Bard Spring 2014

Spring 2014

Young Talents: Menlo’s freshman and sophomore stars Behind the Scenes of the Dance Concert, Knight School classes and more!

Editor-in-Chief: Maya Singhal Photo Editor: Katelyn Weingart Content Editor: Pooja Kathail Blog Editor-in-Chief: Hunter Brown Chief Reporter: Helena Ong

Spring 2014

The Music Issue

Staff Reporters: Danya Adib Samantha Frenkel-Popell Katherine Lazar Riya Mirchandaney Alice Shaw Scott Stevens Maya Varma

CONTENTS 4- Letter from the editor 6- “If music be the food of love, play on” 7- Writers’ Week 8- Behind the scenes of the Dance Concert 9- Compose Yourself!

10- Parvathi Narayan 14- Sophomore takes the spotlight: Monica Juan 16- Men’s Chorus 17- Jason Moon 18- Mental illness, misconceptions and Menlo

“If music be the food of love, play on”

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By Riya Mirchandaney

usicians at Menlo: students and teachers who are proud of their instruments and vocal ranges, pitch and rhythm ringing in their ears. It’s a selective focus - the music of a small, upper-class, private high school - but there is something so fundamentally human about music. We all listen to it, we all notice it, we all find solace in it. So, what makes music grip us so? And how tight can its fist really be?

There are four main points depicting the power of music. The pleasure, the rhythm, the emotion, and the language.

Music, after all, induces pleasure. Associated with the brain’s reward system, music sets off a particular structure called the striatum to release dopamine in response to food, or sex, or other pleasure-related stimuli. Is the pleasure from music comparable with the pleasure from sex or good food? Perhaps. I can assure you that neurologists are trying to find out.

The common refrain of being “touched” or “moved” by music is actually a lot more literal than you may think. Nietzsche once said, “We listen to music with our muscles.”

And it’s true. The sound literally enters our eardrums and stimulates responses through our brains. We tap our feet and nod our heads almost subconsciously. People with motor disorders such as Parkinson’s can synchronize their motions with music to help them walk better.

We often associate certain songs with emotional moments in our lives. While the specific moments obviously vary, studies show that listeners largely agree on the general emotions conveyed in a piece. Most songs do not explicitly say that they produce sadness, anger, fear, or joy; they just do, and our brains can distinguish these emotions.

Not all music has words, but learning to play music falls on the spectrum of difficulty between learning to speak and learning to write. The part of our brain that is responsible for memorizing words and meanings in language is responsible for memorizing familiar melodies in music. According to Anthony Brandt, the newborn brain has the ability to distinguish the basic units of speech sound, and attributes such as pitch, rhythm, and timbre. According to Brandt, “Music comes first, and language arises from music.”

Both Bach (if the poor lad weren’t dead) and I will attest to the fact that music is an incredibly significant aspect of our lives. If only Bach could hear Parvathi Narayan or Anna Boonyanit play the piano, Monica Juan sing, or Rebecca Gertmenian play the viola: Menlo is a small school, but any school with musicians is infinitely larger than the size of its student body.

Writer’s Week 2014 For one week in March, Menlo invites authors and writers to come present and talk to students.

During Writers’ Week, authors, scriptwriters, and bloggers come to show how writing applies to everyday life. Librarian and Writers’ Week organizer, Cathy Rettberg emphasizes the importance on writing, “It isn’t easy for an adult writing a book any more than it is easy for a tenth grader writing an essay; it’s a writing process, its an editing process, and I think what it does is make writing seem like a real life skill instead of just something you’re just having to do in school.” This year, all presenters were local writers. The week culminated in the LitCafe, sponsored by Menlo LitMag, where in interesting introvert/extrovert twist, students performed and read works by their own peers.

“I hope students and adults take away the fact that writing is enjoyable and hard and fun and challenging and one option in life that you might want to think about pursuing,” Rettberg said, “I think we have any number of good writers here at school that could be just as successful as our authors. This is a chance for students to maybe see themselves in that role and see it as a possibility for the future.”

What happened: Monday: Nat Silverson, a former Menlo Middle School English teacher, spoke about breaking into the career of writing and read an excerpt of the book he is writing.

Tuesday: Michelle Redmond spoke about her most recent novel Golden State and writing about the local area she lives in.

Wednesday: Ellen Sussan, New York Times and San Francisco Chronicle best-selling author of The Paradise Guest House (2003) came to talk pursuing her dream as an author and the challenges she faces.

Thursday: Allison Brennan, Menlo School `87 alumna and author of 20 mystery and romance novels is also a New York Times and USA Today best-seller, spoke about writing from a young age and how she grew as a writer. Brennan spoke about her latest book Cold Snap, book 7 of the Lucy Kincaid series, one of two series she is writing.

Friday: This year’s Lit Café, sponsored by Menlo School’s LitMag, was a full house and had a twist this year with an introvert/extrovert theme. “Introvert” writers who were not comfortable with presenting their work as themselves would have “extrovert” performers perform their pieces for them.

DANCE CONCERT

By Scott Stevens

Every year, the Menlo Dance Concert brings in record audiences, who watch this production of movement, grace, rhythm and flexibility. Friday’s performance this year, sold out in an hour. The Dance Concert is a showcase for the Menlo Middle and Upper School’s work in dance, the theme of which, this year, was “The Architecture of Dance.” As per usual, it was organized flawlessly by Jan and Courtney Chandler and Bibi Khalili.

The Knight Dancers, those students dedicated so fully to dance, opened the concert with a reflection comparing the art of architecture to dance; both having strict structures not to limit creativity, but to allow legs become concrete beams supporting impossible sights. Senior Sabrina Karlin’s choreography was spot on in having the Knight Dancers’ contortionist-level flexibility take the spotlight as the opening.

What followed was a mix of performances by the Midknights, the Middle School, and the advanced and beginning dance classes. True to form, they followed up on the Knight Dancers’ promise of showing us how striking dance can be.

Two annual dances, the Bollywood and senior dances, as expected, prompted audience hoots and cheers, not just for their surprising synchronization (given the presence of students who don’t normally dance), but for a culmination of what Menlo does so well: encouraging students to dip their toes in all disciplines while having fun. Fittingly, the senior dance was “All In This Together” from High School Musical.

Then, special dances like the solos, duets, and the tap dance added welcome variety. Seniors Nicole Crisci, Lilian Siegel and Karlin proved that “Diamonds Are A Girl’s Best Friend” with enrapturing stage presence, and their swinging of pearl necklaces at the end was A+, but their individual demonstrations shone better than their synchronization. Karlin followed up in the first solo, in which she captured a kind of feline beauty to an instrumental “Titanium.” Senior Fifi Mpai’s solo gave Menlo a Botswana-inspired treat, a soaring, joyful dance of triumph for her time here with us. Lastly, if anything can be said of Crisci and junior Brandon Rabaria’s fantastic duet to “All of Me,” it is that they did give all of themselves to one another; they streamlined two dancers into one.

As the parapets to the concert, the Knight Dancers popped in and out with adroit execution and fantastic costumes. Two that combined both those factors best were “Ramalama” and “Hey Brother.” “Ramalama”’s costumes had teal accents that subtly connected them to each other and the backdrop lights, yet their tutus and mime garb clashed, putting out the song’s feeling of something cracked and fallen, now stitched. In their choreography, they pulled off a difficult strategy in dance: to switch from coordination to chaos and back, to seem random when actually being very deliberate. Finally, “Hey Brother,” with its gorgeous gold and white costumes, pulled the architecture theme full circle, literally, when they danced a circle, then a group dance, then a beautiful ending to the Dance Concert.

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The Compose Yourself! Knight School course was founded by Vicky Greenbaum, who wanted to make a course that would be meaningful but not require weeks of prep work. The curriculum is straightforward: students are loaned computers that they use to write short melodies. Once they have created a tune, they can build on it by adding to its length or writing new harmonies. At the end of the week, the final music is saved and often played in front of the class.

Students spend a portion of time listening to famous musicians like Hans Zimmer, Tchaikovsky, Holst, and Mozart, and even visiting the San Francisco Symphony for a day. The exposure in listening to these melodies helps students become familiar with certain keys and patterns, inspiring students to write their own melodies. For example, Zimmer and many other composers write in D minor, “the most epic key,” according to Greenbaum. This kind of knowledge may help students trying to convey a certain emotion in a piece.

The students compose using a computer program called Sibelius, allowing them to easily get music saved and played back to them.

Sibelius allows students to type melodies onto a computer using computer keys or a piano, which is then recorded. Compose Yourself! allows students the opportunity to immerse themselves in the art of music with access to Sibelius, which not typically available to everyone as it can cost $200-600 dollars depending on the version.

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Most people don’t realize how difficult writing music can be. Patience and skill is required to understand how to convey emotion into a melody, and then how to have that melody flow from one part to the next. “Good melodies sound so good that you never forget it, and it makes you feel something,” Greenbaum said, despite admitting that, “most melodies suck at first.” This challenge is the core of the Knight School course. Some students go above and beyond, writing twenty-four bars of solid music in two days, while some students are unable to write eight bars in the five days.

Most students write classical music, but some experiment with rock or other genres, which is typically more difficult within the framework of the class because writing in another genre has a different formula compared to classical music.

Many students find the class to be hugely rewarding, as it allows them to express themselves without fear of failure. Failure in this sense means giving up after the melody sounds bad or just doesn’t live up to the standards set by prominent composers. As Greenbaum said, “It’s ok to fail. And even if you fail, you can still say you learned something.”

composing her world: parvathi narayan

By Maya Varma

When sophomore Parvathi Narayan was six years old, she started fiddling around with the keys on her piano. She has taken piano lessons since she was four, but never really enjoyed lessons as much as goofing around on the keys after her teacher had left. Like any other four year old, she wasn’t very interested in learning correct timing, fingering, and tone. Narayan started composing her own music, creating a melody through listening, rather than reading. She later leaned the importance of musical theory and used her theory knowledge to structure her compositions. Now, she composes complex romantic pieces, which, unlike what it may sound like, aren’t pieces laced with memories of break ups and romantic walks by the beach. “Romantic pieces are usually a melody on the right hand and a flowing base on the other. I like minor keys because they are more dramatic,” Narayan said.

When Narayan wasn’t exploring notes on the piano, she was watching movies with her family. They didn’t have cable, so she grew up watching

only movies and was moved by the music in everything she saw. “Music and movies can do anything to you,” Narayan said. “Music can have you in tears or clutching to your seat, and the effect is only amplified by the film. The movie just isn’t the same without the music. It sort of completes it.”

Although Narayan loves composing classical pieces, she doesn’t think that people normally listen to compositions on their iPod like any other artist. If anything, they listen to composers born 400 years ago. Her dream is to put her skills towards the world of Hollywood and create music for films. “My ultimate goal would be to win an Oscar for best original score,” Narayan said. “I want people to hear my music and associate it with something epic. You hear the Sherlock soundtrack and associate it with Sherlock. You hear the name John Williams and connect it to Star Wars”.

When she isn’t watching movies or composing film scores, Narayan plays varsity and club lacrosse, and her life in a sport has also affected the way she views her music. “I like the team aspect of sports, but composing music is about expressing your own themes and ideas,” Narayan said. “It’s really fun to make something and it’s your own thing, you know?” While Narayan loves learning pieces written by Bach and Mozart, being able to express her own ideas has contributed to her love of music.

Narayan has presented her work at Menlo’s classical recital for the last two years. She also uses online notation software’s to write and share her music through the Internet, but writing is so time consuming that she prefers live recordings. “I definitely wish I could perform them more often,” Narayan said. She still takes piano lessons, and her teacher is very encouraging of her own music. “We rarely work on my pieces for more than five minutes, so I am teaching myself new methods,” Narayan said. She also continues to expand on her compositions by teaching herself how to play guitar, hoping to be able to use it to compose once she’s mastered the instrument.

Beyond film, Narayan gets some extra inspiration from the world around her. “One thing I particularly enjoy doing is picking some sort of animal, event, color, or person to represent,” she said. Last week she started a piece where she attempted to represent a whale through minor keys, conveying darkness, while channeling some inspiration from the Pirates of The Caribbean soundtracks. Always looking to improve, Narayan continues to experiment with new composing methods, and her future in composition gets brighter every day.

Sophomore Takes the Spotlight

By Alice Shaw Sophomore Monica Juan has been singing and performing since she was eight years old, when she was cast as Annie in a local play. “I sang all the time when I was little at home, and I got really excited about an opportunity to audition as Annie for a show. After that, I realized that I loved to not only sing, but also to perform in front of people and express myself through a song,” Juan said. Juan’s talent grew quickly, and by the time she was ten she was on a dance team, performing in the Macy’s Thanksgiving parade in New York. Since then, Juan has been invited to sing at a private party for the Mayor of San Mateo, the Sigona’s Supermarket holiday party, the Redwood City Courthouse, St. Matthew’s Catholic Church Carnival, and the San Mateo county fair. In addition, Juan has sung at several retirement homes, but her biggest event yet has been performing the National Anthem for the San Jose Giants.

On average, Juan sings seven hours a week with Ms. Linford and her voice coach while also singing at the San Francisco Conservatory of Music once a week. This year, Juan has taken her performance to a whole new level. After going through a tough audition, Juan was offered the opportunity to sing at a Warriors game this month. “I’m really nervous but excited about singing at the game, and I think it will be a really fun and cool experience that I can finally check off of my bucket list,” Juan said. In addition to this, Juan expressed her appreciation and reassurance by the Menlo community. She is constantly congratulated by her friends and is thankful for the amount of people attending the game.

For Juan, singing is a source of rejuvenation and entertainment for other people. She feels that music is supposed to be something beautiful and emotional that people can listen to and share. “When I sing, I feel that sense of sharing, and I love that because it really does make me feel like I am making an impact on the audience,” Juan said. When asked about her future, Juan says she has no doubt that singing will be a part of it. “For college, I hope to either go to a music conservatory or major in music. Singing is just a part of who I am, and I never really see myself not singing in the future,” she said.

Men’s Chorus

By Samantha Frenkelpopell

Walk by chorus teacher Karen

Linford’s room during B block, and you’re bound to hear the sound of 11 teenage boys signing songs like “Mr. Baseman” and “My Imagination.” Last year, Menlo continued the tradition of a strong choral program, comprised of Women’s Chorus, Mixed Chorus, and Chamber Singers.

This year, however, the gender imbalance in

new members was enough to prompt Linford to split the Mixed Chorus and begin a men’s chorus, in addition to the women’s chorus. “Men’s Chorus [was something] I was anxious to get roll-

____________ “It gives me an hour to relax and do something I love.” ____________

ing again,” Linford said. “I made quite a few phone calls to encourage some guys to come sing!” The new program has been received quite well by the students. “It gives me an hour to relax and do something I love,” freshman Jacob JulianKwong said. Linford said she loves the class because of their “energy” and “enthusiasm,” and that they are all “strong singers[…] and really fun to work with.”

Budding Talents: Freshman violinist Jason Moon Freshman Jason Moon has wowed Menlo orchestra audiences this year with his prowess as a violinist. What makes him such a virtuoso?

To begin with, he started learning how to play at the wee age of four. From then to now, that’s a lot of practice, an amount that puts my measly piano skills to shame, so I inquired further into how someone so talented goes about practicing. Of course, when he was little, “there were a lot of times when [his] parents were frustrated that [he] wouldn’t practice,” Moon said, but now that he is a little older with more insight, Moon realizes that “how [he’s] going to play eventually” motivates him to practice even with high school’s stress.

When fine-tuning a song, he makes sure to reflect on how to mend his mistakes, which is “the most effective” way to become a better musician, tedious as it may be. We agreed that an eye for self-improvement leads to becoming a better artist, or even a better person.

When I asked him about the sensations in a performance, Moon replied, “It takes over me; I just let it flow. There’s this moment of silence before I play, and then I let it all out like I’ve practiced.”

By Scott Stevens

Naturally, I had to ask what his favorite piece to play is. He said he likes Pablo de Sarasate’s “Introduction and Tarantella,” a very fine piece indeed.

Make sure you catch Jason at the next orchestra performance - Menlo’s musicians like him will fill your ears with a performance only possible through all their hard work.

Photo credit: Menlo Flickr

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By Maya Singhal and Danya Adib “It’s of some interest that the lively arts of the millennial U.S.A. treat anhedonia [the inability to feel pleasure; a form of depression] and internal emptiness as hip and cool. It’s maybe the vestiges of the Romantic glorification of Weltschmerz, which means world-weariness or hip ennui. Maybe it’s the fact that most of the arts here are produced by world-weary and sophisticated older people and then consumed by younger people who not only consume art but study it for clues on how to be cool, hip--and keep in mind that, for kids and younger people, to be hip and cool is the same as to be admired and accepted and included and so Unalone.” -Infinite Jest by David Foster Wallace

The popular American musician or performer has “made it” in the world, and suddenly, it is not merely their music or performance that matters but also what they wear, who they date, how they act and more. Paparazzi capture their every move, filling pages of gossip magazines, and tabloid journalists and bloggers speculate over their private lives and actions. What’s more, the American public consumes it all with a ferocity. They copy what their favorite celebrities wear, they become invested in celebrity relationships, and they look to these celebrities for cues on how to be well-liked and confident. After all, these popular performers are clearly doing something right.

It is difficult, if not impossible, then, for American audiences to distinguish between being “hip and cool” and being “admired and accepted and included and so Unalone,” much less being safe and healthy. As herd animals by nature, humans tend to fear loneliness; thus from a young age, we seek out all possible ways to avoid being left alone. However, society as a whole begins to encounter problems when being self-destructive is equated with being “hip and cool” and therefore “Unalone.”

Although there is a common misconception that being “admired and accepted and included” will alleviate any feelings of depression or negativity, in fact many famous artists (who, by the equation of “coolness” with acceptance with happiness, should be the least alone and most happy people in the world) perpetuate and even glorify selfdestructive behaviors. In turn, this glorification creates a climate that suggests to young people that self-harm is a means through which to be “Unalone.” Artists such as Courtney Love, Sid Vicious, and Marilyn Manson all had histories of committing acts of self-injury onstage during shows, which (especially for Manson fans) prompted a set of fans to cut themselves in support before coming to concerts. Now increasingly with user-created content on sites like Tumblr, young people can find communities and inclusion revolving around selfharm, such as cutting, substance abuse or eating disorders. There is also a well-publicized and heavily media-analyzed celebrity precident for these latter two forms of self-harm. Many other musicians (like Britney Spears, Kurt Cobain, Amy Winehouse, Lou Reed and Michael Jackson) have struggled with drug addictions or (like Paula Abdul, Fiona Apple, Lady Gaga, Alanis Morissette, and Demi Levato) with eating disorders.

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While self-destructive behaviors are a hot topic outside of the Menlo bubble, self-harm is regarded as a largely taboo subject within Menlo. Although there are many meetings within the administration to discuss mental health, these discussions rarely go beyond closed doors. Legal obligations around student mental health create strict guidelines for how Menlo deals with students.

Guidance counselor Tracy Bianchi can attempt to translate the emotional plea of the student into the sensible, straightforward rhetoric of school administrators, and, because she is licensed as more than just a school counselor, students can meet with her on a more regular basis without having to be referred to a personal therapist. While this is certainly an improvement on many public schools, it is still only one resource for students. In addition, there is not much clarity as to what discussion of mental health issues (beyond the discussion with Bianchi) is legally acceptable and what is discouraged due to teachers’ and students’ discomfort with the topic. Certainly, there is no standard education (for instance, a Freshman Rotation class) at Menlo about the facts of mental health, which might help students and teachers to relate to each other on a more informed basis about mental illnesses.

Sex education is instilled at Menlo so that students do not have to get their information about sex from unreliable sources, like the public-controlled Internet or peers. Menlo also strives to educate students on how to reduce their stress, improve their biological ability to perform at high levels (like through getting more sleep), and empathize with others in the larger world community.

However, Menlo’s refusal to discuss mental health openly means that students have to learn about mental disorders solely through the sources that were rejected for sex education as too unreliable. Menlo’s concern is that discussing even the scientific facts of mental health in a group setting would be damaging to some individuals struggling with mental disorders, but this argument fails to see the effects of this silence. Because students don’t have a standard jumping-off point of knowledge about mental health, any further class or group discussions around the issue sees students with hugely disparate amounts of knowledge about the issue, and many students’ lack of knowledge makes them even less sensitive towards others who are struggling with mental health issues, the details of which others do not, even on a factual level, understand.

Due to the widespread and often unhealthy media discussion of mental illness and selfharm, many damaging myths about mental health are propagated, which can prompt people who suffer from conditions like Major Depressive Disorder to feel even more estranged from their communities and self-loathing than their disorder predisposes them to be. One such myth is that mental illness and self-harm are inextricably linked. While many self-injuring behaviors, like eating disorders, are symptoms of mental disorders or are mental disorders of their own right, not every person diagnosed with a mental disorder like Major Depression exhibits unhealthy, self-destructive behaviors.

Possibly the most harmful myth propagated by uneducated discussion of mental illnesses is that depression and its effects are a choice. As David Foster Wallace notes, the “internal emptiness” or even the self-harming behaviors that often (although not always) accompany depression can be imitated in order to be cool. However, Major Depressive Disorder (colloquially, generally shortened to “depression”) itself is generally considered to be a biologicallycontrolled mental disorder. In other words, a person can become depressed through a genetic predisposition, brain damage or, most commonly, a chemical imbalance (often low serotonin levels). Unfortunately, due to the myth that depressives are just whiny, self-obsessed and overly-needy, people who suffer from Major Depressive Disorder are often stigmatized in their communities, thus losing the support that they need to heal.

Because of the prevalence of depression, it would be overwhelmingly naive to believe that not enough Menlo students are affected by depression to make the topic relevant. As a private school, Menlo has the ability to go beyond state and federal standards to help students become more empathetic and responsible members of the international community. Menlo encourages students to do community service to learn about and help others beyond Menlo, but we don’t do any work to help people suffering from mental disorders at Menlo feel more included and supported in the student body. It’s time that people with mental disorders stop feeling like liabilities and disappointments and start feeling more understood and cared about. It’s time that these people can find a community on campus, rather than having to resort to finding a community outside of Menlo whose celebration of mental illness is as unhealthy as Menlo’s controlled silence.