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[CCBC-NET] Chris Raschka Redux
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From: Barbara Tobin <vze2xvdf>
Date: Sun, 20 Oct 2002 19:45:30 -0400
Monica and Jody, I enjoyed reading your enthusiastic vignettes regarding Raschka's books. I am also a huge fan of the man and his works. I'd seen him enchant a large adult audience, performing 'Yo! Yes?' and 'Arlene Sardine' with stick puppets up on a big stage, whilst somebody read the books aloud, and the illustrations were shown via slides on a large screen. Chris was hilarious with those presentations, and it gave me renewed faith that I could sell my own puzzled adult students on this peculiar little fishy book I love so much. I've wondered if I could pull off something like that to get them 'hooked'-- to get them to take it less seriously (in terms of their usual reaction: 'Oh my gosh, the heroine DIES??')
Last year, one of the second grade boys at the school where I work was so enraptured with his teacher's sharing of 'Yo! Yes?' that he went home and wrote his own version of it, 'Hi! Bye!', and proudly brought it back to school the next day to share with the class. In Sammy's version
(inventively spelled), the little shy boy was sad because he had no food, not no friends, but in the resolution, he gained both. Yesterday I walked by this same teacher's classroom and saw some of the middle school Big Buddies of these 1st/2nd graders performing 'Yo! Yes?' to the little kids, who were rolling around the floor in gales of laughter.
Imagine my delight a few weeks ago when Chris Saad, our local children's bookseller, invited me to bring my children's literature class of undergraduates to meet Chris Raschka at her wonderful little children's bookstore, Chris' Corner. Wow! What an fantastic opportunity, and an amazing coincidence--when I checked our calendar to see what was scheduled for that class session, it was 'postmodern picture books', and one of the students' author/illustrator presentations was slated to be... ta da... Chris Raschka!
So we met on campus for an hour before moving out to the bookstore, and in that time, one of my students immersed our class in Raschka and his works, beginning with the soundtrack from Misterioso. She even had them enthralled with Arlene Sardine. We also showed the delightful Weston Woods video version of Yo! Yes? (just six minutes). We were ready to meet Chris.
Chris spent an hour with us, explaining the construction of his 'jazz trilogy'. What a treat! He SANG us the text of 'Charlie Parker Played Bebop'. Then for 'Mysterious Thelonius', he got out a packet of colored markers and demonstrated how he first built the familiar color wheel, then mapped onto it the musical notes, one for one, starting with red.
We learned a lot about the book making and editorial process when he explained how his beloved editor left the publishing house that was publishing this book midstream, and the problems he had when left to his own devices in getting the book ready for printing (like not allowing for the gutter in the middle of his pictures, that disappeared). These sorts of process related issues provided invaluable insights for my students who are planning their own books right now. Raschka has had a huge impact on them--- and on me. I went right out and ordered two of his jazz books that are read and performed by musicians, with Chris adding some commentary at the end of the tape--but was dismayed to learn that his 'Mysterious Thelonius' book/tape by Charles Turner is now unavailable.
So, Jody, I am now hopeful that I have helped create 24 new adult advocates of this brilliant musician-artist. I just wish that the sceptical reviewer, who suggested that Raschka's 'John Coltrane's Giant Steps', with its 'laughably inappropriate abstract language,' would have been better as a video than a book, had had the privilege of seeing Monica's kids. Perhaps he needed Raschka to explain it to him--the kids didn't seem to. Raschka can translate music into synergistic words/images like nobody else. Who knows where these kids might be able to take his innovative ideas when they grow up to be writers themselves.
Barbara Tobin (barbarat at gse.upenn)
Received on Sun 20 Oct 2002 06:45:30 PM CDT
Date: Sun, 20 Oct 2002 19:45:30 -0400
Monica and Jody, I enjoyed reading your enthusiastic vignettes regarding Raschka's books. I am also a huge fan of the man and his works. I'd seen him enchant a large adult audience, performing 'Yo! Yes?' and 'Arlene Sardine' with stick puppets up on a big stage, whilst somebody read the books aloud, and the illustrations were shown via slides on a large screen. Chris was hilarious with those presentations, and it gave me renewed faith that I could sell my own puzzled adult students on this peculiar little fishy book I love so much. I've wondered if I could pull off something like that to get them 'hooked'-- to get them to take it less seriously (in terms of their usual reaction: 'Oh my gosh, the heroine DIES??')
Last year, one of the second grade boys at the school where I work was so enraptured with his teacher's sharing of 'Yo! Yes?' that he went home and wrote his own version of it, 'Hi! Bye!', and proudly brought it back to school the next day to share with the class. In Sammy's version
(inventively spelled), the little shy boy was sad because he had no food, not no friends, but in the resolution, he gained both. Yesterday I walked by this same teacher's classroom and saw some of the middle school Big Buddies of these 1st/2nd graders performing 'Yo! Yes?' to the little kids, who were rolling around the floor in gales of laughter.
Imagine my delight a few weeks ago when Chris Saad, our local children's bookseller, invited me to bring my children's literature class of undergraduates to meet Chris Raschka at her wonderful little children's bookstore, Chris' Corner. Wow! What an fantastic opportunity, and an amazing coincidence--when I checked our calendar to see what was scheduled for that class session, it was 'postmodern picture books', and one of the students' author/illustrator presentations was slated to be... ta da... Chris Raschka!
So we met on campus for an hour before moving out to the bookstore, and in that time, one of my students immersed our class in Raschka and his works, beginning with the soundtrack from Misterioso. She even had them enthralled with Arlene Sardine. We also showed the delightful Weston Woods video version of Yo! Yes? (just six minutes). We were ready to meet Chris.
Chris spent an hour with us, explaining the construction of his 'jazz trilogy'. What a treat! He SANG us the text of 'Charlie Parker Played Bebop'. Then for 'Mysterious Thelonius', he got out a packet of colored markers and demonstrated how he first built the familiar color wheel, then mapped onto it the musical notes, one for one, starting with red.
We learned a lot about the book making and editorial process when he explained how his beloved editor left the publishing house that was publishing this book midstream, and the problems he had when left to his own devices in getting the book ready for printing (like not allowing for the gutter in the middle of his pictures, that disappeared). These sorts of process related issues provided invaluable insights for my students who are planning their own books right now. Raschka has had a huge impact on them--- and on me. I went right out and ordered two of his jazz books that are read and performed by musicians, with Chris adding some commentary at the end of the tape--but was dismayed to learn that his 'Mysterious Thelonius' book/tape by Charles Turner is now unavailable.
So, Jody, I am now hopeful that I have helped create 24 new adult advocates of this brilliant musician-artist. I just wish that the sceptical reviewer, who suggested that Raschka's 'John Coltrane's Giant Steps', with its 'laughably inappropriate abstract language,' would have been better as a video than a book, had had the privilege of seeing Monica's kids. Perhaps he needed Raschka to explain it to him--the kids didn't seem to. Raschka can translate music into synergistic words/images like nobody else. Who knows where these kids might be able to take his innovative ideas when they grow up to be writers themselves.
Barbara Tobin (barbarat at gse.upenn)
Received on Sun 20 Oct 2002 06:45:30 PM CDT
