The Risk Committee

 

That’s when I knew my school was taking the wrong turn on the glorious path we had been walking. When I first heard about it, I thought “Great!! We’re going to discuss what new risks we can take!!” But silly me. First off, nothing as imaginative as that ever happens by committee. Secondly, the culture of litigation was growing all around us, threatening to eventually crash through the gates of our precious piece of heaven. And here they were: “Camping? Too dangerous! Shoes off in music class? What if there’s an earthquake? Art work on the wall?  A kid in Ohio set fire to some, so we better ban it.”

 

So we officially became card-carrying members of the Culture of Fear. But of course, we were wildly inconsistent. If you want to imagine worst-case scenarios, there are plenty around you in schools. “Pencils? Kids could stab each other in the eye! Get rid of them! Scissors? Forget it! Paper? Don’t you know about paper cuts? Computers? Someone could drop one and noxious chemicals would be released! Kids are coming in cars? Do you know the statistics on auto accidents? They’re walking to school? Have you checked the crime reports in your neighborhood?” Once you start down that path, where do you draw the line? Life is dangerous and everything you do is a risk.

 

This on my mind because today’s Men’s Group topic is risk, as good a word as any to describe my life. From a youth of hitchhiking, backpacking, traveling around the world without advance hotel reservations or itineraries, to teaching children (always a risk!), leading Orff workshops and courses, performing jazz and going to jam sessions, public speaking, starting my own publishing company and writing books, saying “yes” without hesitation to just about every invitation— risk is my wheelhouse. 

Within certain boundaries. I’m not into rock climbing or bungee jumping or going to war-torn countries (though I did go to Portland recently!). All my risks have to do with seeking out and accepting challenges in the fields of music, teaching, writing. Things like teaching 80 preschoolers in Taiwan in front of my 100 adult students and the kids’ parents for one hour with a translator. Going wherever they asked me to in South Africa to teach 100 elementary kids in a skinny rectangular room, then body percussion to 100 high school students who did gumboot dancing, then singing to a remarkable South African choir, all of them in the poor black township of Soweto. That same trip including teaching a middle school all-girls steel drum group, a University jazz band, a Jewish preschool, a group of music teachers who were Zulu, Xhosa, British and Afrikaans. Agreeing to work with deaf kids in Japan, special ed kids in Hong Kong, women prisoners in San Francisco. Saying yes to things I had never done before, but was willing to try and see what happens. That’s the kind of risk I thrive on.

 

Then there was going to hear Chick Corea play solo piano at SF Jazz Center. When he asked if anyone wanted to come up and play a freely-improvised duet with him, without a moment’s thought, I leaped up from my seat. I would love to report that we played marvelously together and he invited me on his next tour. (Ha! In my dreams!) But the problem was that I was in the upper balcony two floors up and someone seated a few rows from the stage got there before me. But my spirit was willing, without consulting my risk-committee sensible self. 

Every place I go, I seek out jazz jam sessions and the last one in London was particularly high level. But still I came up when they called my name and when I felt lost in the swirling complexities of the drum solo, I simply went quiet while he played and watched the other musicians as if my life depended on it as to when to re-enter the piece. Made it back in by the skin of my teeth. That was indeed a high-wire risk.

 

My favorite story is renting a hall to perform with a drummer and bass player and at the last minute, the bass player had to drop out. He suggested someone else, who showed up 5 minutes before the concert, I talked him through the set list and off we went. He turned out to be an experienced, virtuosic, high level jazz musician who had no trouble following. At the end, I thanked him and asked if he felt it the concert was okay, fishing for a compliment like, “You sounded great, man! Nice work!” Instead he quipped, “Well, nobody got hurt.”

 

So those are the boundaries of my risky adventures. I can embarrass myself or fail to hit the mark, but no one will die or get seriously injured. It still takes some courage, but a different kind than going to the Ukraine to give an Orff workshop. 

 

But still, I’m proud I went to Portland. :-)