When Fran Molloy tagged me on facebook, inviting me to post a picture of
favourite album,I simply couldn’t decide on which one. The game was such that
I had to tag other friends to invite them to post the same as well.
Finally, I settled for Romanza which is Andrea Bocelli’s first compilation released
internationally in 1997. It means a lot to me because that’s the beginning of my
foray into the world of Italian classical tenors.
Needless to say, that invitation sent me into music overdrive so to speak.
Inevitably, I walked down the hallways of the past as I listened to my all time favourites
of the 80s and 90s.
Believe me, it was not only nostalgic but totally refreshing as images flood the brain and
soul, especially when I hadn’t heard those songs for years.
Great songs carry great memories. I guess that’s why much research has been done on
music-evoked autobiographical memories. (MEAMS)
So I started to check out you-tube and as if the site could read my mind, there was
a whole list of familiar songs.
One of my hot favourites is That’s why (you go away) by Michael Learns To Rock.
(MLTR) When I heard it in the 90s, there was no you-tube then and I never saw
the video clip. Now that I can see the images, I thought it is so clever how the lyrics
are juxtaposed with the images.
Songs by MLTR, Alphaville, Blue, Toto and Westlife remind me of the fun we had
in the classroom. Using music to teach the English language gives students a break
from grammar and more grammar.
My students were ever so creative and would come up with enactments of the lyrics
of the songs. They put in great effort and would even create their own props. There was
a group that sang ‘Lemon Tree’ by Fool’s Garden and they actually brought a
tree trunk into the classroom with handmade paper lemons dangling
from the branches.
Another beautiful song is ‘Cat’s in the Cradle’ by Harry Chapin where a father has no
time for his young son- only to discover that the son as an adult no longer has time for
him. I remember vividly how a group of students performed this song in four distinct
acts with different students playing the roles of the child, the ten year old, the college
student and the father as an old man. I thought it was spectacular. I still have the video
cassette of that performance and since I no longer have the player, I will convert that
to a compact disc.
Thanks to the internet, I am now able to see the different layers of meaning behind the
lyrics. Take ‘Big in Japan’ by Alphaville for example. In the 80s, I thought that it was
about hopeful musicians making it big in Japan. But now I know it is also about a young
couple trying to live and love without substance abuse. The venue of the song
incidentally is Berlin Zoo and the fact that I have been to the zoo twice makes it even
more special.
I also never knew that ’Forever Young’ by the same group was written during the
Cold War, where the singer is ‘hoping for the best, but expecting the worst; are you
gonna drop the bomb or not?
When we hear a very familiar song from the past, somehow the location, the people and
the season associated with that song appear vividly in the mind’s eye. Not unlike
how smells and tastes evoke memories as well.
I had just baked an apple tart due to the overabundance of apples on my tree.
My daughter took a whiff of the tart and told me it reminded her of the same tart
that used to be sold in church for fund-raising when she was still in her primary
school years. She remembered that I steered her away from the table because money
was tight then and buying that tart would be a luxury.
I had clean forgotten that episode but she remembered it well.
Different circumstances in a different time zone.
And it’s not only the past that songs and images evoke.
I know when I visit Africa next year, images of Tarzan swinging from tree to tree and
Toto’s Africa will have a heyday in my mind.
THIS ARTICLE WAS ORIGINALLY PRINTED IN THE NEW STRAITS TIMES MALAYSIA 18 SEPTEMBER 2016 http://digital.nstp.com.my/nst/books/160918nstnews/index.html#/23/
No comments:
Post a Comment