Tuesday afternoon I had the privilege of joining a group of second graders from Mason Elementary on the stage of Powell Hall and observed a presentation by Jennifer Nitchman (flute and piccolo) and Cally Banham (oboe and English horn). We learned high and low; we learned that the smaller the instrument the higher the voice and the bigger the instrument the lower the voice. We learned about melody and accompaniment, and that "the melody is the tune" and "accompaniment goes with the melody." To help us learn this concept, Jen and Cally would alternate--the flute would play the melody, the oboe the accompaniment; the English horn would play the melody, the piccolo the accompaniment.

Afterward, I sat in on a power point presentation given by Richard Ashburner, who helps musicians design their in-school lessons, just as he did with Jen and Cally. With prospective in-school musician/teachers assembled, Jen and Cally talked about how their melody lesson has evolved over three years in classrooms. My favorite exchange: Richard: "What did you do after you got back your basic info at the start of the process?" Jen: "We went to Wasabi for sushi."

The amazing thing to me about listening to Richard was to discover how that simple, 40-minute presentation for second graders has so much educational experience, theory and research beneath it--the iceberg metaphor is an apt one.

Richard took us through multiple intelligences, the varied ways of learning in the classroom, and a real eye-opener (especially for someone who used to teach) "structure is the behavior modification."

I'll be writing a Playbill article later this season about the support musicians have behind them when they go into the classroom; but suffice to say for now that your St. Louis Symphony is doing the good, and effective, work in area classrooms today. It's not a musician trying to play Mozart for a gymnasium full of screaming schoolchildren anymore. It's about learning, with music as the tool.