Music Education

Absolute power corrupts absolutely.But there are exceptions to that rule -- people so good that they're incapable of being corrupted, such as the violinist Midori.She's got the power to charge one of the highest fees in classical music and draw sellout crowds no matter how high the ticket prices. That's why the Peabody Conservatory wanted to engage her for the benefit recital that the violinist and her longtime collaborator and Peabody professor of piano, Robert McDonald, give tonight in Friedberg Hall.

Every week for the past 12 years, Worthington Elementary School music teacher Saundra Cunningham has moved cafeteria tables and rearranged chairs so that Howard County's best student singers could explore places such as South Africa, Israel, Ireland and the Deep South through music.While the youths come away feeling they have a better understanding of music, Cunningham says the Howard County Children's Chorus -- one of only two advanced choruses in the state -- is as much about enhancing their academic performance as it is about singing.

CRAB CAKES, stuffed baked potatoes and strawberry shortcake will be offered at The Crab Shanty as the restaurant celebrates its 20th birthday Friday.And in honor of its birthday, the restaurant will donate 20 percent of its proceeds May 25 through 28 to Howard County General Hospital's Imaging Center.The Ellicott City seafood restaurant will take an additional 20 percent off each check. "It's a way of saying 'thank-you' to the community," said general manager Cliff Hughes.Glenwood resident Billy King Jr. inherited the restaurant from his father, Billy King Sr., who lives in Ellicott City.

When conductor David Effron arrived in Annapolis last Sunday, his phone began ringing off the hook.And why not? So many talented graduates of the Eastman School of Music are musicians in the Baltimore-Washington area and relish the prospect of greeting the teacher-conductor with whom they loved working back at their prestigious alma mater in Rochester, N.Y.Indeed, Effron, who comes to Maryland Hall this weekend to conduct music by Rachmaninoff, Mendelssohn and...

THE HALF-DOZEN teen-agers in Alexandra Suhoy's music theory class at the Baltimore Music School in Pikesville must have thought they were going crazy last week.Suhoy, a twentysomething, Kiev Conservatory-trained pianist who immigrated to Baltimore from Ukraine five years ago, was playing the role of stern taskmaster. First she would play a short selection from one of the great composers on the piano or a tape she had brought, then quiz her students to identify the pieces."Dvorak?" ventured one youngster after a particularly fiery exposition of the Tchaikovsky Piano Concerto.

IT IS ONE THING to crack down on smoking in school lavatories, but in Howard County, they're talking about lowering the boom on music and art education in middle schools.Superintendent Michael E. Hickey makes a terrible mistake if he relents to pressure from some circles and sacrifices arts education in an overwrought, if well-intentioned, move to focus on math, language, social studies and science in middle schools.Pitting the core subjects against arts and music is a mistake. Why turn one positive education goal into the enemy of another positive education goal?

We can't keep shutting out the young, oldHurrah for Donald Reuwer ("Glenwood residents decry proposed senior condos," Dec. 10). I know there are always people against any new development, but this time Don is right.As an employer and almost senior citizen, I think there is an invisible sign on every road leading into Howard County saying, "If you are young or too old to buy a big house, just drive through."The middle-aged people here see their kids move out of the county and their parents, with an eye to retirement, can't afford live here or may not be physically able to take care of a big house and yard, but want to keep their independence, be near their kids and grandkids and not live in a congested part of the county.

Pastoral western Howard County, known for small farms that produce corn, soybeans and milk, is growing a more exotic international export: jazz musicians.The Glenelg High School Jazz Ensemble will travel to Europe again this summer to perform at the prestigious Montreux and North Sea jazz festivals, with a performance in between at the Jazz Cellar in Freiburg, Germany.It will be the ensemble's fourth invitation to Montreux, in Switzerland, and its third to the North Sea Jazz Festival in The Hague, Netherlands, in the past 10 years.

WHEN MARYLAND'S music teachers get together, they expect to be entertained by the best. Vocalists and instrumentalists from Wilde Lake High School at River Hill will travel to Ocean City next week to rehearse and perform at the annual state music education convention.Katie Harkness and Dylan Gentile will perform with the Senior All-State Chorus. This is Katie's second year making the highly competitive group and Dylan's third.Three Wilde Lake freshmen will debut with the Junior All-State Chorus.

Whenever she has a free Saturday night, Carol Nethen plunks down on the sofa to watch Fox TV's "America's Most Wanted."But it isn't the gritty crime re-enactments that interest the 43-year-old Annapolis woman. It's the music that underscores the action that she wants to hear. It's her music.Ms. Nethen has been writing the scores for "America's Most Wanted" for six years and watches the show frequently. "But I always hear the mistakes and am immediately imprinted with the thought, 'I'll never do that again,' " she says.

BLUEMONT, Va. - The holidays are here, which means public school teachers across America are presenting "winter programs" with music selected to challenge students and delight parents - but too often sacrificing artistic merit to avoid singing of the Bethlehem Babe. One program I attended featured songs about Santa, chimneys, and reindeer, plus five Hanukkah tunes and one Kwanzaa melody, even though the school had only one (nonpracticing) Jewish family, and not a single African-American.

Corridor transportation strategies talk Thursday The Corridor Transportation Corp. will present a "Moving Mid-Maryland: Baltimore-Washington Corridor Transportation Summit II" from 7:30 a.m. to 3 p.m., Thursday at the BWI Marriott, 1743 W. Nursery Road, Linthicum. The summit will focus on strategies for regional cooperation, identifying and offering creative solutions, the potential of funding options and establishing achievable goals. The cost is $115 for a full day, $65 for the morning session (including breakfast)

The nine youngsters flapped, twirled, and sang songs about bugs and their creepy personalities. In a song about butterflies, one child donned antennae ears to portray a stinky bug, while the other eight children wore floor-length, sheer scarves to portray butterflies. When the music started, they did their best imitations of butterflies fluttering through the air. "I chose the bugs theme because I knew it was something that the kids would really get into," said Joyful Sounds School of Music co-owner Sandy Pietrowicz, who is also piano and voice director.

Police seek missing 83-year-old County police were searching yesterday for a missing 83-year-old man who apparently walked off from an assisted-living home in Arbutus. James Earl Vanhoy, a resident of the home in the 5100 block of Shelbourne Road, has been missing since 11:40 a.m. Tuesday, police said. He suffers from bipolar disorder, dementia and other ailments and is on several medications, police said. Vanhoy is originally from Bel Air, but has no immediate family in the area, authorities said.

When Marin Alsop began her tenure as music director of the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra last year, she put a high priority on developing educational projects that could bring together the institution and the surrounding community, especially those parts not being reached by the orchestra. Yesterday, Alsop announced the launch of OrchKids, an after-school music program spearheaded by the BSO, in conjunction with a partnership of city organizations, and pledged $100,000 of her own money to support it. Inspired by the success of the countrywide El Sistema program in Venezuela, which provides musical training and social outlets for several hundred thousand low-income children, OrchKids will begin as a pilot program with about 25 first-graders at Harriet Tubman Elementary in West Baltimore, starting in September.

The sad irony is that the No Child Left Behind Act is intended to better prepare our children for the real world, yet it's leaving music behind despite its proven benefits."

SMITH ISLAND --Michael Lisicky had the kids of the Ewell School right where he wanted them yesterday - in their classroom soaking up every note, every passage, even a few honks and squawks thrown in for laughs by his Trio La Milpa. Unlike other music education programs that the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra oboist has conducted, this one couldn't have been any cozier. The entire school - 14 students from pre-K through seventh grade - took part. The children listened to the oboe trio while sitting at their desks in their one-room schoolhouse here in the middle of the Chesapeake Bay. None has ever heard a symphony orchestra.

William Ryan gets the chills when he hears River Hill High School's musicians play. "It gives you goose bumps when you hear students at the high school level performing pieces that are such high quality," said Ryan, the school's principal. He attributes much of the music program's success to band director M. Joseph Fischer. "Joe has worked with [students] and supported them to be able to play at that level," Ryan said. "To know that you have a strong teacher that's really supporting and pushing to a strong level makes you feel good about our music program."

Victoria Hazel Perkins, who taught music in Baltimore County public schools for 31 years, died of colon cancer Friday at Gilchrist Center for Hospice Care. The Lutherville resident was 58. Born in Baltimore and raised in the Hamilton section, she was a 1966 graduate of Eastern High School and earned her bachelor's degree in cello and music education from the Peabody Conservatory in 1970. She later earned a master's degree in music education from what is now Towson University. Miss Perkins taught instrumental music and spent most of her career at what is now Catonsville Middle School until retiring in 2000 because of failing health.

When the county school system was hit with a $5 million budget cut in 1999, the school board compiled a list of "nonessential" programs that could be considered for elimination. The elementary school music program was on the list, and although it was not considered to be in serious jeopardy of being cut, concerned parents filled the auditorium where the school board met to discuss the budget. Teachers, parents and residents packed the hearing, recalled Robert Powers, a band instructor at Emmorton Elementary School who attended the meeting.