tea, not just alcohol).

Remember, you *must* bring your official identification (Washington driver's license or your passport) which proves you are 21 years old or older.

Please respond to me if you want to come to this show. Feel free to bring friends. In your response, tell me if you have a car or if you need a ride. If you need a ride, please remind me of the neighborhood you live in.

I hope a lot of you come to the show, it's really good -- Seattle's best kept secret!!

A note for you movie fans: The best theater to see the new James Bond film is in Seattle; it is called the Cinerama (www.cinerama.com) . This theater has a massive curved screen and is the best place to see action films. The theater is located in downtown Seattle (map).

14 November 2008 (Friday) -- Dinner at a Turkish restaurant

In the music conversation class we talked about doing a series of dinners where we try food from different countries. The first choice was Turkish and Ozlem was very kind and found a restaurant near BCC. Friday after classes 14 of us squeezed into three cars and went to Meze in Kirkland for dinner.

For many of the students it was their first experience of Turkish food. We basically ordered everything on the menu and just shared around. I think the hummus was the biggest hit.

Here's a picture of the whole group:

Trying all the different foods!

Clean plates and big smiles!

At the end of the meal Ozlem read everyone's future in their coffee grounds:

The next restaurant trip will probably be Japanese, in December!