ALLen Reads Tunes Up for 2009-10
Thank you, Friends, for helping to make the first two years of ALLen Reads so successful. It’s your hard work and willing participation that bring all the energy and excitement to this program!
And now we are here to introduce the reading choices for the third year of ALLen Reads. The main book for 2009-10 is The Cellist of Sarajevo, by Steven Galloway, a fictional story inspired by a real event. It shows how one person can make a difference, how influential music can be, and how people can retain their humanity, even through the harshest of times.
The “companion book” for our 4th – 8th grade readers is called The Mozart Question, by Michael Morpurgo, illustrations by Michael Foreman. The link to the main book is music and its influence in our lives. This story takes place in peacetime, but the waves caused by a previous war influence all the characters. Other good talking points include the power of family secrets and “finding your bliss,” as Joseph Campbell would say.
For our youngest readers, the “companion book” is Mole Music, written and illustrated by David McPhail. Mole hears a musician and decides to learn to create his own music. The related themes follow through here as well in this “quiet story of a life well lived.” The illustrations wonderfully depict what is happening below ground in Mole’s world and above ground, too. An edition with CD is especially delightful, since music is a key element of the tale.
The ALLen Reads committee is working on planning all the programs and related activities now. Each year is a new and exciting challenge, as the types of events planned change, just as the books do.
We have already been in contact with author Steven Galloway. He was excited that we have chosen his novel for our “one book” program, and he has agreed to speak at the library on March 6, 2010, followed by a book-signing. BORDERS will be on hand on March 6 with books for purchase, and they have already set up a display at the store with all the ALLen Reads selections for this year, for those of you who can’t wait to start reading. The library’s copies of the books should be in by the end of September or early October.
The kick-off event for ALLen Reads 2009-10 will be the Allen Philharmonic Symphony Orchestra concert on Saturday, October 3, at Suncreek Methodist Church. The orchestra will perform Albinoni’s Adagio in G Minor, the piece that the cellist of the novel plays. The cellist’s reason for choosing this piece is that the Adagio had been recreated from a fragment after the only existing score was destroyed when the Dresden Music Library was firebombed in 1945. The fact that this piece of music “rose from the ashes,” so to speak, seems symbolic in this situation and is an inspiration to the cellist.
That will be only the first musical performance linked to ALLen Reads. The cellist in the novel plays the Adagio each day for 22 days to honor 22 innocent victims of a bombing. As part of this year’s “Celebrity Musicians” program, we plan to have 22 musical performances of different kinds across Allen between October 3 and March 6, when the author will be here. Watch for that schedule and other programs to be announced.
For questions about programs, call Tom Keener, 214-509-4911. To join the ALLen Reads Committee, contact Jane Bennett, 972-390-1238 or jane@jrbennett.net
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