2007 Teacher of the Year:
Neal Kirkwood
National Dance Institute's 2007 Teacher of the Year, Neal Kirkwood, has been making music with NDI since 1990. He is a composer and pianist, serving as a band leader and arranger for the Neal Kirkwood Octet, the Chromatic Persuaders, and the Discovery Orchestra.
This past year, Neal embarked upon a uniquely special collaboration with 4th grade students from PS 199 on Manhattan’s Upper West Side and PS 161 in the Bronx. These NDI dancers enjoyed the opportunity to collaborate with Neal in the creation and performance of an original composition, a song cycle entitled Village Songs.
Village Songs was inspired by NDI’s 2006-2007 curricular theme, An African Village. NDI students received postcards from the children of Potou, Senegal filled with questions about the lives of the children of New York City. They responded in song, writing lyrics describing what they see on their way to school, the games they like to play, and their dreams. Neal composed music to accompany the lyrics, infused with African traditional music and jazz. The song cycle was then performed by the children in each of their school communities, accompanied by an eleven-piece band of professional musicians. A third concert was performed at LaGuardia High School for the Performing Arts.
“The idea behind this project is what the African Village theme, and what NDI, is all about: connecting,” says Kirkwood. “The children in the two New York City schools connected with each other by collaborating on the lyrics and singing together in the chorus, and they are connecting with the children of Potou by sharing their lives in this musical postcard. Maybe this communication can help us find, in the words of student Pedro Rosado from PS161, ‘a more peaceful world where everyone can be nice to each other.’”
Village Songs was commissioned through a grant by The New York State Music Fund, established by the New York State Attorney General at Rockefeller Philanthropy Advisors.
2007 Teacher of the Year: Neal Kirkwood