Joshua Stone

JOSHUA STONE

Kids write a song about ‘home’

By DAVID HUTTER

TORRINGTO — Students at St. Peter/St. Francis School worked with a professional musician this past week to create a song based on their thoughts on what “home” means to them.

About 200 students from pre-kindergarten and eighth grade worked with professional musician Joshua Stone for four days this past week, said Lisa

Juliano-Coudriet, the organizer of the project and the parent of two students at the Catholic school. Each student wrote one sentence about what he or she thinks about the concept of “home,” she said.

"I wanted something unique and something the children could be a part of,” Juliano-Coudriet said. “The finished product is going to be incredible.”

Stone used the students’ response to form the lyrics and the tune of a song. He guided the students in singing verses. He will incorporate these verses into one four-minute song, she said. He will spend the next few days in his studio, he said. The song will incorporate each of the children’s thoughts and voices, he said.

He will return to the St. Francis campus of the Catholic school at 360 Prospect St. on Friday, Jan. 18, when he will lead the students in a performance of the song. This performance is open to the public.

An Emmy winner who has composed and conducted music on five continents, Stone said he is excited about the project.

“What I think is unique is that I work with every kid in the school,” he said. “I’ve never done a project that involved this number of people.”

At the performance, he will first play a recorded version of the song. Then he will play the piano and accompany the students as they sing in with the recorded version of the song.

“It’s been an amazing experience working with all these children,” he said. “It’s their song.”

Juliano-Coudriet said she wants the students to have something concrete of which to be proud. The school’s principal, Jo-Anne Gauger, and all its schoolteachers are supportive of the project, Juliano-Coudriet said.

“It’s cutting-edge what he is doing with the students,” she said, noting that the Catholic institution will use the song as part of its advertising campaign. “He was able to take the kids’ thoughts and incorporate them into a song.”

Juliano-Coudriet said that the project is being paid for jointly by the St. Peter/St. Francis School and by the Connecticut Commission on Culture and Tourism and the National Endowment for the Arts. She declined to disclose how much money is being spent, but describes it is a “reasonable” amount. The music project is being put together in conjunction with Catholic Schools Month, she said. Gov. M. Jodi Rell issued a proclamation in which she declared January as Catholic Schools Month.

Stone has produced music for the White House, CBS News, The Metropolitan Museum of Art and The Smithsonian Institution. He is a registered teaching artist with the Connecticut Commission on Culture and Culture.

David Hutter can be reached by e-mail at torrington@registercitizen.com.

Saturday January 19, 2008

Students perform their song about home

By DAVID HUTTER

TORRINGTON — The sound of children’s cheerful voices filled the gymnasium at St. Francis School on Friday morning as students performed a song they created in collaboration with a professional musician.

The students sang “Home” as Joshua Stone accompanied on the piano while dozens of parents and grandparents in attendance smiled at the performance. Earlier this month Stone worked with each of the approximately 200 students from pre-kindergarten to eighth grade who attend St. Peter/St. Francis School. Each student was asked to write one sentence about what “home” means to him or her. Stone used their answers as a basis for writing the lyrics and melody of the song. He returned to his home studio and compiled the song from a multitude of audio recordings he had recorded with the students.

On Friday, the students smiled and some swayed their arms while singing. One of the verses of the song is: “Stars keep shining bright/ Let your light lead me back home/ Stars keep shining bright/ I’m alright when I’m back home.”

The idea for the project originated with Lisa Juliano-Coudriet, a mother of two students at the Catholic institution who proposed the idea to Stone and to school officials. On Friday, she beamed while talking about the schoolchildren’s performance.

“We don’t think there is anything like it,” Juliano-Coudriet said. “It’s very unique in its concept and in its execution.”

Before the performance, Stone led the students in rehearsing a few stanzas of the song. While playing the piano during the rehearsal, he peered over the instrument to watch and listen to each section of students sing. He encouraged the students to embrace their singing. Satisfied, he stood up from the piano bench clasped his hands together and proclaimed: “beautiful.”

The project was paid for jointly by St. Peter/St. Francis School and the Connecticut Commission on Culture & Tourism and the National Endowment for the Arts. Juliano-Coudriet declined to disclose the monetary cost of the project but described it as a “reasonable” amount.

An Emmy-winner who has composed and conducted music on five continents, Stone said he had never worked on a project of this magnitude. He told the assembled students and teachers he enjoyed taking part in the project.

“What I think is unique is that I work with every kid in the school,” he said, in an interview with The Register Citizen, earlier this month. “I’ve never done a project that involved this number of people.”

Jo-Anne Gauger, principal of St. Peter/St. Francis School, said her students loved the experience of making a song. She was pleased with their performance.

“I think it is an absolutely wonderful experience for the students to have worked with Mr. Stone,” Gauger said. “This week, students couldn’t wait for Mr. Stone to return. They were singing in the hallways.”

The school will use the song as part of its advertising campaign, Gauger said. The school has already added an audio clip to its Web site, www.spsfschool.org, and has printed an excerpt of the song’s lyrics in a pamphlet. The Catholic institution has two campus; prekindergardeners to second-graders go to the St. Peter campus at 28 St. John Place and third-graders to eighth-graders go to the St. Francis campus at 360 Prospect St.

David Hutter can be reached by e-mail at torrington@registercitizen.com.

Students perform piece entitled ‘Home.’

Saturday January 12, 2008