Skip to main content

Father meets Head of School

For years now I have championed our April recital week as one of the hidden gems of Berwick Academy. Whether in the theater or in the “smoldering ruins” of Chip Harding’s classroom, all of our students who participate in music lessons on campus are asked to put themselves out there and publicly display what they have learned. I have been through it enough times now, over a decade, to know that the quality of these events will always impress me. What never gets old, however, is seeing an unexpected student – someone pegged as an athlete, or someone who just took a trip to the Honor Committee, or even someone who is perceived to be introverted – find themselves out on these stages taking a risk.

I work as hard as I can to keep boundaries in place between my role as a father and my role as a Head of School. My kids have opinions, they have strengths, and they certainly have flaws. But this week I had one of my true dreams come true, and I have to thank Berwick Academy for making it possible. A few years ago, my oldest daughter, Kenna, heard Dad crooning away in his study on a song about walking through the streets of London, acknowledging the fate of human beings who had been ignored or forgotten. Kenna always loved the melody and would hum along – even as early as second grade. While she has been rocking on drum lessons for a few years with Mr. DeCato, this was her first year picking up a guitar with Mr. Harding. It became clear that one of her goals was to play Streets of London with me at her recital.

So it was remarkably sweet and moving just to know she wanted to do this, and I was committed to making sure it would happen in some fashion. But I never imagined she would be singing behind a microphone. Or offering input into the arrangement we should use. Or having the capacity to hold the song together on her own while Dad tried to pluck a twangy solo over her rhythm guitar work. She even learned how to get herself back on track when she got off from the form. So speaking purely as a Dad, I was pretty humbled by what the school had done for her.


I have lots of pictures taken of me in this role, and the people who try to do it know that smiling doesn’t come naturally, and I often seem to have my eyes closed. But the pictures that emerged from this moment captured a shared joy between a father and a daughter that had nothing to do with staging. It spoke to a little bit of amazement that the performance was actually happening but even more amazement about the performances yet to come.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Piercing the Bubble

This week we were so fortunate to have former NH Senator Kelly Ayotte address grades 7 – 11 in our theater about Civil Discourse in a time of Political Polarization. Senator Ayotte spoke to the need to take the high road in tough conversations and put an incredible primacy on building relationships with people who hold different opinions. She was able to speak to some of her own successes in working across the aisle to develop legislation to address the opioid crisis in New Hampshire as one powerful example of how this can be possible. Additionally, Senator Ayotte offered a strong reminder to our students of the need for more women in positions of leadership within our government, citing that she had only been the 53rd woman to serve in the US senate during her tenure. With a down-to-earth style and but an appropriately impassioned call to action, she challenged our students to become the leaders that they could be. Her call to action and example of service were powerful reminder...
Post a Comment
Read more

The wonders of nature at Berwick

I started my day in the Admin meeting on Thursday hearing about the newest iteration of Earth Day this year. Thanks to senior Quinn Santos and his Innovation Pursuit, we learned about the ways in which Earth Day will be a bit more hands on and active than it has in the past. Quinn has been a passionate environmentalist on campus and this year his IP project has focused on building out our Earth Day programming. As Head of School, it is pretty compelling to see one student mobilize an entire PK-12 school into action to clean up beaches and come to know our local wildlife. While we can sometimes worry about the amount of disruption and special schedules that these events create, it’s amazing that we have kids who care as much as Quinn does. His passion is authentic, and it goes well beyond any kind of grade motivation. He is off to Unity College next year to take this passion to the next level. I finished my day by enjoying the miracle that Lower School parents know as the Lower S...
Post a Comment
Read more

Arts Underground

One of Berwick’s great strengths is its arts culture, and I have always felt that there is both a public and private face of this culture. The public face includes our amazing concerts, our ambitious productions, and the various art shows we produce throughout the year. The private face tends to include things like private lessons, coffeehouses, assembly performances, murals painted on walls, and unexpected artistic expressions that emerge on campus throughout the year. One of the great traditions I will miss at Berwick will be the annual recital week in April. So many of our students hone their craft on private music lessons throughout the year in the hopes of having a public performance at this time. Simultaneously, we have a week of performances in the theater and in Chip Harding’s coffeehouse lair – the space he likes to refer to as his “smoldering ruins,” referring to the carnage left there after every Middle School electric guitar class. This year, for my second and final time, I...
Post a Comment
Read more