New Bing Storytelling CD: Happy Tales from Bing
By Beth Wise, Assistant Director
As a child, I fondly remember listening to record albums of children’s stories. This early experience gave me an opportunity to create the characters in my mind, to listen intently to the words and music and to experience the instruments’ subtle variations in pitch and tone. There was always an unidentifiable instrument that would pique my interest and enable me to make a connection between music and storytelling. This increased my listening ability, tapped into my creativity and began a love for storytelling and music.
The skills that are necessary to attend to a story are very different from the listening skills needed to listen to a song. The listener is transported on a journey through a story that has many characters, actions, changes, scenarios and emotions. The act of listening to and following the beginning, middle and end of a story is also a pre-literacy experience that builds comprehension and understanding. Listening to stories also increases auditory attention and builds a rich creative experience for the child.
After recording four music CDs at Bing, a parent suggested making the next CD one of stories that could be enjoyed on long car trips or commutes to school. Remembering the record albums with their vivid musical sound effects and enchanting tales, I began visualizing how to do this with the next CD. Calling upon our talented current and alumni parents and a few local guest artists, we recorded stories that had both a musical element and strong accompanying text. The result is “Happy Tales from Bing.”
The narrative expertise of Bing teachers Todd Erickson, Lars Gustafson, Mark Mabry and Sarah Wright, and Bing parent Virginia Gutiérrez-Porter, went into recording and producing familiar stories such as The Three Little Pigs, The Gingerbread Man and Goldilocks and the Three Bears. We added a popular folk tale from Panama titled Conejito and a Chinese tale that is similar to the Three Little Pigs, called Little Rabbit. The Little Red Hen was included as both a song and a story, and we added two popular songs: I Am A Fine Musician and Hush Little Baby.
Some of our gifted musicians included husband-and-wife duo Jeff Nutall, of the St. Lawrence String Quartet, and Livia Sohn, concert violinist. Talented bassist and alumni Bing parent Saúl Sierra joined us, as well as local jazz-guitar legend Rick Vandivier; alumni parent Evan Brooks, chairman of the Stanford Jazz Workshop and co-founder of Digidesign audio technology company; and Bing parent, actress and vocalist Angel Burgess. Martín Fraile, former assistant director of the Stanford Symphony Orchestra, transported a full marimba to Bing to play in the Three Little Pigs. Former Bing teachers Michelle Forrest and Matt Linden (also a current Bing parent) returned with violin and banjo in hand to be a part of the project, and current teacher Minjae Bae played flute and ocarina.
One of the most touching experiences in the project began when Bing alumna and current Stanford student Audrey Proulx participated in the project. Knowing her love of music and storytelling since early childhood, I asked Audrey if she would like to write a song with lyrics for The Three Bears. She sent back an entire composition, which she performed at Bing during our recording session.
The song I Am A Fine Musician featured alumni parent Karen Such performing vocals, with guest musician Michael Goldman on bassoon, Marina Dantcheva on violin, Sheri Luevano on percussion and Matt Linden on banjo. Another highlight of the CD was the song/story of Little Rabbit, lovingly presented by three generations of both Dan and Shelly Chu’s family and the Higgins-Chen family. Jindong Cai, director of the Stanford Symphony Orchestra and alumni parent, sent a fantastic group of musicians to Bing to accompany the song with Duny Lam on yangqin, Yongping Tian on the erhu, Jun Gao on dizi and Audrey Proulx on the violin. We have also been very fortunate to have an extremely talented producer, sound engineer and recording artist, Lars Hidde, from Rivery Sound Studios in Los Gatos. He and I co-produced all of our Bing CDs, which are recorded right here at Bing!
This CD was produced with generous donations from the Arrillaga family and the Rebecca and Eric Stein family, and the proceeds will go directly to the scholarship fund at Bing. The new CD will be available at the 2011 Harvest Moon Auction on Saturday, November 5. All of our CDs can be viewed on the Bing website at http://bingschool.stanford.edu and purchased in the office at Bing.