Paranoid

  I think someone is out to get me.  

Actually,  someone is not only out to get me but out to get all primary school music teachers. You think that's a bit extreme?  Maybe.  But it is undeniable that a hardworking primary school teacher who has decided to make her life easier by singing songs that should just be easy in the run up to Christmas doesn't expect to be accidentally lured  into swearing in front of 30 (or 60 in one instance - 2 classes together) small children.

Schools buy in Christmas Nativities so that they have the script, the backing CD, the music, staging suggestions and everything they need to make it easy.  They expect to be able to put on the CD and for the children to learn how to sing the songs by osmosis.  I'm a bit old fashioned in this respect and like to actually teach the children the notes and words they should be singing.  I always get a bit worried around Christmas time, when the speed at which songs need to be learnt outstrips the time you have to teach them because these are perfect conditions for a mondegreen.  "On the first day of Christmas my tulip gave to me," "Deck the Halls with Buddy Holly," and "Sleep in heavenly peas," for example. 

This year we have bought a Nativity about an Ox and some toys. I'm still not quite sure why the Nativity needs to be re-written every year but that's another blog post.  Some of the toys are soldiers and they sing a song based on the American Military marching tune, "I don't know but I've been told...." 

 When the lyricist has tried to squeeze their words into the song they have found themselves with the word 'country' and three notes and for some strange reason they have split the word into "count- er - ry"  What's wrong with that? Try saying it.  

As I repeated the phrase over and over again in front of the class I was teaching (they just weren't getting the notes right - hence my paranoia) I was struggling to keep a straight face.  The word, split in this way, sounded like a skill the woman from Thailand, who was on the Graham Norton show many years ago, aiming ping pong balls into a bucket would have.

Graham was delighted with her cunt-er-ry skills

I have changed the emphasis now but the children will still be learning the song by osmosis and I expect to hear a few cunteries creeping in.

If this were the only bit of swearing I was about to do then maybe I wouldn't be quite so paranoid but I am also singing Frozen Karaoke, with year 3/4.  We love a bit of Karaoke and it's a music teacher's easy option.  There is a nice little Disney app, which shows the pictures from the film, puts the words over it with a dancing snowflake.  There is an option to record your performance, so all the classes can compare each other's singing.  They love it.  After we had started with the obvious 'Let it Go' I thought I'd practicse another song for next week's lesson.  

Disney Frozen App

These songs aren't easy and whilst I was hoping for an easy ride in the run up to Christmas my ears really can't take the caterwauling that occurs if I just let them sing without telling them how it 'should' sound.  I picked 'Fixer Upper' because I thought it was a great song.  That is, until I realised, that they are out to get me again.  Whose silly idea was it to put a tongue twister in the middle of a song that kids might want to sing? 

Try it.  Three times fast: The only fixer upper fixer that can fix a fixer upper ...

Disney are evil.  I have deleted my recording of the song from the school i-pad and won't be trying to sing it in this week's lesson.   

I'm becoming so paranoid that I've decide to sing all the other Christmas songs we do this year in Latin.  I'm sure it's safer.