Jeffery Watson Instructing Students at Unalaska Elementary School /Credit: Stephanie Joyce

Getting a group of elementary school students to sit through a lesson on classical music is no simple task, but on Friday, visiting pianist Jeffery Watson managed to do just that. Watson is a professor of music at George Washington University, and is in town to perform at the Aleutian Arts Council’s “Just Desserts” event.

KUCB’s Stephanie Joyce sat in on one of the lessons, and talked to Watson about teaching, and playing, music. 

[music, applause]

“Watson: Thank you, and good morning, Unalaska!
Students: Good morning!
Watson: My name is Mr. Jeffery, and I play the …
Students: PIANO!
Watson: That’s right, I play the banana!
Students: No!
Watson: What, you don’t call it the banana?
Students: No!

“Well it’s hard because you’re only with them for half an hour, maybe forty minutes, and you want to engage them, you want to give them a piece of something to take home that maybe they’ll think about.”

“Who likes to read? Raise your hand. Yeah, me too! Every piece to me is like telling a story. There are characters in it, just like when you’re reading a book. Like princesses. Or like in that one, I think there were actually knights riding their horses, very fast because they were going to a big party in the castle, and so they were happy and they were riding. You can make up any story you want. I don’t need to tell you. You can just feel it. That’s the wonderful thing about music!”

“You know, really, what I hoped to do today, and what I try to do with my own students, is break down that sense that classical music is something other. That there’s this wall of unknowable music, that just because it’s classical that you have to approach it some different way.”

“Here’s another piece by the same composer, and I want you to see what this one makes you feel like and I’m going to ask you afterwards.”

[Music]

“I played some pieces and then asked them what the music made them think of, and one of these children was amazing. She raised her hand and she goes, ‘I felt like I was in a tea party in someone’s house in 1916.’ And then I asked her, I said, ‘well that’s wonderful,’ because I could actually see that with what I had played, and I said, “Well, I have to ask, ‘Why 1916?’ And she said without batting an eyelash, ‘Because in 1916 there wasn’t music for them to listen to. They would have listened to music on the piano like this.’ And she was absolutely right.”

“Watson: In 1916 were there iPods?
Students: NO!
Watson: Were there iPads?
Students: NO!
Watson: Was there iAnything?
Students: NO!
Watson: If you wanted to listen to music in 1916, you had to have somebody like me in your living room, playing for you."

“I didn’t play a piano sonata until I went away to college, and now I have my doctorate in piano, and I’m getting to go places like here, and perform, to me that means that if you have the desire, and yes, the opportunity, you can do this, and it’s a wonderful life to pursue in the arts, and to be called to that is a wonderful gift.”

[Music fades out]

You can see Watson play at the Aleutian Arts Council “Just Desserts” event on Saturday, May 4 at 7pm at the Methodist Church.