Hinata's musical postcard

 

Dear Jim,

I went to a big music festival in this weekend. First day, I enjoyed my favorite artist live. I like this artist more.

Today I went to the world Natural Heritage in this city. That's place is one of Japan's most beautiful and unspoiled national parks. I enjoyed the view and take many picture.

I will do my homework tomorrow. Because I have a lot of homework but I didn't do my homework in today and yesterday. I want do that tomorrow.

Thank you

Moeka's musical postcard

Dear Jim,

I'm travelling in the United States. I'm in New York now.

I saw the Statue of Liberty yesterday. I was surprised that is was bigger than I imagined.

Today I see a circus. Animals like lions and monkeys were performing. It was very pretty and exciting.

I'm going to listen to jazz. That will be cool!

I will talk a lot when I get back.

Your student, Moeka
 

Musically inspired postcards - Reiko

Dear my brother

All my family is fine and happy. Now we stay in Karuizawa. And we are camping. And my family and our friend's family have rice party there.

We are very happy. Rice ball is good. And other food and wine are good too.

Please come to rice party next time. We would like to join your family.

See you again.

From Reiko

Musically inspired postcards - Yoko

Dear Damian

I have holiday one week from yesterday. This letter is from Hawaii island.

Today I went to beach with boyfriend. Weather was sunny and sea was blue and clear.

We enjoy our vacation. I will buy souviner for you.

See you

From Yoko

Musically inspired postcards - Misuzu

Dear Damian

I am holiday now. I am staying Hawaii. I am lying on the sea side and looking the festival. Everyone's dancing.  girl is running to a boy with flowers.

I am very happy when I watch them.

See you soon

Misuzu

Musically inspired postcards - Misako

Music can be a great teaching tool, and it's something that I don't use enough of with my adult classes. Music can spark imagery, feelings and emotions, which was what I was aiming for with this lesson. The first step was to draw a picture while listening to a song (a upbeat little number by Musical Youth, chosen intentionally to inspire a summery beach scene), jotting down whatever came to mind while the tune played. Every 30 seconds we paused the song and passed our picture (key here being on OUR not MY) onto the person next to us, evolving the picture every so slightly with each iteration. After the song had played it's course, we were left with 4 unique postcards.

The next stage was to imagine yourself as part of the scenery, and to send a postcard home describing what you're doing, how you feel and what is going on around you. To get a feel for each picture, everyone took turns describing the postcard, and how they felt whilst listening to song. This allowed everyone to collect some ideas before putting pen to paper. 

Although all the picture share some a common style and contents, each one has it's own twist and interpretation. It would be a fun experiment with the type of music students listen to and observe the differences!

Dear Damian

I am staying in a southern island now. The weather is fine and people look very happy. Little children

are playing together outside. They don't need any toys.

I am now relaxing and feeling all my stress go away.

See you soon!!

Misako

Send me a musical postcard, Shimei!

Listen to various snippets of music, and draw pictures of what comes into your mind. (Today we listened to bits of Holst, Jeff Beck, Peter Gabriel, Carolina Chocolate Drops, Yoshida Brothers, Yen Town Band, Squeeze, Queens of the Stone Age...).

Now, imagine these images are on a postcard, and that you have been on holiday. Connect the images as you describe your amazing vacation!

Dear  Jim

I am in middle of the ocean between UK and US. I crashed into a giant iceberg and my ship is sinking. I’m by myself because I killed everyone on the ship, and I’m heading to Mongolia so no one could find me.

When I crashed to the iceberg, I tried to use a lifeboat to escape, but unluckily I forgot how to use it. The weather was extremely awesome so I think the weather won’t be bad as I’m thinking. So I ran across to US on my bare feet.

In the US, I had no cash, so I stole a cool golden racing car to get to route 66. When I got there, I raced with a funky Lamborghini and a red Russian Ferrari which were controlled by erasers. The erasers had a computer brain which was under control from the space station. When I was racing, a hundred Pусский spies came and asked me if I had a PC eraser. So I said yes, but the next moment a big Russian man poked me with a drum stick, and somehow I woke up in hospital in Okinawa.

Shimei

Musical postcard - imagined & illustrated by Takuro

Hi Jim,

I'm having a trip to China. I never been to China before so I am really exciting. It took 4 hours in plane to get here which was really uncomfortable. I can't believe that the quality of the seat is low compaired to Japanese one. It's been a bad start, but I experienced and learned many things about China.

First I went to an enormous castle near to the Great Wall of China. It was interesting to see the difference between the Japanese one. The scenery from there was fantastic. What's more, the sunset was so beautiful that I was watching it for a long time, which made me miss the bus, but fortunately I was able to see an endangered bird.

When I got to a lodge, I watched a famous SF movie which was crap.

What I'm going to do tomorrow is visiting the Mexican City, meeting a man who can play music with bins and go to a disco at night, which is the most exciting event for me.

I especially request China for you to visit. It's a good fun.

Takuro