A recent joy that I (Steph) have had is working with other volunteers and students in the AIMS program to play music for our Christian gatherings here with Armonía. I am usually on guitar, but sometimes piano. Job plays flute. Grace (another volunteer) plays violin. Sotico is going to start playing the guitar soon. And [...]
Archive for the ‘Music’ Category
26 Jun
Robust Oaxacan Music
On Tuesday we went to the city to greet a group that will be serving with Armonía for a month, and also to provide them with some orientation for their time here.
After doing that, we had the pleasure of attending a concert at UNAM (largest university in Mexico, and one of the largest in the [...]
11 Jun
Easy to Find in Mexico (4): Pirated Entertainment
In Mexico, the industry for pirated music and movies is a well-oiled machine. In particular areas of Mexico City, there are huge warehouses devoted to making copies and distributing them to stands and shops around the city. These pirated copies are not sold in secret like you might think, but completely in the open and [...]
4 Jun
Zacchaeus was a wee little man
This week in music class, I taught the kids the Spanish version of “Zacchaeus was a wee little man.” I also used the opportunity to talk a little bit about the story of Zacchaeus. How he was small and not a good guy, but he wanted to see Jesus. How Jesus chose to go to [...]
30 Apr
Swine Flu Music
The swine flu has been made into a song. That’s right, Stephan Zielinski, a computer programmer and writer, has programmed his computer to assign various instruments to the different properties of the protein in the swine flu. This CNN article explains more:
“Zielinski took the various categories of amino acids, the building blocks of the protein, [...]
27 Apr
Do you Like “Hass Music?”
We were sitting at the dinner table the other night when one of the students asked me if I liked “Hass Music.” I sat there with a questioning look on my face, when suddenly it dawned on me. He meant Jazz music. (In Spanish the “J” is pronounced like the English “H” and the “Z” [...]
11 Mar
Teaching Music
For the last few months, I have been teaching music at the community center to kids of all ages (pre-K through 9th grade equivalent). To say the least, this has been an interesting and challenging learning experience.
Being musically-inclined, one of the first things I noticed when we started living and working with Armonía was how [...]
28 Jan
Mission as Inculturation
“The Christian faith never exists except as “translated” into a culture.” Thus Bosch begins his discussion on the different ways in which this was accomplished throughout the history of Christian mission. At its worst, Christian mission caused the disintegration of cultures into which it entered, but for most of church history a certain level of [...]
11 Dec
Sergio’s Clarinet Recital: A Story of Transformation
When Armonía first met Sergio at age 14, he was a bitter young man, angry at God and the world, but with an amazing clarinet talent. Armonía offered him a place in their community and an opportunity for education, under the condition that Sergio would leave his world of playing in bars and drinking and [...]
23 Oct
Marigolds and Music
A few days ago we were walking past the Zócalo and an orchestra was playing under the shade of the big trees. We noticed that there was a table available in a a cafe overlooking the orchestra, so we grabbed a seat and sipped on some cafe de olla with box seats to the orchestra. [...]
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