Can’t Wait Until Music Night

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“This is the kind of gig I had in mind when I moved to the Hudson Valley.” That’s what Jason from the King of Rome said when he took the stage at the January 2014 Music Night, and everyone who has ever been knows what he meant: Music Night is suffused with the kind of intimate ambiance lent by the glow of warm embers in a friend’s fireplace. The venue is a private residence at the Old Glenford Church, and all the details of it, from the rows of low slung couches, to the overlapping carpets, to the tapestries and the stuffed book shelves, to the giant world map hinting at vastness behind the stage, add up to an uncontrived, comfortable, and attractive space that goes beyond the public/private dichotomy. It’s always just so good to be there.

Many people who go to Music Night regularly go first and foremost for the food. The seasonal gourmet fare, featuring a main course with vegetarian option and 10-12 side dishes, is prepared by host Mor Pipman. At $10 a plate, eating at Music Night sometimes feels like stealing. The menus are creative, the food is fresh – much of it is organic and local – and it is at once satisfying and invigorating, like a pleasant week abroad (I would think). Mor is able to make simple dishes with few ingredients that highlight and enhance natural whole flavors in a curious and delightful way; after dinner, you will know what, say, carrots, lentils, and yucca really taste like, respectively (they taste delicious). You will remember what you ate. You will sleep well later (but only when you want to). Some people bring their own wine and beer to Music Night, but the food itself is really enough to get everyone rosy-cheeked, happy, and talking. This is all before desert, too. Mor usually has six or seven options, and it’s necessary to have two, at least.

Music Night manages to combine the better features of the formal sit-down concert and the stand-around-in-a-bar concert. Those in attendance form a listening audience, which is part of the draw for the musicians (who are volunteers), but the atmosphere is also relaxed and informal, audience members coming and going as they please, and it is not so hard to find a corner or a nook for quiet conversation (although if you’re too loud in the kitchen during the music Mor will shush you don’t say I didn’t warn you). Better than either a formal or bar setting is the social attitude of the event; it’s more akin to a house-party or a gathering of friends than a public setting, so it’s easy to approach someone and introduce yourself (but don’t worry you don’t have to talk to anyone if you don’t want to). And that’s important because really, the event is about community, in two distinct ways. First, it provides a venue for communal relaxation and enjoyment. There are even regulars at Music Night who only go out once a month, choosing this event. Second, it is a point of contact between the HVSS community and the public. Music Night has lent the school a reputation for outstanding quality in the Woodstock community. The volunteers who put Music Night on do it out of a love for the event and a dedication to the school, and the school owes significant thanks in return: to date, Music Night has generated more than $20,000 in funds for the school. That’s important to know because – although most of the people you see at Music Night are not associated with the school, and the event has developed a life of its own – each event is a gift to the HVSS and an expression of the HVSS community’s dedication to the project of building an enduring and excellent school. A great deal of hard work and coordination go into producing each Night. But having spent the better part of a year at the school witnessing growth and learning the history of the place, it’s no surprise that people are doing it; it’s become apparent to me that this is how you build a school from scratch, or any community institution for that matter: you do it together.

[ed.  You can find out more about Music Night by visiting their Facebook page at: https://www.facebook.com/pages/HVSS-Music-Night/101144769954447]

Why So Many Song About Rainbow

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[Ed. The title is a literal translation from American Sign Language]

Perhaps it’s because rainbows operate in our psychology as a symbol of plenitude, especially for children, most of whom spend a great deal of their time under strict surveillance in secure pens called “schools,” which is ominously defined in Meriam-Webster’s online dictionary as “an institution for the teaching of children.”  Rainbow-land is where we will finally be free to do as we please and be respected as complete human beings.  But more on rainbows later.

At HVSS students are already free to do as they please – most of the time.   They do have serious social work to do, too.  Everyone has to take their turn serving on the Judicial Committee, for example, which occasionally becomes difficult, because investigations are quite thoroughgoing, and it can even become tedious, because they can take considerable time and sometimes backtracking and reworking.  But it is real work with real flesh-and-blood importance, because the freedoms and rights of School Meeting Members are at stake, so it’s always important to proceed with patience and attention.  Then there is School Meeting, where discussions sometimes extend beyond anyone’s reasonable predictions, but coming to the best decision we can – and honoring everyone’s right to fully participate – is always worth the extra time.  Of course, HVSS is not at all dominated by intricate judicial investigation and laborious democratic process.  Most of the time people are doing other things, and especially for younger students, a lot of the time that’s playing.  But the play and the hard work of democratic process are not separate activities here; they support and inform each other.

A few weeks ago School Meeting was particularly fraught, filled with passionate debate and procedural frustration.  I am the secretary, so it is my honor to type and post the minutes immediately following each meeting, and I usually have a couple other administrative tasks to take care of quickly before the end of the day.  After the meeting in question, though, I felt rather burnt out, and instead of retiring directly to the office I stepped outside into the sunlight, where something was happening.  Within the space of several seconds I found myself ensconced in a snow turret in the midst of a furious battle, anxiously shooting foam arrows at an approaching  Viking force, comprised mostly of students who had been in School Meeting seconds before. They were huddled together and advancing slowly, shields held together wall-like in the Tortoise Formation made famous by Roman Legions.  Two or three allies stood to my right, brandishing swords and whispering things like, “they’re going to overrun us,” nervously.  And overrun us they did, and as I desperately tried to notch one last arrow I was felled by a sword blow to the thigh and then, writhing on the snow, I gritted my teeth and waited for the final blow.  And then, moments later, I was heading back inside to complete my tasks, only now – my cheeks rosy and my heart light – I whistled while I worked.

Everyone knows that all work and no play makes Jack a dull boy, but it’s worth thinking about how deep that dullness really goes; it’s far beyond a dour countenance.  Jack also won’t work nearly as well if he does not play.  And generally a group won’t work as well as a team if they don’t also play together.  And how are solid relationships formed? How do acquaintances often become friends, at any age? By laughing and playing together.

Here’s an example of how expertly play and serious consideration are woven together by students at HVSS:  for maybe two weeks now, the American Sign Language class has left a song chorus written on the blackboard in the JC Room.  It is “translated” so that it can be signed in ASL, and it reads,

Why so many song about rainbow
And other side what there
We see rainbow
But only illusion

For a few of us, this has become a little joke.  When we run into each other around school we might ask – quite seriously –  “why so many song about rainbow?”  or we might sneak up behind one another and whisper, “only illusion.” The verse is still there, untouched, above the JC table.  

One day last week, JC was dispatching with business with its ordinary care and efficiency, despite being interrupted by tours and playing host to multiple visiting observers.  At some point in our second hour one member had to use the office telephone.  There was still a lot of work to do, and the rest of us decided to discontinue our work and take an in-room break until we could function as a complete body again.  After 30 seconds of relative silence, one of the members, looking up at the blackboard, sang in an exaggerated falsetto, “Whyyy…sooo…many song…about raaiiinbowww…?”  We all giggled, and then he continued, “And-other-side-what-there?”  Another member or two joined in to sing the last two lines, and then – I’m not sure quite how – an a capella jam session broke loose.  There was beat-boxing, operatic bel canto, harmonizing, polyphony, and a sort of monastic chanting (“rainbow-rainbow-rainbow”), all at once, and – somehow – it sounded great.  There was a lot of laughter too, of course.  We continued, organizing ourselves variously, and I’m sure I wasn’t the only one who began to wish that our missing member never returned.  When she did, though, we reentered our work renewed.

Serving on JC can be exhausting, as it was on that day, but it’s vitally important, especially because it seems that it’s usually the process of JC itself – rather than, say, serving a sentence – that motivates transgressors to reflect.  Facing a panel of peers concerned with what’s happening at school and charged with investigating whether you’ve done something that might violate someone’s freedom, and being given careful due process by that panel, is very powerful.  Despite the difficulties, we’re able to do it well because at HVSS, while working on justice keeps us reflective and morally aware, play keeps us fresh, lively, and in tune with one another.