This year, Shining Star Orchestra set out to explore “Transformation.” How does music transform our mood, emotions, space? How does the sound of a place transform its meaning? How can we use music to affect our school space? Very quickly, however, the immense creativity and energy of our handful of students took the reins, and we went down a path of foley, song writing, video making, writing, directing, improvisation, and more. 

Towards the beginning of the year, we struggled with attendance (only having one student for the first few weeks), as well as having to shift our teaching team due to the availability of one of the instructors. Thus, our projects were very focused on the specific musical goals of our one student. We talked about mood and music, attempted compositions in different moods, and created visual responses to music of different affects.

This movie, titled The Painting Jackerz, was our final project and took almost half of the year. In some ways, it does respond to the original prompt of transformation: the school space transforms into a movie set, the students transform into their characters, the foley and music transforms the meaning of the image. Perhaps more so, the idea of transformation manifested in the format of the class as we responded fluidly to changes in attendance, structure, and student ideas and interests. 

below, left to right: Sasha creating a ghost puppet for the final scene (first two pictures). Lily creating a painting for the art museum scene. Julian and Lily taking field recordings in the Waters Elementary garden.