The Musical Playground as a Vehicle for Community-Building

by

Riccardo Marsella

A thesis submitted in conformity with the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in Music Education Graduate Department of Music University of Toronto

© Copyright 2021 by Riccardo Marsella

ii

The Musical Playground as a Vehicle for Community-Building Doctor of Philosophy in Music Education, 2021

Riccardo Marsella

Faculty of Music, University of Toronto

Abstract

This study hovers around one central problem: the struggle between structured and unstructured learning models in education, the creative arts and community building. In this research study, I sought to outline how an alternative music education site, such as a musical playground can positively impact creative expression, music education, and community. An instrumental case study was conducted on the Music Box Village (MBV) in New Orleans, Louisiana as run by the collective and not-for-profit organization, The New Orleans Airlift. Through interviewing over

20 related stakeholders, observing grade four students playing for three consecutive days in the space, and analysis of secondary data, I learned that a musical playground itself can act as a co- composer (Morgan, 1980), a third teacher (Gandini, 1998), and a conduit for social change. The

MBV is a stage for creative expression, supporting exploration, improvisation and composition through its aesthetics and design. The post-modern space celebrates rebellion in music, while honouring New Orleans tradition at the same time. As a music education environment, the MBV celebrates free play, physical and musical risk, and unstructured learning models. MBV embraces the tenets of community music (Higgins, 2012) in that it is a space outside of traditional music education which coalesces the New Orleans Bywater neighbourhood in the

Upper Ninth Ward. A meta-theme of radical collaboration emerged, which was prevalent in many of the working relationships fostered by the New Orleans Airlift organization, who founded and run the MBV. iii

An exemplar for this model is explored, as well as educational curricular development ideas.

Keywords: architecture, community, community music, design, experiential learning, experimental music, free play, mechanical music, music, music education.

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Acknowledgments

I would like to offer my deepest thanks to Dr. Lee Bartel, my supervisor, who convinced me to take on this challenge six years ago. Dr. Bartel has been a major influence on my career in music education from the early days of my undergraduate work, through; without his ongoing guidance, and belief in my work, my path would be drab and boring. Lee, thanks for your patience, leadership, and continued understanding. Dr. Linda Cameron, special thanks for being that off-camera voice of support through many a Skype call, offering your extended love and guidance. Your graduate course on play helped validate my thinking around the importance of playgrounds in the development of children.

Secondly, I’d like to thank my advisory committee, Dr. Benjamin Bolden and Dr. Lori

Dolloff, who have been such a great support and helped me navigate these uncharted waters with a calm and steady hand that helped keep me on track. Your belief in my work over the last two decades is so genuinely appreciated.

To my new family at the Music Box Village, each of you made me feel so welcome, from the first email I sent Delaney Martin, right through to the end of this process. Thank you for your incredible spirit, as a collective, you embody the surrealism, the warmth and uniqueness of

New Orleans. For experts in outsider music, you sure embody the welcoming spirit of Southern comfort.

To the Board of Directors at the Regent Park School of Music in Toronto, who saw this work as a benefit to the greater community: thanks for your growing support with every year of collaboration. To all of my fellow colleagues and especially the students at Regent Park School of Music: thank you for the inspiration you provide in every note, every smile. v

To R. Murray Schafer, a role model for clearing the path for future generations of weird, and who has always supported me without question. To Henk De Graauw for accepting my random friendship, introducing me to the eternal beauty in mechanical music and the art of tinkering.

To my mother and father, for always providing the means, guidance and support, no matter how strange my ideas sound. Thank you to my entire family for always accepting me for who I am, and making the weird stuff just seem normal.

Finally, to Lyne, the love of my life and keeper of all the right answers: thank you for the decades of adventure, I’m so honoured and lucky to spend every day I am gifted with your presence – je t’aime. vi

Dedication

Dedicated to the noise makers, the misfits, the tinkerers, the weirdos, those who never fit in on the traditional playground…build your own. vii

Table of Contents

Abstract ...... ii

Acknowledgments...... iv

Dedication ...... vi

List of Images and Videos ...... xvi

List of Tables ...... xviii

Chapter 1: Introduction ...... 1

The Purpose of the Study ...... 5

Research Questions ...... 5

Principal Question ...... 5

Sub-Questions ...... 5

Situating Myself with a Musical Playground ...... 6

Situating the Case Study: A New Orleans Story ...... 8

Overview of Thesis Structure ...... 11

Chapter 2: Review of the Literature ...... 12

Section One: Music ...... 12

Noise and musical rebellion through the 20th century ...... 13

Music and social change...... 16

Section Two: Free Play and Music Education ...... 20

Free play ...... 24 viii

The importance of risk in play...... 28

Section Three: Playgrounds and Playground Learning ...... 29

Music and architecture ...... 33

Section Four: Community ...... 36

Chapter 3: Methodology ...... 40

Overview ...... 40

Case Study Methodology ...... 41

Instrumental Case Study ...... 42

Criticisms ...... 43

Narrowing My Research Questions ...... 43

My Research Questions ...... 45

Principal Question ...... 45

Sub-Questions ...... 45

Rationale ...... 45

Dependability and Credibility ...... 48

Ethical Considerations ...... 49

The Researcher ...... 50

Bonding Over Experimentalism ...... 52

Study Design ...... 54

Selection of Site ...... 55 ix

Criteria for Selection ...... 56

Description of The Space: The Music Box Village, New Orleans ...... 56

Data Sources ...... 57

Historical documentation...... 58

Audio and video footage...... 59

Interviews...... 59

Observation ...... 61

Analysis ...... 62

Limitations ...... 64

Delimitations ...... 65

Chapter Summary ...... 65

Chapter 4: The Music Box Village and its Development ...... 66

Historical Background 2008 - 2019 ...... 66

2008 – The New Orleans Airlift and initial efforts...... 66

2010 – The house on Piety Street ...... 68

2011 – A shantytown sound laboratory ...... 69

2013 – Prototypes and outposts ...... 72

2015 – City park roving village ...... 72

2016 – A permanent home for musical architecture ...... 73

The Music Box Village as a Form of Creative Expression ...... 74 x

Radical Collaboration – Leading to Community Development ...... 74

The Villagers – Connecting the Dots ...... 75

Founding members...... 75

Jay Pennington, Co-Founder New Orleans Airlift ...... 75

Delaney Martin, Co-Founder New Orleans Airlift ...... 75

Taylor Lee Shepherd, Technical Director, New Orleans Airlift...... 77

New Orleans Airlift – members of the collective...... 78

Leah Hennessy, Artistic Director, New Orleans Airlift ...... 78

Alita Edgar, Director of Strategy and Special Projects, New Orleans Airlift ...... 79

Christian Repaal, Shop Manager/Lead Fabricator ...... 80

Eliza MacDermott, Director of Public Programs and Community Engagement, New

Orleans Airlift ...... 80

Key contributing stakeholders...... 80

Elliot Perkins, Executive Director, New Orleans Historic District Landmarks

Commission ...... 80

Rick Snow, Professor of Practice, Music Science and Technology, Tulane University 81

Bryan Bailey, Board Member, New Orleans Airlift ...... 81

Contributing artists...... 82

Quintron, musical artist and contributor ...... 82

Andrew Schrock, contributing artist ...... 82 xi

Tif Lamson, contributing artist ...... 83

General stakeholders...... 83

Teachers “Ms. French” & “Mr. English”, a participating elementary school in New

Orleans, Louisiana ...... 83

Daniel Sharp, Chair of Music, Tulane University ...... 84

Marilyn Payne, regular visitor during Open Hours ...... 84

Houses in the Village ...... 85

Bowers Nest ...... 86

The Synphonium ...... 87

The Delphine ...... 88

The Shake House ...... 88

Chateau Poulet ...... 89

Western Electric 2 ...... 90

Drum Kitchen ...... 91

Tintinnabulation Station ...... 92

Inter-relational Messages and Patterns ...... 93

Pitchbo House ...... 94

Chief’s House ...... 95

Vox Murum ...... 95

Porch Life ...... 96 xii

Elevator Pitch ...... 97

Chapter Summary ...... 98

Chapter 5: The Music Box Village and Creative Expression ...... 99

Creative Expression in the Music Box Village ...... 99

Exploration ...... 100

Improvisation ...... 101

Composition ...... 102

Creative Performance: The Music Box Village as Presenter ...... 103

Development of Themes from Data Analysis ...... 106

Multi-purpose: the re-imagining of old objects ...... 108

The benefits of good design ...... 109

The audio-visual aesthetics of the Music Box Village ...... 109

Visual artists and musical innovation ...... 110

The Battle in the Village: Experimentalism versus Traditionalism ...... 112

Rebellion in music ...... 114

Celebration and Commemoration ...... 115

A safe space for protest ...... 116

Honouring New Orleans ...... 117

The Organization ...... 119

Chapter Summary ...... 122 xiii

Chapter 6: The MBV as an Educational Space ...... 124

Development of Themes from Data Analysis ...... 124

An Informed Approach to Music Education ...... 127

Messing around with sound: sound art in education ...... 127

Multiple intelligences reflected ...... 129

Fomenting invention ...... 130

Expertise of the team: a collective vision for A new sound ...... 132

Education comes naturally ...... 135

Order in the Village: Structured versus Unstructured ...... 135

An alternative learning space...... 136

Observation of unstructured play ...... 136

Free Play ...... 144

All-ages appeal (multi-generational) ...... 144

Physically and musically risky ...... 148

Space: the third teacher ...... 149

Impact ...... 151

A musical equalizer: from special needs to performance anxiety ...... 151

Student Learning: Before Their Visits ...... 153

Perceptions of MBV ...... 154

Prior musical experience ...... 154 xiv

What the students thought about this musical space ...... 154

Musical tastes of the participating students ...... 155

What the students like (or dislike) about their school music classes ...... 155

What the students liked about the structured play experiences ...... 155

What the students liked about the free play experiences ...... 155

Student Learning: After Their Visits ...... 156

Curriculum Development ...... 158

Teaching creative sustainability ...... 162

Chapter Summary ...... 162

Chapter 7: The Music Box Village as a Vehicle for Community Development ...... 164

Development of Themes from Data Analysis ...... 165

Community Music ...... 167

Accessible arts ...... 167

Community development ...... 170

Assets ...... 171

As connector: creative cross-pollination ...... 173

Community-minded ...... 176

Post-Katrina social effects ...... 177

Intergenerational and intercultural ...... 180

Commemoration ...... 182 xv

Disruptor ...... 182

An Exemplar for Other Cities to Adopt ...... 184

Porch Life – A “Possibility Zone” ...... 187

Chapter Summary ...... 190

Chapter 8: Their Brand of Radical Collaboration ...... 191

Introduction ...... 191

Background on Radical and Collaboration ...... 191

The Collaborative Model of MBV ...... 195

Unobvious artistic connections ...... 196

Trust and removal of ego ...... 198

Risk-taking ...... 198

An anything-goes approach ...... 199

Vignettes and Reflections ...... 201

Vignette One: Elevator Pitch ...... 201

Vignette Two: Teddy’s Twilight Serenade ...... 204

Reflection One: Space Rites ...... 208

Reflection Two: New Water Music ...... 209

Chapter Summary ...... 209

Chapter 9: Conclusion...... 212

The Sub-Questions ...... 214 xvi

Q1. How does The Music Box Village function as a safe space for creative expression? .

...... 214

Q2. How does The Music Box Village function as an educational space? ...... 215

Q3. How does the Music Box Village function as a vehicle for community development?

...... 215

Meta-Theme: Radical Collaboration ...... 217

Implications for Future Research and Curriculum Development ...... 218

One Final (Ugly) Note ...... 220

References ...... 222

Appendix A: The Interview Participants ...... 222

Appendix B: Stakeholder Consent Form ...... 262

Appendix C: Organizational Consent Form ...... 264

Appendix D: Participating School Consent Form ...... 266

Appendix E: Student/Parent Consent Form ...... 269

Appendix F: Interview Questions ...... 272

Appendix G: A Field Guide to Musical Architecture ...... 276

Appendix H: Survey Results ...... 278

List of Images and Videos

Figure 1. Sketch of The Musical Playground ...... 7

Figure 2. Bower's Nest...... 86 xvii

Figure 3. The Synphonium...... 87

Figure 4. The Delphine...... 88

Figure 5. The Shake House...... 88

Figure 6. Chateau Poulet...... 89

Figure 7. Western Electric 2...... 90

Figure 8. Unstructured Play Excerpt...... 91

Figure 9. Drum Kitchen...... 91

Figure 10. Tintinnabulation Station...... 92

Figure 11. Inter-relational Messages and Patterns...... 93

Figure 12. Pitchbo House...... 94

Figure 13. Shepherd Performing on Pitchbo House...... 94

Figure 14. Chief's House...... 95

Figure 15. Vox Murum...... 95

Figure 16. Porch Life...... 96

Figure 17. Elevator Pitch...... 97

Figure 18. Elevator Pitch...... 97

Figure 19. Programming Overview...... 106

Figure 20. Video Clip of Unstructured Play...... 137

Figure 21. Playing in Solitude...... 138

Figure 22. Structured and Unstructured Elements Combined...... 142

Figure 23. Adding Structured Elements to the Play...... 143

Figure 24. Structured and Unstructured Elements Combined...... 144

Figure 25. The Social Aspects of Play...... 156 xviii

Figure 26. Porch Life...... 188

Figure 27. Elevator Pitch...... 202

List of Tables

Table 1. Methodological Overview...... 54

Table 2. Sub-Themes Extracted from Interviews Related to Creative Expression...... 106

Table 3. Sub-Themes Extracted from Interviews Related to Music Education...... 125

Table 4. Sub-Themes Identified from Audio-Visual Recording of Play Sessions...... 139

Table 5. Sub-Themes Extracted from Interviews Related to Community Development...... 165 1

Chapter 1: Introduction

This study focuses on one central problem, the struggle between structured and unstructured learning models in education, the creative arts, and community building. The current societal climate skews education, arts, and community with its dominant demand for structure and containment. This is evident today both in the playground (Soloman, 2005) and in the music classroom (Stubley, 1995). Although there are multiple studies related to the benefits of children’s museums (Chwyl, 2018; Weihsin Din, 1999) and free play experiences (Smithrim,

1997), there has not been extensive research related to alternative sound art spaces, such as musical playgrounds.

This study explores how an alternative music education site, such as a musical playground, can positively affect creative expression, music education, and community. The concept of free play in a musical playground is in the foreground, with an unstructured approach that can help students learn the importance of exploration, improvisation, and composition.

Pedagogues such as Piaget, Vygotsky, and Gardner provide valuable insights into how learning occurs through physical, emotional, and cognitive experiences and how spaces like a musical playground may support knowledge development.

How does a particular space affect the way we teach, learn, and make music? The musical playground is a unique space, linked to architecture and landscape architecture and equally to urban planning and music education. These multiple dimensions affect how we perceive public space and community interactions within those spaces. According to Grose

(2014):

many students are still being taught within a conventional school model where the classroom is the primary place of learning, the school day is the prime educational time, most tasks are paper and pen or pencil driven, the teacher is the primary source of 2

information, the curriculum is constructed of distinct subject areas, physical spaces represent these traditional disciplines, and there is an expectation students proceed in linear age-appropriate placements for some 15 years (p. 5).

This applies strongly to music. Standardized, structured methods of teaching music persist although these methods have been questioned over the years (Bartel, 2004). What are some alternative ways to learn music? The learning environment as "third teacher" (Gandini, 1998, p.

168) derived from the Reggio Emilia approach in education, considers the three teachers of children to be adults, other children, and their physical environment. A musical playground can play this role.

But, why a musical playground? A musical playground naturally presents the best elements of play, movement, and musical collaboration, in a recess-like environment, as free as it can be for a young person. A musical playground would attract multiple visits, and a sense of familiarity – like with a traditional playground, a home base. This recess renaissance (Keeler,

2015) makes a case to extend and enhance recess by adding materials to the outside space to inspire children's self-directed play.

When an educator crafts, presents, and scaffolds learning to create a well-rounded child experience (Gardner, 2011), a musical playground fosters multiple intelligences, including musical-rhythmic, visual-spatial, verbal-linguistic, logical-mathematical, bodily-kinesthetic, interpersonal, intrapersonal, and naturalistic. But for this to be possible, careful design is crucial.

A musical playground can be equally important to civil servants and politicians as to music educators, students, and community artists. The Scottish government (Wood, 2017) has developed a “national-level architecture and design policy that should guide developers and planners in their decision making” (p. 588). The resurgence of child-led public play spaces is helping cities make wiser long-term decisions around playgrounds. An important consideration is 3 the importance of playground safety, but for musical playgrounds we might embrace the simple tenet, as outlined by Schafer (2017), that “art should be dangerous.” Almon (2013) supports this notion, that a certain level of risk in play is actually healthy.

In observing the overall design of modern-day municipal playgrounds, I noticed that they tend to add a musical element, such as sound devices and other elements, in a seemingly cheap, limited way, that does disservice to the desired outcome of opening a child’s musical imagination. Richard Dattner (1969) asserts that sterile playgrounds invoke sterile play, which does not lead to long-lasting, multiple-visit experiences.

Play, set either in a traditional music classroom, or a turnkey municipal playground, conforms to social norms and in my opinion, boredom ensues. Children with energy that does not conform to each learning or playing environment, often fall between the cracks (Hedges, et al., 2014). Those who are actually doing the playing should come first in the design of play potential, no matter what their age. Play spaces must capture the imagination of first-time visitors and long-time users alike. And importantly, a musical playground needs to help the educator question how and why we make music.

In pursuing this research, I hoped to explore a different path for music educators. Why does a musical curriculum need to be so standardized? Who really needs another Winter

Recital? Let us dream of new musical instruments (Machover, 2004), projects, collaborations, deliverables, outcomes, even spaces that have not yet been invented. As more formal publicly- funded music programs are being cut from elementary and high schools (Womack, 2017), there is a growing need for alternative music education models to fill this gap.

Where can a musical playground function? A musical playground can function in any city, and will take on a distinct reflection of that city’s sonic and cultural traits. Community 4 health and playground design all come in to play when discussing a musical playground, as it has the potential to help a neighbourhood heal. Consequently, this research is relevant to the field of community development, architecture, and urban planning.

In this research study, I examined a specific musical playground, The Music Box Village in New Orleans. It serves as an exemplar in how to unlock the imagination of its community. I saw the Music Box Village as a space which normalizes the avant-garde and helps it become more palatable to the general public. And, as a space it continues to develop and has its conceptual roots in earlier ideas.

As an alternative public space, the Music Box Village traces back to the adventure playgrounds or “junk playgrounds” of Denmark in 1943. Sørensen (1931) envisioned spaces that repurposed junk into new concepts to stimulate community play. The Music Box Village takes old Creole cottages and transforms them into new musical houses that spark imaginative collaboration.

The space branches outward, on an international level, as equally as it serves its own community in the Bywater upper ninth ward of New Orleans. Music Box Village collaborates with such cities as their sister city in Orleans, France (2019), Kiev, Shreveport, North Adams,

Massachusetts and other outpost installation sites. The sharing of this model with other municipalities shows a robust concept, well-rooted in sound art, and experimentalism.

A musical playground acts as a new venue for presenting music, therefore it affects the field of music itself. With popular artists such as Solange Knowles, Fiona Apple and Wilco involved in the Music Box Village project, this concept of questioning the traditional music venue, and the traditional structures in music theory all apply. The Music Box Village, wired as it is for audio production, becomes a new forum for collaborative music-making and recording 5 music, as demonstrated by the group The Animal Collective (2017), who recently recorded in the space.

The Purpose of the Study

This is a case study of the Music Box Village (MBV) in New Orleans and fundamentally seeks to understand how this alternative musical play space functions within its community. The purpose was to learn about the function of the MBV by studying its development, talking to its founders and practicing artists, observing children playing freely in a musical playground, engaging with sound art, and discussing with their teachers what learnings they observed.

Focusing on the musical playground as a vehicle for creative expression, educational reform, and community development, this study points to a new curriculum for making music in unique and diverse environments.

Research Questions

I began this research study with the primary question: how does The Music Box Village musical playground function within its community? Within this framework, I sought to learn how it functions from three different perspectives, as a space for creative expression, as an educational space, and as a vehicle for community development. Specifically, then:

Principal Question

How does The Music Box Village musical playground function within its community?

Sub-Questions

1. How does the Music Box Village function as a space for creative expression?

2. How does the Music Box Village function as an educational space?

3. How does the Music Box Village function as a vehicle for community-development? 6

The three sub-questions focus on the main constructs for this study, creative expression, education, and community building.

Regarding creative expression, I wanted to understand how a space like Music Box

Village sparks creativity and unique collaborations in its users. Paschall (1934) defines creative expression to be the constant development of a child’s thinking brain (p. 149). In other words, tinkering, or constant evolution. This was prevalent in the MBV.

When it comes to understanding how the Music Box Village functions as an educational space, I set up a three-day study of grade four students exercising in structured and unstructured play within the space. With the construct of music education, I sought to understand how children play in such a unique and experimental space, and how it changes their understanding of music.

Finally, I conducted over twenty interviews to understand how the Music Box Village functions as a vehicle for community development; as defined by Green and Haines (2016), to be

“the fostering of a sound infrastructure that will eventually lead to a healthy community” (p. 5).

In the case of Music Box Village, the sound infrastructure is rooted in sound exploration.

Situating Myself with a Musical Playground

Over fifteen years ago, I discussed a concept for a 1-acre musical playground with composer and mentor, R. Murray Schafer on one of his advisory visits to Brampton, as he was an early supporter of my Parade of Noises project. Schafer immediately confirmed that the idea was a strong one, and that he had dreamed up something similar in the 1970’s. This stuck with me, as it helped me trace my lineage to other experimentalists. From there, the concept developed, and in October 2007, I co-drafted a proposal with the Toronto landscape architecture firm, Building Arts Architects Inc, and formally presented it to the City of Brampton’s Parks 7

Department. We pushed the concept to late phases of consideration, where they had actually designated an acre of land for it in their city plan, as a part of the redesign of Chinguacousy Park.

However, due to a substantial departmental reorganization, our municipal champions vanished, and sadly, so did the proposal.

An early sketch concept of the playground [Figure 1] included a drone cave, a musical mini golf, a teeter-totter organ, a musical swing set and Canada’s Largest Cuckoo Clock, to name a few. We envisioned a piece of modern musical architecture that hundreds of children could play simultaneously, coming in by the bus load, to animate a public space.

Figure 1. Sketch of The Musical Playground

The musical playground is a concept that I intend to develop with any interested stakeholders in the future, including municipalities, schoolyards, developers, children’s museums, a variety of sound artists and designers to help mitigate the boredom of turnkey playground models, helping ignite the creativity in children of all ages. This concept links to 8 community health as much as it does the more obvious benefits in parks and recreation, community music, and education. The musical playground has remained a strong concept, one that I have devoted my PhD research towards, as I see it as a great canvass for much of what I have stood for over the last twenty years working in music education: a space for free play, creativity, aleatoric music-making, discovery learning, rebellion, friend-making through music, mistake-making, and more (Marsella, 2004, 2017).

Situating the Case Study: A New Orleans Story

In the Bywater neighbourhood of the Upper Ninth Ward of New Orleans, at the intersection where the Mississippi River meets the Industrial Canal, there is a unique one-acre space known as The Music Box Village. Run by the not-for-profit arts organization, The New

Orleans Airlift, it functions as a musical playground where children of all ages play freely on musical structures, repurposed houses that create a sonic landscape of wondrous cacophony when the playground is buzzing. When the musical playground is all buzzing together, the MBV creates a unique music, never heard before in this setting. New Orleans Airlift demonstrate advanced sound artistry, maintained by a collective of like-minded experimentalists, extreme do- it-yourselfers who make the place sing with some of the strangest sounds imaginable.

The Music Box Village is a one-of-a-kind play space that acts as music venue, a playground, an education space, a convention centre, and much more. To the people of New

Orleans, and beyond when it travels remotely, or with their outpost installations; the MBV acts as an incubator, fostering new artistic creations and scenes within their environment.

When I envisioned a musical playground in the early 2000’s, I always considered it to be a class trip destination for schools within driving distance. In speaking with New Orleans Airlift co-founder, Delaney Martin (2019), her vision was the same: 9

…what I really like to see is it to become like a real part of children's lives that they really grow up with. You know, like I want Music Box virtuosos who grow over time. I want it to be like a really crucial part of people in the Gulf south, not just New Orleans. Like I want it to be like the field trip of the south. You know what I mean? Like, instead of like going to Washington DC and going to the White House, I want to be like children in the Gulf region, come visit the Music Box (Martin Interview, 2019).

I had always heard stories of how culturally rich the City of New Orleans is from fellow musicians such as Dave Clark, a Toronto-based drummer and educator who has been travelling there every year since the 1990’s. Clark’s love of the culture and knowledge of musicians helped me connect with others while I was there and feel the warmth of the people.

In May 2019, my research trip to New Orleans began with some of the warmth that one might describe as other-worldly. For example, upon landing at Louis Armstrong New Orleans

International Airport, I was generously picked up by Leah Hennessy from New Orleans Airlift, and so my study began.

Leah and I discussed a recent project the organization had launched in Music Box

Village, an opera by Louisiana composer Bernard Pearce. I asked about Bernard, as I had worked with him many years ago, when I booked the Brampton Indie Arts Festival in my hometown. The day later, I received a call from Pearce, and shortly after, we were meeting for coffee. Pearce reminded me why we had initially crossed paths so many years ago, as he had been displaced from Hurricane Katrina, which allowed me the opportunity to book his one man show in Canada, and vice versa, he booked my 10-piece band to play in Manhattan, where he was staying for the year, as a displaced artist. We reminisced, and briefly discussed my research of the Music Box Village, where he had recently presented his opera, The Coronation. In fine

Southern form, Pearce then generously offered me his bicycle for the remainder of my stay. He said that he was leaving for Hawaii for a little while and wanted me to have his bicycle. The 10 next thing I knew, I had a bicycle and my adventures flowed naturally from there. Throughout my time in New Orleans, there was a wonderful sense of generosity and inevitability that shrouded my work. From the place I stayed at, The Aquarium Gallery, very close to Music Box

Village in the Bywater neighbourhood, to my new mode of transportation, I was thankful for each day that I got to learn more about this special place, the Music Box Village, embedded in such a special city, New Orleans.

There were the core items on my research agenda, for example the observation of children playing, the participant interviews, and the events that were slated to occur in the space.

Then there were the peripheral moments that left such an impact on my thinking and understanding of culture, education, and even race relations in America. Early in my stay, I attended a lecture on Black spirituality at the Music Box Village, presented by local groups, which really captured some meaningful conversations in the community, and in a very respectful way, helped not only educate me in the three weeks I was in New Orleans, but left a deeper, lasting impression on me. One of the speakers provided a primer on the background of Second

Line parade culture, advising that if one were to attend a Second Line parade, they not pull out cameras and begin filming it, as though it were a spectacle, but to respect it as a deeply spiritual procession, rooted in Black history. I drew on this advice when I finally did attend a Second

Line parade on my final day in New Orleans, where I was profoundly moved by the level of community, teams in each krewe that interacted, and a musical bonding, an intergenerational love that left me weeping, appreciating the beauty and also the sorrow I felt, from the long history of oppression in America.

I learned some of this history from a new friend in New Orleans, Michael Ward

Bergeman, an accordionist who took me on an in-depth tour of the Lower Ninth Ward, hardest 11 hit from Hurricane Katrina. Ward Bergeman walked me through the deeply rooted effects that

Katrina has had on this rich and resilient city. All of these thoughts rattled through my head, as I watched that Second Line parade get started, an older gentleman using a screwdriver to bang on a half empty rum bottle. I was quickly transported back to the summer of 2018, when I witnessed my first “tintamarre,” a noise parade that celebrates Acadian independence in

Caraquet, New Brunswick, where pots and pans are struck in solidarity. And for me, the direct link between Acadian and Cajun culture was made.

As noted above, for much of my professional life, I have been attracted to noise, and public noise-making events that can help bring communities closer together. To discover, in both of these examples, that I am not alone, that this noise parade culture has a deeply-rooted history and community-building aspect to it was not only moving, but very encouraging to see how a city could rally around this activity in such a positive way.

Overview of Thesis Structure

This thesis is presented in nine chapters. In chapter 2, I present an overview of the literature that informs this study. Chapter 3 provides an overview of the methodology I used to conduct the instrumental case study. Chapter 4 gives a background on the origin story of the

Music Box Village, including the interview participants. Chapters 5, 6, and 7 unpack my findings related to each construct respectively: creative expression, education and community development. Chapter 8 outlines the meta-theme of radical collaboration and how it straddles the three prior chapters. Finally, Chapter 9 consists of an overview of the research findings as well as implications for future development in other cities, and future research.

12

Chapter 2: Review of the Literature

As described in Chapter One, this is a case study of a musical playground in New

Orleans, the Music Box Village, examining its social impact on multiple aspects of the community. The purpose of this chapter is to review the scholarly literature as it relates to the three key constructs inherent in my research questions: creative expression, alternative education space, and community development

I begin this chapter by tracing the history of creative music and sound art over the last century, and how it links specifically to the Music Box Village, New Orleans. From there, I discuss the social change that came as a bi-product of this shift in music-making. Later in the chapter, I discuss play, free play, music education and how they fit into an alternative educational space; the musical playground. Next, I outline the history of playgrounds, playground learning and musical architecture. Finally, I end this chapter with a review of the literature on community development.

Section One: Music

The post-modern period of contemporary music accepts any sound as a source for creative expression and music-making. From his readings of Henry David Thoreau, John Cage

(1977) predicted the expansion from the traditional music heard inside the concert hall to the music of the outside world, and the notion that even the sounds of nature could be captured, and tamed to be included in a modern music vocabulary. “Life is music, insomuch that in my repertoire I tried to reproduce sounds that from a musical point of view were prohibited or absurd like the step of an ant on grass” (“La Stampa”, 1977). Cage (1961) defined music as “the means of controlling the continuity from note to note. The material of music is sound and silence. 13

Integrating these is composing” (p. 62). According to Brandon Labelle (2015), “John Cage [is the] progenitor of experimental music and its emphasis on sound’ as a specific category” (p. viv).

Tracing a long line of musical experimentalists listed below, it has been evident for over a century, that all sounds have potential in a musical composition, a concept Claude-Levi Strauss

(1962) coined as bricolage or tinkering with sound. As you will see below, this list spans from the micro in sound artist Mileece Abson (2014) and her music extracted from plants; right through to the large-scale work of R. Murray Schafer, playing a city as a musical instrument

(2001).

Noise and musical rebellion through the 20th century. This anything goes approach in music dates from the beginning of the 20th Century and permeates through the next hundred years. It arguably begins with the Italian Futurist, Luigi Russolo (1913) drawing on war sounds and advocating for noise in music; to the Duchamp (1917) Fountain and the Dadaist movement challenging the notion of what art can be; to innovative composers like Harry Partch (1945) inventing his own set of musical instruments with an accompanying musical language; or

Karlheinz Stockhausen (1991) writing music for string quartet and helicopter. From Frank

Zappa (1963) playing a bicycle on the Steve Allen Show, to the Berlin-based collective

Einstürzende Neubauten (1984) playing the German autobahn; to David Byrne (2008) playing a prepared New York building, to Mileece Abson (2014) extracting sound sources from plant material; to Dr. Steve Mann (2003) running concerts in the key of EEG, pulling sound sources from human brain waves, to R. Murray Schafer (2001) playing an entire city in his special project Coimbra Vibra.

Luigi Russolo’s manifesto links to other similar writings on Futurism by Pratella (1910) and his Manifesto of Futurist Musicians, which called for an originality in music, a distinct 14 liberation from the past and from "well-made" music. This new aesthetic prompted Russolo

(1913) to build his own set of musical instruments, intrarumori, or noise machines. This celebration of the sounds of war, and the industrial revolution are a break from Russolo’s claim,

“ancient life was all silence” (p. 7). Russolo and the Futurists (1910) called for a new music, one that put an infinite palate of sounds first, and less focus on rules of harmony and perfection.

Where the Futurists (1909-1915) called for the destruction of all traditional lines of thinking, the Dadaists (1915-1922) embraced nonsense, and traditional aesthetic art codes.

Subsequently, Duchamp’s Fountain (1917) became a pillar symbol for this movement, where he took a urinal and called it art, highlighting the premise that works of art are intermediaries in a process that the artist begins and the viewer completes.

Without somebody to claim “it is music,” a creator or composer, would there be any music to be heard? If you hear it as music, then it is. Therefore, the listener is equally capable of hearing music in anything. But until it is framed as music, in the organization of the sounds, they remain just that, wild sounds, or raw ingredients left uncooked. Karlheinz Stockhausen

(1972) defines music as follows: "Whenever we hear sounds, we are changed, we are no longer the same ... and this is especially the case when we hear organised [sic] sounds, sounds organised

[sic] by another human being: music" (“The Guardian”, 2008).

George Dickie (1969) on Duchamp’s urinal as an art piece, aka Fountain (1917):

The point is that Duchamp's act took place within a certain institutional setting and that makes all the difference. Our salesman of plumbing supplies could do what Duchamp did, that is, convert a urinal into a work of art, but he probably would not. Such weird ideas seem to occur only to artists with bizarre senses of humor (p. 255).

Shortly after Dada comes Neo-Dada, and the work of John Cage. Cage and the Neo-

Dadaists are best reflected in Cage’s piece The Event (1952) otherwise known as “Theatre Piece 15

No. 1” which linked performance art and theatre. With aleatoric leanings, The Event also borrowed from other elements found in the Dadaists, less interested in deconstructing modern society, but still using ideas of repurposing objects, collage, chance and, of course, absurdity.

Both Dickie (1969) and Zappa (1989) claimed that if the composer deems it a piece of music, then it is simply just that. Intent for the composer, or creator of the artwork is paramount.

Objects found in nature, as Dickie (1969) highlights, such as driftwood, are not art without framing them as such. Arthur Danto (1964) referred to an “artworld,” an institutional knowledge of the history of art, or music, for that matter, that leads to its general acceptance.

Luigi Russolo’s (1913) intrarumori influenced other composers such as Igor Stravinsky, and Edgar Varese. These two composers would later influence the work of Frank Zappa, who embraced a similar take on music, “anything goes,” breaking free of what Lucia D'Errico (2018) refers to as a “baroque regime” (p. 21).

This notion that music is in the ear of the beholder resonates through Frank Zappa’s work. In his autobiography, Zappa (1989) defines music as follows:

If John Cage, for instance, says, 'I'm putting a contact microphone on my throat, and I'm going to drink carrot juice, and that's my composition,' then his gurgling qualifies as his composition because he put a frame around it and said so. 'Take it or leave it, I now will this to be music.' After that it's a matter of taste. Without the frame-as-announced, it's a guy swallowing carrot juice (p. 140).

Frank Zappa was influenced by the work of composer Edgard Varese (1916) who wrote: “we also need new instruments very badly...musicians should take up this question in deep earnest with the help of machinery specialists" (p. 140). Similar to Zappa, Beardsley (1982) defines a work of art as “an arrangement of conditions intended to be capable of affording an experience with marked aesthetic character” (p. 299). Beardsley (1954) claims that “intention is design or 16 plan in the author's mind” (p. 4) and that judging the work is “like judging a pudding or a machine – one demands that it work” (p.4) but that you do not necessarily need to fully understand it, for it to function. The same holds for music.

Music and social change. Halligman et. al., (2013) assert “The parallels between it

[dada] and the punk movement have proven irresistible to some – its explosive iconoclasm, its insolence in the face of authority, its primal aesthetic revolt and its liberation of ideas from the stifling over-dominance of technique” (p. 84). And so, we begin to trace a lineage of musical rebellion and social change.

Stravinsky’s (1913) Rite of Spring caused supposed riots at its premiere, due to its pulsating rhythms, unique use of instrument register, dissonance, not to mention Nijinsky’s awkward dance choreography – once again bringing new musical ideas to push the definition of music forward. At the same time, Arnold Schonberg was developing a new twelve-tone system, his answer to harmony, a system which his pupil John Cage opposed.

Music derives from a variety of sources, including traditional notation, Indian classical raga forms, traditional Inuit ridicule games, or the experimental game pieces of composer John

Zorn, such as his 1984 improvisation game, Cobra, in which Zorn replaces the conductor with a sign prompter to trigger new musical ideas. Zorn (1992), inspired by Stockhausen’s piece Plus-

Minus (1963) said his goal in writing Cobra was to “‘harness’ the creative developments in improvisation and extended techniques by New York City's downtown scene musicians in a semi-structured way, but ‘without hindering’ their performances; he was interested in telling the musicians when to play, and with whom, but without telling them what to play” (“Zorn on

Improvisation”, 1992). 17

The space between sound and silence recurs with theorist Jacques Attali (1985), who refines the spectrum between noise and silence, placing music anywhere in between. “Listening to music is listening to all noise, realizing that its appropriation and control is a reflection of power, that it is essentially political” (p. 6). Attali outlines the spectrum between silence and noise, as a reflection of the technology of its time. If the futurists were obsessing over the soundscape of war, modern artists such as Mileece Abson (2014) are now drawing sound and music from living plants.

Attali (1985) outlines three zones as to why music is made: “to make people forget the general violence…to make people believe in the harmony of the world…and finally, there is one in which it serves to silence, by mass-producing a deafening, syncretic kind of music, and censoring all other human noises” (p. 19).

Although I agree with most of Merriam’s (1964) many functions of music across cultures, I do not believe they play the same role in all cultures due to social, political, and religious implications. However, let me first expand on Merriam’s (1964) concept, that music can develop, support and promote social norms, and help us understand other cultures. During the 20th century, some examples of this include the antisemitism of composer Richard Wagner resonating with Adolf Hitler’s rise. During the Nazi regime, part of their reign included approving an entire catalogue of music that reflected their ideals, including composers like

Bruckner, Wagner, Strauss, Beethoven and others.

Jason McCoy (2019) links the songs of popular musician Simon Bikindi, one of the most popular Rwandan musicians of the late 1980s to playing a role in 1994 Rwandan genocide:

“Bikindi's songs embodied a myriad of local historical and cultural tropes that RTLM's hosts 18 drew upon to bolster their charismatic appeal, an appeal that was used to enhance their genocidal agenda” (p. 93).

Where I disagree with Merriam’s (1964) suggestion that music can function as an enforcer of conformity to social norms, is that it can also do just the opposite – function as a disruptor. For example, one composer who kept his voice just subversive enough to survive the

Russian revolution was Dmitri Shostakovich. As Burton-Hill (2015) states “to know him was dangerous; to associate with him, potentially fatal. He risked execution or deportation to the

Gulag yet played the system just carefully enough to survive” (“BBC Culture”, 2015).

Shostakovich (1945) embedded subversive political statements in his music, for example, working in Jewish themes into his music as an answer to the Stalinist antisemitic reign that he survived. Many of his works could not be performed until after Stalin’s death in 1953.

More modern examples of musical counterculture include Russian feminist punk collective Pussy Riot (2013) and their use of music as a form of social protest in their masked performance of Punk Prayer. “Although they sympathize with the cause of the wider protests accompanying the presidential elections, Pussy Riot are convinced only widespread illegal demonstrations can achieve lasting change” (p. 127). Another fascinating example of more recent social changers are the unsung heroes of Iran’s 2009 revolution, who like Pussy Riot wearing masks, chanted anonymously from their balconies at night to help initiate change in

Iran. “Many of those who shout ‘Allahu Akhbar’ in night time from the windows/balconies/rooftops of contemporary Iranian cities do so in order to use these words as a sort of encrypted message of protest, whose decrypted content is: ‘I protest’” (Leone, 2012, p.

352). There is a constructive form of rebellion in this gesture to initiate change anonymously via chanting from one’s balcony at night. 19

So, if music is made to forget, believe and/or to silence, as Attali suggests – noise carries meaning, and the ability to disrupt power lines. But who does the silence potentially mute?

Marie Thompson (2013) points to misogyny in Cage’s 4:33 (1947) and on the other side of the spectrum in noise music, where women are “best seen and not heard” (p. 299). The deaf sound artist Christine SunKim (2015) depicts silence as “a noise without character” (Willes, 2015, p.

11). In much of SunKim’s sound art, she asks the audience to “rethink the very nature of sound as a communication medium by redrawing notions of connectivity, trust, power, and otherness in relation to audibility” (Willes, 2015, p. 11). All of this leads to anarchist models found in many of the modern movements in music history.

Adorno (1956) claims: “Music creates no semiotic system” (p. 285) or what Cage (1974) termed a demilitarization of language. (“johncage.org”, 2020) Therefore, music is non- discursive, it delves more in the sublime, or what philosopher Edmund Burke (1757) calls the strongest emotion. Burke (1756) also believes sound and music to also have a much stronger power than words, leading to “a sensation by which a sublime passion may be produced” (p.

150). Turino (2008) also supports this, arguing that music best reflects emotion, highlighting iconic signs which form “the basis for feeling direct empathic connection” (p. 16).

Returning to the subject of intention, the architect and composer Iannis Xenakis (1971) defines music as a “comportment necessary for whoever thinks it and makes it” (p. 181). This echoes a theme prevalent in the work of R. Murray Schafer, as highlighted by Kate Galloway

(2010, 104), which demonstrates that anybody, from amateur to professional, is capable of making music, similar to the Finnish concept called Bildung, that “everyone has a right to music” (Heimonen, p. 195). Like Adorno, Xenakis (1978) agrees that “music is not a language.

Any musical piece is akin to a boulder with complex forms, with striations and engraved designs 20 atop and within, which men can decipher in a thousand different ways without ever finding the right answer” (p. i).

So, if anything goes in music, and everybody has a right to it – where do we go from here? Music is an activity that can be played by anybody, anywhere, anytime. The music of a city is well-reflected in the musical playground of New Orleans, the Music Box Village. To name a few sound sources, this space includes boat horns, often heard in their natural environment in the nearby Mississippi River; the clanks of shunting trains, reflected in the junk drum kits; and the bounce music of New Orleans, a new musical genre reflected in the Shake

House, an electronic musical instrument. The musical inventions of contributing artists such as

Quintron are present in the Music Box Village, his weather-manipulated electronic instrument,

Weather Warlock (2017).

Xenakis (1971) called music “the gratuitous play of a child” (p. 181), which leads to the next related section, play.

Section Two: Free Play and Music Education

Play, as defined by psychologist Lev Vygotsky (1978), is an activity desired by the child, involving an imaginary situation, and some set of rules. Whereas Piaget (1962) felt that play was merely practice for adult life, with no cognitive function; Vygotsky (Vandenberg, 1986) thought the opposite, that it developed it. As Nieuwmeijer (2013) compares the two, “Piaget considers of children’s play as a means for a primarily cognitive development. This, unlike others, who regard of play as a social phenomenon.” (p. 8) For example, Vygotsky (1933/1976) links play to child learning, as it includes language in play as an important tool for social development.

Goncu and Perone (2005) argue that play is an essential mechanism for not only understanding life as a young person, but also as adults. Play, in many ways, for children is like 21 practicing to be an adult, or as Dattner (1976) states “to put is simply, play is a child’s way of learning” (p. 23). Soloman (2005) furthers this notion, citing playground designer Joe Brown, who believed that “play was preparation for adulthood” (p. 37). Myers (1990) coined education as “learning to be human” (p. 626). Framing play as a rehearsal for adulthood also connects to curriculum theory and John Bobbitt (1918) who believed that "curriculum must directly and specifically prepare students for tasks in the adult world" (p. 97).

However, play for adults, as stated by architect Richard Dattner (1976) is an attempt to return to the freedom of childhood: “freedom, or abstinence from work. Adult play usually takes the form or recreation – literally re-creation of ourselves after periods of work by engaging in freely chosen activities that restore our sense of completeness” (p. 9).

Vygotsky’s (1931) Zone of Proximal Development points to the importance of adults and mimicry in the mix of a play setting. As Nieuwmeijer (2013) claims, the Zone of Proximal

Development represents “the difference between a child’s actual developmental level and its level of potential development. To Vygotsky, play forms the actual source of development and creates the zone of proximal development” (p. 10).

As play helps a learner define their world view, Nieuwmeijer (2013) asserts that putting the emphasis on play in music also helps children similarly:

Namely, if we assume children to learn about their world through play, it is likely to expect that, when children learn about music in that world, they will proceed in the same way, namely by means of play. This could mean children might just as well demonstrate musical roleplay, musical manipulative play, or musical parallel play (p. 12).

Moseley (2016) furthers Dattner’s notion of recreating one’s reality, the act of recreation in playing music: 22

Bearing witness to this process, Georges Bizet’s Jeux d’enfants (1871) reveals how play at the keyboard became intimately bound up with the sensual and affective operations of memory. Bizet’s twelve miniaturized evocations of children’s toys and games are imbued with nostalgia for the innocence of bygone days. By mounting a four-handed display of remembering and recreating, the performance of Jeux d’enfants indicates how playing back the past at the keyboard might be construed as replay, a means of reconstructing the temporality of musical events that supplements the history of recording as most commonly recounted. From barrel organs and music boxes to beatmania and Guitar Hero, the digital mechanisms and programs implicated in these modes of recreation (p. 10).

Mosely (2016) continues on the notion that play “was feared, demeaned, and infantilized for representing a subversive threat to the work ethic” (p. 33). Contrary to the work ethic, Pat Kane

(2000) emphasizes the importance of a play ethic, not being a frivolous pursuit:

The play ethic is what happens when the values of play become the foundation of a whole way of life. It turns us into more militant producers and more discriminating consumers. It causes us to re-prioritise [sic] the affairs of our hearts, to upgrade the quality of our emotional and social relationships. It makes us more activist in our politics, but less traditional in their expression. And most of all, the play ethic forces us to think deeply about how we should pursue our pleasures - and how we reconcile that with our social duties. So, just like the work ethic, the play ethic is a set of feelings and principles. But the difference between the two is huge. Work is always (to coin a phrase) the involuntary sector - the realm of necessity, where men and women have to do what they have to do. But as Sartre says, play is what you do when you feel at your most free, your most voluntary. When every positive decision you make about your life carries both a risk, and a promise, of something new and challenging taking place. This is why the play ethic isn't 'the leisure ethic': the last thing it involves is slumped relaxation (“The Guardian”, 2000).

Hirsch-Pasek and Golnikoff (2008) assert that “one thing play is not, is frivolous. Recent research confirms what Piaget always knew, that ‘play is the work of childhood.’ Both free play 23 and guided play are essential for the development of academic skills” (p. 1). When it comes to guided intervention by the teacher or other in a free play musical setting, the level of intervention can vary. For example, Gluschankov (2008) explored a very limited form of intervention, to the choice of available instruments, where Niland (2009) explores a curriculum centred around the student’s interests and experiences. As cited in Nieuwmeijer (2013), Page Smith (2011) conducted an action-based study which links in the facilitator “by both joining in their play and adding objects to their play on the basis of observation…here children’s play forms the basis, and the teacher’s role is that of observer, initiator and facilitator” (p. 26). This sliding scale of teacher intervention (Nieuwmeijer, p. 26) leads in the direction of more student-led play scenarios. In these examples, variation on the freedom of choice in the play is evident. As outlined below in the section on free play, this freedom in the play model does not undermine the importance of teacher’s role in the activity; as Vygotsky (1931) supports, they remain as crucial role models to unleash the child’s potential.

This dichotomy between work and play has been a significant cause of philosophical friction in education and other fields. It even affects the justification for why we play. In our hectic modern society, structured general activity often wins over free play, which might be perceived as wasted time or a less serious pursuit. In The Overscheduled Child, Alvin Rosenfeld

(2000) outlines the dangers for some children, that in such a hurried lifestyle, they can become stressed and may even become depressed.

Callois (1958) outlines four types of play, agon, alea, mimicry, and ilinx. Agon involves competitive play, including sport, and win or lose game models. Alea involves chance-based play, including lottery, nursery rhyme and other improvised play. Mimicry involves simulated play, including theatre, dolls and other imaginary play scenarios. Finally, ilinx involves vertigo 24 or “the dizzying, unruly play of motion” (Mosely, p. 27) including riding, skiing, carnivals and other thrill-based play activity.

Moseley (2015) continues on this subject of competition in play versus the hedonic consumption (Lacher and Mizeski, 1994) model of simply reveling in the act of play itself:

While agonistic play has to do with the assertion of self, the exertion of power, and the dividing of participants into winners and losers, alea involves the abdication of the self to the arbitrariness of external events… But while Striggio depicted card-playing as a form of social allegory, life itself could also be construed in terms of the arbitrariness and amorality ascribed to play: Chaikovsky’s [sic] operatic adaptation of Pushkin’s The Queen of Spades (1887) imbricates fortune, destiny, and the supernatural to underline the nihilistic credo that ‘life is but a game’ (pp. 27-28).

This nihilistic enjoyment and acceptance of play is where I land. Even though there is evidence that playing music is beneficial to academic development, this should not be the main reason to advocate for free play. Pasek and Golnikoff (2008) assert “children’s free play contains the roots of mathematical learning 46% of the time” (p. 2) and Pellegrini (2005) finds that elementary- aged children who enjoy free play during recess return to the classroom more attentive to their work. However, general free play and in music bears greater social benefits as outlined below.

Free play. Dattner (1969) also discusses play as a mixed activity between children and adults: “play – that of adults, as well as children – also takes place within a framework of rules, often very intricate ones” (p. 13). Free play, or unstructured play, is a loosening of these rules. I agree with Vygotsky (1966), that free play is vital to child development, as it contributes to the cognitive, physical, social, and emotional well-being of children and youth (p. 182). For

Vygotsky, a child is at their highest form of development, when they are at play. As Pasek and

Golnikoff (2008) assert, the social benefits of free play are key: 25

Free play and guided play are also important for fostering social competence and confidence as well as for self-regulation, or children’s ability to manage their own behavior and emotions. In free play children learn how to negotiate with others, to take turns, and to manage themselves and others. Play is essential for learning how to make friends and how to get along. (p. 3)

Similarly, Tina Bruce (2011) identifies 12 features of play, which act as a framework in support of free play:

1. Children use firsthand experiences from life. 2. Children make up rules as they play in order to keep control. 3. Children symbolically represent as they play, making and adapting play props. 4. Children choose to play – they cannot be made to play. 5. Children rehearse their future in their role play. 6. Children sometimes play alone. 7. Children pretend when they play. 8. Children play with adults and other children cooperatively in pairs or groups. 9. Children have a personal play agenda, which may or may not be shared. 10. Children are deeply involved and difficult to distract from their deep learning as they wallow in their play and learning. 11. Children try out their most recently acquired skills and competences, as if celebrating what they know. 12. Children coordinate ideas and feelings and make sense of relationships with their families, friends and cultures (p 117).

Each of the above features of play tie-in to the Music Box Village and helped shape my sub- question related specifically to play and education. This framework also helped me in my analysis of the free play and identification of what to look for in my data. Through free play, or experiential learning, Kolb (1984) draws on the work of Piaget, Dewey and others, to map an experiential learning model that I wanted to explore through observing play in the Music Box 26

Village. Kolb (1984) begins with a concrete experience for the learner, followed by reflective observation, then abstract conceptualization, and ending with active experimentation.

In shaping my research sub-question around music, alternative learning spaces and education, I considered Swanwick’s (2001) general theory that musical development, should

“have musical validity; have relevance across different musical activities; take account of both maturation and cultural setting; identify qualitative, sequential and hierarchical changes; have widespread cultural application” (p. 229).

Mosely (2016) links the playing of music to the playing of games:

‘How is music played?’ asks how music might be akin to other things one plays, such as solitaire, chess, rugby, roulette, Tetris, the fool, footsie, or truant. In these senses, the playing of music can be related to the playing of games, to role-play, simulation, and deception, to calculation and strategy, to risk and uncertainty, to sociality and flirtation, even to the wanton—sometimes violent—pursuit of euphoria and self-abandonment (p. 15).

Nieuwmeijer (2013) asserts “free musical play however, takes place in an environment that has been prepared by the teacher, and which stimulates the child to experiment with and to explore the musical properties of sound” (p. 24). Although the space, like Music Box Village in

New Orleans can be pre-set in a way that is quite deliberate, what occurs minute by minute, day by day, is very much in the control of its user, the player.

Smithrim (1997) reminds us that free play in music often leads to outcomes that teacher- led activities would not reach otherwise, that children can take their time absorbing ideas, and approach musical instruments in unique ways, where experimentation is in the foreground.

Independent learning is a tenet of free play, as exemplified in the research of Rena Upitis (2019)

“that children in the music playground felt they could take charge of their learning” (p. 36).

Upitis (2019) continues, that: 27

children must be allowed to create their own ways of structuring the content of the discipline, and much of that structuring can happen through the manipulation of concrete objects—through play. It is ridiculous to think that every child will acquire the same knowledge, by the same method, in the same order, and at the same age. Yet this is what a glance at most math workbooks and piano lesson books would imply (p. 31).

And as Upitis (2019) reminds, learning and fun can co-exist, “children do learn when they are playing, although like many adults, they are sometimes dubious about learning and having fun at the same time” (p. 32).

Free play is instrumental to the development of a creative child. Helping children develop their creativity has many benefits, notably to help foster problem-solving and improvisation skills, transferable to more than just music-making. Erikson (1963) and Winnicott

(1971) argue that play contributes to creativity within a greater culture or environment that is facilitated by comfort and safety.

According to music educator Stephen Nachmanovitch (1990), free play is more than improvisation. It runs deeper than our activities involving music and art. It is the essence of our being, something we were born with then strive to recapture. It has been deemed so vital to the health of children, that for over fifty years now, the United Nations (1959) has declared it a basic right of children.

Kyttä (2004) provides a conceptual understanding of children’s use of outdoor space in her fields of action theory, where one field is structured, the other is guided, and between those two fields is other where the child roams freely. Likewise, Wen and Kim (2016) highlight the importance of a place of learning, where creativity can flourish: “educators should establish a

‘place of learning’ where thoughts and ideas can be interacted with each other; most importantly, 28 students should pay more attention to the roles of ‘imagination’ and ‘intimation’ in an educational conversation” (p. 45). Stubley (1995) furthers this notion of space to play:

The field, in each instance, creates a space in which the goals and pressures constraining action in ordinary experience are temporarily suspended. The formal parameters of the space are generally believed to be determined by three forces: human potential, ritual, and trust (p. 274).

The importance of risk in play. In his book Design for Play, the renowned architect of

New York City’s Central Park Adventure Playground Richard Dattner (1969) argues “an environment that provides only the familiar challenges that already have been overcome countless times will never call forth any new learning” (p. 47). According to Joan Almon

(2013), the European Adventure Playground model seems to be more prevalent overseas, opposed to our obsession with safety in North America. Almon (2013) asserts “adventure playgrounds not only challenge children’s physical skills, they also provide opportunities for rich social interaction” (p. 21), which was also prevalent in observing various play sessions in the

MBV.

One of the leading playground equipment suppliers in the world is Little Tikes

Commercial, who, according to their website, “have the highest safety and quality standards available and feature cutting-edge innovation and important developmental play value” (“Little

Tikes Commercial”, 2020). The Little Tikes Commercial turnkey prefabricated solution for ordering playground equipment is as simple as ordering from a takeout dinner menu, but subsequently, it is not a fine dining experience when it comes to play. According to Dattner

(1969), “the typical New York playground (which is typical of 99 per cent of the playgrounds in the United States) could not be more hostile for children’s play if it had been designed for the 29 express purpose of preventing play” (p. 34). Further to this, and the argument that ‘a safe playground makes a good playground’, Joan Almon (2013) of the Alliance for Childhood asserts:

Children need and want to take risks when they play…and the only thing these parents don’t seem to realize is that the greatest risk of all just might be trying to raise a child who never encounters any risks... As children grow, they embrace risk as a natural part of life and develop a finely tuned sense for risk assessment, an essential skill for survival (p. 10). In her book on the history of American playgrounds, Susan Soloman (2005) warns of the dangers of the McDonalds playground, safe to a fault and that playgrounds should not be formulaic, or interchangeable. Illich (1973) encourages to build “a network beyond schools, where museums, film clubs, juke boxes etc.…all became a part of the learner’s menu” (p. 82). In this approach, it is not just “the teacher” as we know them – this more holistic approach to education and community fits nicely into a musical playground.

In summary, free play leads to a well-developed individual, which also leads to the overall health of a given culture. The Music Box Village in New Orleans adheres to Stubley’s

(1995) parameters for a healthy play space. This leads us outdoors to the playground, and how children learn within it as a play space.

Section Three: Playgrounds and Playground Learning

As Nieuwmeijer (2013) asserts, musical play begins with an appropriate space “in order to stimulate childrens’ musical play, one of the first actions a teacher can take, is to provide for a challenging musical environment, fitting to childrens’ age and phase of musical development”

(p. 31). Danish architect Carl Theodor Sørensen (1931) imagined “perhaps we should try to set up waste material playgrounds in suitable large areas where children would be able to play with old cars, boxes, and timber” (p. 9). This vision was brought to life in Emdrup, Denmark in 1941 serving as a symbol against Nazi occupied Europe, with the free play of children. Sørensen 30

(1945) quickly realized that although these “junk playgrounds” were the ugliest of his architectural creations, they stood as some of his “most beautiful and best works” (Bosselman,

1998, p. 67).

The first “junk playground” opened in Emdrup, Denmark in 1943, during World War II.

In 1946, Lady Allen of Hurtwood visited Emdrup from England and was so impressed with them, she brought the idea back to London. These "junk playgrounds," planted in ten United

Kingdom bomb sites, became known as "adventure playgrounds" to appease the concern around hooliganism and the devaluation of playing with junk (Benjamin, 1974). Free play and junk playgrounds remain relevant in the United States of America, where, Nefertari-Ulen (2016) claims young black and brown children also “encounter disproportionate rates of discipline and policing, both in public spaces and inside of school buildings” (“truthout.org”, 2016).

The modern world, and how it engages with free play, is just as complex. Chown (2016) outlines how structure and bureaucracy continue to creep in, putting even the original Emdrup junk playgrounds at risk of becoming more institutionalized and formal. Tim Gill (2007) argues that playground safety and the fear of municipal law suits are interfering with child happiness and community health. Gill (2007) claims that the obsession over playground safety in the UK over the last twenty years has led to increased statistics in antisocial behavior, and bullying, and that “there almost appears to be a desire to repress childhood itself” (p. 77). Gill (2007) asserts:

“Alongside these physical interventions society needs to embrace a philosophy of resilience” (p.

82).

The Danish landscape architect Helle Nebelong (2002) designs nature playgrounds, 31 inspired by the imperfections found in a natural landscape, using it as a starting place for designing around wild environments. Nebelong (2002) rejects standardisation in the firmest of terms, arguing that in fact it can create its own dangers:

When the distance between all the rungs in a climbing net or a ladder is exactly the same, the child has no need to concentrate on where he puts his feet. Standardisation is dangerous because play becomes simplified and the child does not have to worry about his movements. This lesson cannot be carried over to all the knobbly and asymmetrical forms with which one is confronted throughout life (“Free Play Network”, 2002).

In her research of American playgrounds, Susan Solomon (2005) warns against the dangers of fast food chains paving the way for sterile play spaces, serving a purpose that does not have much to do with play at all. Solomon (2005) reminds us that playgrounds evolved from the early years of a communal sandbox with rusty tools in them, to sterilized environments void of curiosity, and danger. American educator and children’s play advocate Joe Frost (2009) says that the most meaningful play settings for learning, such as construction areas or natural areas with indigenous plantings and animal habitats, are often not supported by adults. As Upitis

(1989) reminds us, “playgrounds are not without structure, there is structure in the setting, social interactions, and the learning” (p. 25). Stubley (1995) also outlines the importance for aesthetics and design in the outline of an effective play space: “Play begins with a captivating awareness which, through an accompanying sense of amazement or wonder, seems to instantaneously transform the player's experience of self as having the capacity to make something happen” (p.

275). Joseph Lee (1915), long regarded as the father of the playground movement, claims:

…there must be creation, song, wonder, inquiry, and adventure. If these are slighted we shall have committed once again the ancient crime against childhood, of which 32

practically all education has been guilty – the crime of not letting the child live as well as learn. (Butler, 1965, p. 10).

The United Nations Children's Fund’s (2004) vision is to advocate for child-friendly cities, and to guarantee the right of every young citizen to:

* influence decisions about their city; * express their opinions on the city they want; * participate in family, community and social life; * receive basic services such as health care, education and shelter; * drink safe water and have access to proper sanitation; * be protected from exploitation, violence and abuse; * walk safely in the streets on their own; * meet friends and play; * have green space for plants and animals; * live in an unpolluted environment; * participate in cultural and social events; * be an equal citizen of their city with access to every service, regardless of ethnic origin, religion, income, gender or disability (p. 1).

The playground is a prime public space to help foster some of the above rights. The Ithaca

Children’s Garden’s Hands-on-Nature Anarchy Zone borrows from some similar tenets from the

Scandinavian city garden model, and harkens back to early model playgrounds, where liability is reconciled, and discovery learning is embraced. Their playscapes are very much a return to the sandbox, and communal sharing of old tools, and ideas for child-led adventures. The elements of a musical playground should borrow from this approach, where the child is in charge, or at least feels like they are. 33

Music and architecture. The Canadian Standards Association (2007) links logical wayfinding in playgrounds to child development:

due to the tremendous gains a child makes in the physical stature, skills, abilities, and knowledge between the ages of 18 months and 12 years, the play space should provide a variety of opportunities, for various age groups, or for each group separately, in adjoining or separate spaces (p. 7).

Good, logical design which considers its users, as asserted by architect Richard Dattner (1976) is an effective way to inspire and help shape the world view of children:

This kind of playground conforms to the requirements of administrators. It is simple to build, indestructible, and noncontroversial. It is another story when the children’s requirements are considered…another fault of the typical playground is its total lack of anything to inspire interest or curiosity. After a little swinging and climbing and seesawing, the built-in opportunities for play are exhausted…even a poorly designed playground is a learning experience for children, and what they learn becomes a part of the way they see the world around them and the persons who inhabit this world (pp. 36- 37).

Lynch (1960) defines wayfinding as "a consistent use and organization of definite sensory cues from the external environment" (p. 3). From the McGill School of Urban Planning (2008), the definition of urban planning: “can be described as a technical and political process concerned with the welfare of people, control of the use of land, design of the urban environment including transportation and communication networks, and protection and enhancement of the natural environment” (“McGill University”, 2008).

The Roman, Vitruvius, said to be the first architect, in his treatise on architecture, De

Architectura, asserted that there were three principles of good architecture: firmatis (durability), that it should stand up robustly and remain in good condition, utilitas (utility), that is should be 34 useful and function well for the people using it, and venustatis (beauty) that it should delight people and raise their spirits. In my audit of all things functional, beautiful, and durable, I came across quite a few permanent installations that illustrate the above principles, where sound and music are produced from natural manipulators such as wind, fire or the sea.

One was The Singing Ringing Tree in the UK, designed by architects Mike Tonkin and

Anna Liu of Tonkin Liu in 2006. The Singing Ringing Tree is a 3-metre tall construction comprising pipes of galvanised steel which harness the energy of the wind to produce a slightly discordant and penetrating choral sound covering a range of several octaves. Another, The Sea

Organ in Croatia, the first of its kind to be constructed, a natural musical organ driven by the ocean’s waves. Built by expert Dalmatian stone carvers and architect Nikola Basic in 2005, it is driven by the unpredictable energy of tides and winds, offering a never-ending concert of numerous musical variations in which the performer is nature itself. A big part of the inspiration for this installation was a statement of resilience in an attempt to “repair the devastation Zadar suffered in World War II, turning much of the sea front into an unbroken, monotonous concrete wall. Now, the inviting white marble steps lead down to the water” (Basic, 2005). There were other water-driven organ installations I came across such as the Blackpool High Tide Organ in

UK and the Wave Organ in San Francisco, however the Croatian Sea Organ struck me somehow as more important, as it reinvents a place of prior trauma and association with something welcoming and healing. This theme of architecture and sound art as a healing agent is something the musical playground should consider.

On the side of beauty, when I mentioned this concept to R. Murray Schafer fifteen years ago, he connected me with le Centre de decouverte du son in Cavan, France, and with Guy Noel

Ollivier. It is a musical amusement park, with scholarly programs, and a musical garden, 35 designed, from an aerial view, in the shape on an ear. There were other noteworthy installations, not too interactive in their design, such as Seattle’s Sound Garden designed by Douglas Hollis in the early 1980’s, and the Sibelius Monument in Helsinki also capture themes of durability, beauty, utility, and this spirit should make its way into the musical playground. The latter, the

Sibelius monument, 600 hollow steel pipes welded together in 1967, a 24-tonne monument designed by Eila Hiltunen in dedication to the composer’s life and work resonated with me. It inspired me to do something similar with the musical playground, in honour of R. Murray

Schafer, perhaps.

The theme of durability is found in the concept of The Clock of the Long Now (Brand,

2000) also called the 10,000-year clock, a proposed American landmark, to be built from the most durable alloys intended to last centuries, embodying the practical use of long-time perspective. Cage’s concepts weave throughout the exploration of a musical playground, from silence to aleatoric music to stretching a piece over a thousand years. This piece, subtitled As

Slow As Possible (1987), has Cage's instruction to play the piece "as slow as possible," given that an organ imposes virtually no time limits, a project emerged to perform the piece for 639 years at the same church in Halberstadt, Germany.

From here, the theme of durability also ties in functionalism, related to architecture and public access. A great example of this, is Dr. Steve Mann’s hydraulophone, a water organ manipulated by humans using water pressure. Dr. Mann’s invention of a hydraulophone makes the organ accessible to all by placing them in high traffic public spaces, and the beauty of what happens when you remove that barrier to highly-coveted musical instruments, which, according to Dr. Mann are typically guarded by the sarcophagus of a church. Ken Yang (2016) outlines: 36

Traditionally music has been very closed off to the public, because the way we consume music is a one-way path. Usually a group of people staring in the same direction. With hydraulophone, it opens it up and makes it a two-way path, if you can connect over water and music, words become unnecessary. (Yang Interview, 2016)

This installation is certainly a piece of public art, but also, if designed thoughtfully, it acts as a community-building device, unifying its players. How does this eventually find its way into a musical playground? Similar to a gamelan, for example, with its unifying qualities, unlike a symphony orchestra or a death metal band, where everybody is doing their own specific thing as part of a greater musical output, a gamelan or hydraulophone takes more of a team approach on what seems to be one larger instrument played by many. This is the notion with the large-scale musical playground, that busloads of school children, by the hundreds, could potentially unify by playing the playground all at the same time.

Kathryn Marsh’s The Musical Playground (2008) researches children playing in schoolyards noting that children’s play should not be “ordered by adults, as children had so little control over other aspects of their lives and should have the freedom to direct their own play” (p.

317). Similarly, Shehan (1998) “The Songs in their Heads” outlines how kids acquire music on the playground.

Denora (2009) says this on Adorno: “Music is a constitutive ingredient of social life” (p.

151). The many facets of music-making can help coalesce community. In this next section, I will outline how.

Section Four: Community

Theodori (2005) defines community as “a place orientated process of interrelated actions through which members of a local population express a shared sense of identity while engaging in the common concerns of life” (pp. 662-663). Community development, as defined by Green 37 and Haines (2016), is the fostering of a sound infrastructure that will eventually lead to a healthy community (p. 5).

Assets, as defined by Kretzman and McKnight (1993), are “gifts, skills, and capacities of

‘individual associations and institutions’ within a community” (p. 9) There are seven forms of assets, as outlined by Green and Haines (2016): physical, human, social, financial, environmental, political, and cultural. These assets link to the people living in a community and outsiders attempting to help it. Every community has a unique set of assets, equally as complex as its challenges. Effective community development takes a creative approach to maximize and magnify those assets to help combat the mentioned challenges and bring forth positive change in a community, or what Tom Burrup (2006) calls creative community building, “finding the broader identity of place and connecting people across sectors” (p. 9). This is where music and community building intersect.

Higgins (2012) identifies three different perspectives on community music: the music of a community, communal music-making, and intervention between a music leader or facilitator and participants. He underlines that community music is particularly concerned with music- making outside of formal music institutions, such as schools, and the intersections of formal, non-formal, and informal music institutions.

On its website, the Community Music Activity Commission (2016) states:

We believe that everyone has the right and ability to make, create, and enjoy their own music. We believe that active music-making should be encouraged and supported at all ages and at all levels of society. Community Music activities do more than involve participants in music-making; they provide opportunities to construct personal and communal expressions of artistic, social, political, and cultural concerns. Community Music activities do more than pursue musical excellence and innovation; they can contribute to the development of economic regeneration and can enhance the quality of 38

life for communities. Community Music activities encourage and empower participants to become agents for extending and developing music in their communities. In all these ways Community Music activities can complement, interface with, and extend formal music education structures (ISME Community Music Activity Commission, 2016)

In Lagrimas (2009), we find two key definitions from Elliott and Higgins of community music that also apply to this discussion:

David Elliott defines community music as ‘incredibly open, fluid and changing.’ Using Jackson Pollock’s paintings as an analogy, he suggests that community music is kaleidoscopic through its celebration of diversity. Meanwhile, Lee Higgins suggests that community music can be understood through five different dimensions: people, participating, places, context and diversity. (p. 6)

Lagrimas (2009) furthers this notion of community music existing outside the traditional music institutions:

Even those who claim familiarity with the complex and difficult-to-define nature of community music often break it down into two basic themes: a) Musicmaking that occurs outside the formalized institutions such as conservatories, public schools, or universities, and b) Partnerships or outreach programs between schools and professional music organizations, such as guest artists from the local symphony working with music classrooms in a school. (p. 6)

A musical playground can play a role in fostering this healthy space. As discussed above,

Merriam (1964) outlines ten of music’s functions across cultures, the tenth being that it can help coalesce communities.

Ruben Gaztambide-Fernández (2005) warns of a rhetoric of effects in music education, where the instrumentalist argument that arts education improves academic scores and other unsubstantiated opinions, where the arts might serve as a healing agent. This also spreads into community development, with economists such as Richard Florida (2002) claiming that a sector 39 of arts workers he calls the creative class can help fuel a city’s economy. Gaztambide-Fernández

(2005) continues:

While these justifications are based on the argument that, when it comes to such futures, creativity and talent trump social inequality, the analysis that my colleagues and I have developed reveals the opposite; the social and economic context has a direct impact on how both students and teachers imagine certain kinds of artistic futures and the opportunities available to students for pursuing such work. (p. 223)

Contrasting these two opinions, Grams and Warr (2003) and The Ford Foundation (2003) point to cultural organizations helping foster “social relationships, enable problem solving, providing access to resources, as well as artistic activity improving derelict buildings, preserving cultural heritage, bridge cultural, ethnic and racial boundaries and stimulate economic development” (p.

4). Burrup (2016) continues: “The terms community building and creative community builder describe these cross-disciplinary activities and visionaries who break the rules to forge new ways to create and repair communities” (p. vx-xvi).

In the case of this study, those visionaries are the members of the Louisiana not-for-profit organization, The New Orleans Airlift, and their unique sound art play space and musical architecture mecca, The Music Box Village. 40

Chapter 3: Methodology

Overview

In this chapter, I discuss the research methodology and strategies that were used to conduct my study. I explain how I developed my main research question, sub-questions and the case study design that I chose to shape my inquiry.

While pursuing a graduate course on music and architecture (MUS2998H Reading in

Advanced Topics in Music, 2017), I discovered episode seventy-seven of The Organist Podcast

(Leland, 2017) entitled The Self-Rattling House, a feature on the Music Box Village (MBV) in

New Orleans. Because of my general research interest at the time in musical playgrounds, I began contact with the New Orleans Airlift organization, the creators and stewards of MBV, and explored possible research study ideas. My areas of interest hovered around musical installation, sound art, experimental music, architecture, and how unique spaces or projects like this might impact the well-being of a community, from a social, educational, and creative standpoint.

Before discovering the MBV in New Orleans, to observe the impact a musical playground might have on a given community, I considered other options. One option was to test a few temporary installation ideas locally, potentially in a participating school’s playground, where I could research the play of children interacting with new, unique, alternative play structures that I was intending to build myself. For example, a teeter totter that created wind for a giant bellow system that would then allow an outdoor organ made from PVC piping. This would have been a difficult challenge, not only to build a few alternative play structures of substance, but also around effectively navigating the logistics of designing such a study. 41

Case Study Methodology

Yin (1984) defines the case study research method “as an empirical inquiry that investigates a contemporary phenomenon within its real-life context; when the boundaries between phenomenon and context are not clearly evident; and in which multiple sources of evidence are used” (p. 23).

As a research site, MBV presented a tangible array of possibilities to develop questions about the role and function of a musical playground already in existence in a real-world setting.

MBV also extended other pertinent research angles that I was very interested in learning more about, including the aspect of community connection through space, artistic collaboration, organizational understanding that allow for such a project to thrive, cultural events, educational and creative impact, all through the lens of this one alternative play space, The Music Box

Village, an established site in the Bywater neighbourhood of New Orleans. One of the co- founders, Delaney Martin, was responsive and excited at the prospect of me using the Music Box

Village as my focal point for a case study. I was interested in what community relationships would allow for such a concept to thrive, with an eye to potentially develop an exemplar to replicate in other cities.

Research focused on a specific musical playground could have proceeded in several methodological ways: (1) as narrative study of the experience of the founders and participants of the MBV; (2) as a strictly social history of the development of the MBV; (3) as a set of field experiments focused on the function of the MBV as an educational space; and (4) a collective case study (Creswell, 2005) comparing observations from several similar sites. Instead, I narrowed my focus on an instrumental case study design, as outlined below. 42

Instrumental Case Study

This study employs an instrumental case study model because it best fit the multiple aspects I was seeking to examine related to this one special site, the MBV. Given the multiple perspectives I was seeking, and their relationship to how MBV functions specifically, an instrumental case study design best fit my needs. Since I had established a great working relationship with the New Orleans Airlift, this allowed access to background information about the development of the playground, interviews with the founding members, event launches in the space, coordination of play with a participating school, and related audio-visual footage.

As Grandy (2010) asserts “in an instrumental case study the case itself is secondary to understanding a particular phenomenon” (p. 2). In this case, I sought to understand how a musical playground impacts its community, from three different perspectives: educational, creative, and place-making. As Grandy (2010) states, “in their instrumental case research design they [researchers] test existing theory in a real site” (p. 2), which is precisely what I set out to do at MBV in New Orleans.

Stake's (1995) approach to conducting a single instrumental case study showed a suitable methodology that could be applied with the MBV: a clearly identifiable case with boundaries. I saw an array of possibilities for what Creswell (2005) calls purposeful maximal sampling, which allowed for multiple perspectives on the same topic, in this instance a unique one-acre playground of sound sculptures. The participating organization was open to extensive data collection, in line with Yin’s (2003) suggested recommendations for a case study, including documents, archival records, interviews, direct observations, and participant-observations. 43

Criticisms

Hamel (1993) observes a limitation of the general case study model, "its lack of rigor in the collection, construction, and analysis of the empirical materials that give rise to this study.

This lack of rigor is linked to the problem of bias...introduced by the subjectivity of the researcher and others involved in the case” (p. 23). I made every effort in my design and execution to be mindful of my own biases as I worked through the process. However, some of these biases provided a unique filter of comprehension in the end.

Another criticism of the instrumental case study model is that with the focus on one subject, in this case, MBV, the risk of generalization in a case study is high. I used pattern- matching to extract themes from my data sources (Yin, 1994), and remained mindful of sweeping generalization in my observations.

Finally, as Creswell (2005) warns “some case studies may not have clean beginning and ending points, and the researcher will need to set boundaries that adequately surround the case”

(p. 76). My study did have a clean beginning and end, from my initial email to Delaney Martin expressing interest on March 2nd, 2018, to the final night in New Orleans on May 23rd, 2019 and my performance in Teddy’s Twilight Serenade. This event, which I discuss in Chapter 8, offered me a completely unique perspective to the space, and its stakeholders, and gave a closure on the study, with a communal music-making experience.

Narrowing My Research Questions

The study was built on a framework of previous theories, as Aaltio & Heilmann (2010) assert:

It is important that the setting for research is connected to previous theories, which form a foundation for the analyses and interpretations in the conclusions. A researcher and a 44

research object interact constantly with each other in a case study, and maintaining mutual trust is, therefore, a part of the research process. (p. 2)

From my first email response from Delaney Martin, this “mutual trust” began to form. My initial shorter visit to New Orleans in September 2018 quickly revealed that this case study would be hinged on the foundational theories of sound art, experimental music, alternative education, and community-building, that much of my professional practice and theirs had circled.

Creswell (2005) outlines clear procedures for conducting a case study, including determination if a case study approach is appropriate to the research problem. Then researchers next need to identify their case. Followed by the data collection, drawing on multiple sources of information, such as observations, interviews, documents, and audiovisual materials. With access to the data above, I began to shape my research questions accordingly, all with a lens to unravel the phenomena of the impact a musical playground can have on its surrounding community.

My initial trip to New Orleans for 4 days in September 2018 was to meet many of the primary stakeholders and build a list of those I needed to interview. With members of the New

Orleans Airlift, we also discussed how to best include a participating school, what I would observe, when I wanted to conduct the study, and for how long. They were very accommodating to this discussion and to my overall research needs. From there, especially after seeing and experiencing the playground and its creators, it helped me refine my research question and sub- questions, and to begin forming initial theories on the space. I was interested in three primary constructs as they related to MBV, how it functions as a vehicle for creative expression; how it functions from an educational aspect, and how it helps build community. This led me to developing my research question and set of sub-questions: 45

My Research Questions

Principal Question

How does The Music Box Village musical playground function within its community?

Sub-Questions

1. How does the Music Box Village function as a space for creative expression?

2. How does the Music Box Village function as an educational space?

3. How does the Music Box Village function as a vehicle for community development?

Rationale

Sub-question one points to an exploration of the context for creative expression, how the

MBV fosters unique artistic voices. “Creative expression” in the context of whether the space provides opportunity for decision-making, whether it functions as a creative hub, a venue for experimental musical performance. As Paschall (1934) defines it in education, creative expression develops “in the child-mind a well-balanced personality, and a mind encouraged to think without fear of consequences; an imagination vivid enough to visualize both past and future; an emotional nature taught restraint and sympathy” (p.151).

In most cases this hinges on uniqueness of artistic voices, on forms of composition, improvisation and collaboration (Kratus, 1990). Consequently, indicators of awareness would include funding restraints, resistance to limitation, actions like transgressive acts, encouragements to risk, and conscious challenges to aesthetic norms.

Sub-question two seeks to understand how the MBV functions as an educational space, for example, as an alternative space for learning music, versus the more traditional environments, such as the grade school classroom, music schools, and church. Indicators of this would align with the 12 features of play (Bruce, 2011) as outlined in Chapter 2, showing signs that children 46 are deeply involved, playing alone, together, mimicking each other, and that some students who may show behavioral challenges in more traditional settings are more engaged in this one. Other indicators would be that the space itself acts as the teacher (Gandini (1998), that it helps children understand the tenets of experimentalism in music and sound art, simply from its design; that the children embrace the foreign sounds of the playground, and the play helps solidify the understanding of new musical concepts. Finally, that multigenerational teaching models

(Vygotsgky, 1976; Ferrell, 2017) are embraced by the participants; and new ideas for musical instrument design are imagined.

Sub-question two also seeks to understand how children interact with a musical playground in both guided and unstructured play experiences. It points to the design of the playground, as Nieuwmeijer (2013) asserts, the preparedness of the space by the teacher, in this case, the organization at large, and how that incites musical exploration. Curriculum development around the musical playground and implications for educators were also considered.

Delimitations include observation of play in more traditional settings, comparing musical learning from pre and post play; selecting a focus group of children with special needs or behavioral challenges; I also sought to learn how this interactive space functions in engaging children with special needs, if it resonated with them, providing a diverse learning environment that a classroom could not. Furthermore, I sought to learn what curriculum would support a musical playground thriving in a community.

In sub-question three, I sought to learn how the MBV functions as a vehicle for community development, for example, related to public access, what politicians supported it, and how the community members realize such a phenomenon - unpacking the origin story of the 47

MBV. Although community health can be measured from multiple perspectives, for this study, I narrowed that field to using the parameters as set out by Weaver et al. (2010), where the vibrancy of the community was discussed through community change stories, and other significant indicators such as “community safety, access to education, physical health, social support, engagement of citizens, culture, community vibrancy, diversity and access to arts and recreation” (p. 33). I wanted to learn how the MBV builds community with every interaction, related to its influence on community healing and community health (Freeman and Lee, 2007), as it relates to the impact MBV has had on the community in helping the city recover since

Hurricane Katrina, in August 2005. I sought to determine how MBV helps build assets in the community, including: personal assets; physical assets including emergency supports, food, housing, and transportation; social assets including civic participation and networks; and, human assets including health, life skills, financial literacy, and education (Weaver et al., p. 35-36).

I wanted to learn who exactly benefits from a musical playground, including cities, schools, children, youth, special needs communities, and others. Conversely, I also sought to examine how the space could function as a vehicle for protest. In this set of sub-questions, I wanted to learn what social challenges a musical playground can help resolve, outlining ways it helps coalesce a community. I looked at how MBV functions as an intercultural community- building space, bridging paths between different cultures. I also had an interest related to commemoration, how a musical playground could be designed and tailored for the neighbourhood it is built for, and also consider honouring an important figure or event from said community.

Lieberman (2011) states “architecture is a performing art” (p. 1), and he does not advocate for out of the box, turn-key solutions, but rather a model that best adapts to its 48 surroundings. I considered all of the above questions when developing my research study, in an attempt to develop a series of guidelines that could help replicate such a model in Canada.

Dependability and Credibility

Credibility refers to the degree to which the research represents the actual meanings of the research participants, or the “truth value” (Lincoln and Guba, 1985). Both credibility and dependability relate to all aspects of the research design, including the focus of the research, the context, participant selection, data collection, and the amount of data collected; all of which influence how accurately the research questions can be answered (Graneheim and Lundman,

2004). As stated by Moon, Brewer, Januchowski-Hartley, Adams, and Blackman (2016) “The most commonly reported criteria corresponded with elements of dependability and credibility, e.g. recruitment, number of participants, population description, data collection methods, triangulation” (p. 8).

Triangulation, according to Cox and Hassard (2010), “is associated with the use of multiple methods and measures of an empirical phenomenon in order to reduce bias and improve convergent validity, which is the substantiation of an empirical phenomenon through the use of multiple sources of evidence” (p. 2). Where possible, some of the data I gathered allowed for triangulation, that is, the information received from different data could be compared (Aaltio &

Heilmann, 2010). The study was designed so that themes derived from the interviews, participant surveys, and other data sets could be easily triangulated.

In the case of MBV, I aspired to collect the best data set that I could from my interview participants, the students and also the data that was provided by Eliza MacDermott and Delaney

Martin in advance. In the case of my interviews and the school surveys, I linked both of these 49

(see Appendix H) to my research questions, with the goal to structure my analysis and understanding systematically from there.

My first trip to New Orleans in September 2018 was a valuable four-day audit of the site and the stakeholders. I began to comprehend the generous spirit of its people, and the other- worldly nature of New Orleans. I was also able to line up an interview list, secure the participating school, and begin to formulate the research design model.

I wanted to speak with a City of New Orleans official, who helped approve the project, along with the founding members and as many members of the New Orleans Airlift collective, related board members, collaborating artists, children who frequent the park, parents from the neighbourhood, Tulane music professors and more.

That trip helped set the context of the study, and to continue formulating initial theories about the site. I began to learn from Hennessy and MacDermott (Interview, 2018), that most members of the collective did not consider their site to be a playground, or a maker space

(Pennington Interview, 2018). I also began to gain a deeper understanding and sensitivity toward the social impact Hurricane Katrina had on the city, and its education system.

Ethical Considerations

This study was reviewed and approved by the Ethical Review Board at the University of

Toronto; protocol number 00037513. Consent forms were acquired from all interview participants (Appendix C), the New Orleans Airlift organization (Appendix D), the participating school administration (Appendix E), and the student participants (Appendix F).

When working with children, average age 9, this research posed a moderate risk. The nature of what was being observed, play patterns, outcomes and impact from the experience, was low risk. In this instance, the participating school and student identities were anonymized, for 50 privacy protection. In advance of my May 2019 visit, I had confirmed the participating school and all related ethics forms (see Appendices E and F) were signed, which include providing consent to use video footage in this dissertation and future related presentations.

The Researcher

My role as a researcher was to recruit interview participants, collaborate with members of the New Orleans Airlift and the participating schools to set up the free play sessions. I developed a template questionnaire, conducted the interviews, and analyzed the data.

As Bresler (1996) states “the qualitative paradigm assumes that value-free interpretative research is impossible. Every researcher brings preconceptions and interpretations to the problem being studied” (p. 31). In this case study, my preconceptions around experimental music in public spaces, community music, and civil disobedience were well formed and certainly shaped my opinions around what I was observing. When conducting the interviews, I made every possible effort to be impartial regarding my preconceptions around experimental music, allowing the participants the opportunity to lead the direction of our discussions.

With over two decades recording and making experimental music, I found several aspects of the Music Box Village project and philosophy that resonated with my experience. Over the last twenty years, I have worked passionately in the field of experimental community music. In my early years as a composer, performer, educator and community organizer, I unknowingly honoured some of the early tenets of community music, as outlined by Bartleet, Dunbar-Hall &

Schippers (2009) in my relationship to place, social engagement, support/networking, dynamic music making, engaging pedagogy, and links. Sprung from my early years working in my hometown of Brampton, Ontario, and eventually expanding through to our nation’s capital in

Ottawa, organizing cultural events on Parliament Hill. My prior experience gave me a unique 51 standpoint in my observations, allowing me the necessary empathy to gain the trust of interview participants, but not tarnish the results of our discussions.

It all began as a way to stave off boredom, where a shred of support from Brampton’s cultural department went a long way. In the winter, I would curate an eclectic arts festival, The

Brampton Indie Arts Festival, which ran from 1999 to 2009. In the summers, I offered up something different, a noise parade with over 700 grade-four students marching down main street with homemade musical instruments, an event I called The Parade of Noises which ran for five years. These two different cultural offerings gave my hometown something a little different to consider, while keeping me gainfully employed.

I was, and remain, passionate about sharing absurdist musical ideas with children of all ages. In an attempt to preserve the outsider concepts in music education, I persevered to find my place, working with the National Capital Commission in Ottawa, and more recently The Regent

Park School of Music, always making it a priority to include alternative methods of music- making whenever possible, because I see what happens when a young mind studying music gets ignited by the act of creating something new – they light up! Creativity is at the root of all smiles. It brings us together in such deeply-rooted, meaningful ways. Through it, we forge life- long friendships, we map our lives, we connect the dots.

Along my path, to date, I’ve met certain mentors, people who showed me that this line of thinking was worth pursuing, they taught me that it was ok to remain odd, to celebrate, even normalize the weird. Without them, I’d probably be on a much different path, perhaps one less creative. Those mentors include people like Dr. Lee Bartel, who then connected me with R.

Murray Schafer, who both remain strong supporters of what I do in the music room today. 52

Bonding Over Experimentalism

Bresler (1996) claims that “every researcher brings preconceptions and interpretations to the problem being studied (cf. Denzin & Lincoln, 1994; Gadamer, 1975): the interactional text is present whenever an individual is located in a social situation (Denzin, 1989)” (p. 31). In this case, my work in sound art, education and refining my palette for absurdist music, both as a connoisseur and performer, served me well.

In September 2018, my first visit to New Orleans, the family-like atmosphere at the

Music Box Village was apparent. In our first discussion, I was in a conversation with one of the founders, Taylor Lee Shepherd about how Brian Poole, from the experimental 1970’s duo

Renaldo & The Loaf, was one of his favourite clarinetists. From here on in, I knew that I had something in common with this collective, when it came to weird music. I quickly learned that many within the organization, had an ear for foul music, the broccoli, the hard to digest stuff, like The Residents, Sun Ra, noise music, and Renaldo and the Loaf, some of the music I was raised on, that I often claim helped make me weird. I learned later, through interviewing

Delaney Martin and Taylor Lee Shepherd, that much of what spawned the Music Box Village was found in Russolo’s The Art of Noises (1913), another big influence on my musical path. As

Shepherd (2019) put it when I interviewed him “Nobody knows. Renaldo & The Loaf figure greatly in my psyche” (Shepherd Interview, 2019). As Sharp (2017) outlines, the New Orleans

Airlift opened their permanent space for Music Box Village on North Rampart Street in 2016 with a celebration of the 100-year anniversary of Dadaism.

When I met Jay Pennington for the first time, I learned about his connections with

Thurston Moore, and we quickly began discussing R. Murray Schafer, The Nihilist Spasm Band and John Cage. It was not the traditional jazz that brought me to New Orleans, it was this world- 53 class approach to avant-garde music and sound art (Pennington Interview, 2019). Like

Pennington, Elliot Perkins (2019) also believes the MBV is an attraction to children of all ages –

“You feel like a little kid, with the children come the adults” (Perkins Interview, 2019). This is a theme I have noticed in my own work, the importance of selling kids on the weird concepts early, so that parents are obliged to tag along once they witness this buy-in. My work with my own organization Music Roots (2000-2005) and also more recently with the Guelph Jazz Festival in 2013, and our Scheherazade project, winning the trust of the community is key.

They led me to meeting local weirdo connoisseur Rob Cambre at a musical improvisor show he was putting on, when I mentioned the Nihilist Spasm Band, he had mentioned knowing them, and having come up to London, Ontario for their infamous NO Music Festivals in the

1990’s. I am also drawn towards the rebellious side of music, with my noise parades and how I became drawn to making a public racket. Recent travels to Caraquet, New Brunswick to experience their 30-year tradition of a “tintamarre” or noise parade, and how that also loosely links you to New Orleans, via the Acadian traditions in Caraquet trace to the settling path of the

Cajuns in Louisiana, and similar parades evolving there, from noise, to Mardi Gras, to Second

Line.

With over two decades recording and making experimental music, I found several aspects of their project and philosophy that we held in common. As the Executive Director of a community music school in Toronto for over ten years, it helped provide perspective on this study, from a personal and organizational standpoint. Not only on the physical space, and how programs are developed, but also from an organizational perspective, noting everything from professional development, through to fundraising. 54

Study Design

Table 1

Table 1. Methodological Overview.

Phase Tasks

Development (July 2018-April 2019) Initial discussions with the organization

Site visit and preliminary discussions with key stakeholders, compiling interview participant list

Initial coding of online video content and shared internal documents

Development of research questions and subsequent interview design

Study design

Connecting with participating New Orleans elementary school, setting up the logistics of the study

Ethics approval Research (May 2019) On site research study of grade four participant students

Conducted 20 interviews

Attended related MBV events Analysis (June 2019-March 2020) Interview transcriptions and coding

Refinement of themes

Triangulation and member checking

Each research question helped form the design of this study, with naturalistic observation of the play and surveys informing understanding of the main educational components; stakeholder interviews helping shape the understanding of the social impact MBV has had on 55 community, and participatory experience along with interviews shaping the learning around creative expression.

On day one of arriving in New Orleans, May 13th, 2019, I met with main coordinator for the study, Eliza MacDermott, who helped, along with Delaney Martin, in setting up initial connections with the pre-determined list of interview participants. I spent much of my time on site, observing the set-up of a new house, Elevator Pitch, to be launched to the public in week two of my stay. During that time, I was also setting up my main interviews in person, with each member of the New Orleans Airlift collective, being mindful of the busy time in preparing for this new house launch. I prepared for the three-day student observation of free play in week one, then another observation session in week two, a one-day visit, after the launch of Elevator Pitch by a class of grade two students from a different school. Each Saturday that I was there, I spent time conducting relative interviews on site, during their Open Hours sessions, where the general public has access to the playground. Week three was spent conducting more interviews and preparing for a performance that I was included in on site for the final day of my visit. Every night I was in New Orleans, I journaled my daily observations, helping develop my themes and ideas about the site and its people. This design gave me direct perspective on the site, as an event space, an educational space, and a space for creative expression.

Selection of Site

When I heard the podcast about playing the building, a feature on the Music Box Village produced by The Organist (Leland, 2017) podcast, I suspected that I had found a suitable fit for a research site, given my prior work on sound art, installations, mechanical music, and how they intersect with community. During my initial 2018 trip to visit the site, I learned how diverse the

MBV was. I was greeted with enthusiasm, openness and understanding from the entire New 56

Orleans Airlift team, who saw great potential in what I was proposing to research. Doing my research directly on site at MBV would allow me to conduct the case study as a field experiment, on location, in the real world, which was always my preference, to ensure authenticity in my results.

With a space and their complex musical installations already installed, my research focus expanded, not only from the benefits of the playground on those who are using it, but also on how it came to fruition, and the social impacts it was making.

Criteria for Selection

I chose the Music Box Village, New Orleans as the ideal research site, as it best captured what I had initially envisioned for a musical playground, and is already set up with suitable infrastructure including educational programs, open hours to the general public, creative workshops and a developed concert series. The community connection and artistic aesthetic that

The New Orleans Airlift embody as an organization also align with many of my areas of focus as a music educator and researcher. The New Orleans Airlift is bigger than New Orleans, they have an international presence as an art collective, with community-building as a main pillar of their work.

Description of The Space: The Music Box Village, New Orleans

As outlined in Chapter 2, every community has a unique set of assets, equally as complex as its challenges. Effective community development takes a creative approach to maximize and magnify those assets to help combat the mentioned challenges and bring forth positive change in a community.

The Music Box Village exceeds what I had initially imagined for a musical playground, and fits my requirements for researching a musical playground: an open accessible space with 57 musical installations that children of all ages are free to explore in the familiar context of a playground. The Music Box Village in New Orleans is a one-of-a-kind sculpture garden where you play the repurposed houses as musical instruments. The site is wired for audio recording and has access to some cameras through the security system for video as well. As a leading organization in presenting sound art in New Orleans (Snow interview, 2019), the MBV attracts international and local performing artists for on-site concerts; they offer educational programs, and even host weddings. Their educational model also resonates with children on the autism spectrum, something I would have liked to observe during my research, but learned more about through interviews.

Data Sources

I found that the most frequently used data sources were interview transcriptions, video footage, and pre-read background articles that were sent to me in advance. The rest of the data was also used, but with less frequency.

This study used historical and observational data (Merriam, 2005) to research The Music

Box Village, using a single case design. Through analyzing the historical documentation, interviewing and observing participants and related stakeholders, and observing grade four children playing freely in the space, I garnered the data I was seeking. During my observation of the children playing, I used naturalistic observation methods (Lincoln and Guba, 1985), in which

I remained as unobtrusive as possible, throughout those sessions.

Cox and Hassard (2010) continue that “within each type of triangulation there are various subtypes; for example, methodological triangulation can include various combinations of qualitative and quantitative research designs” (p. 2). I looked for threads or patterns within the various data sets that I acquired during the study. I compared my data from student participant 58 surveys, interview transcriptions, observation notes on my audio and video footage analysis; and from there developed themes in the study that are discussed in the following chapters.

Another type of analysis I used was holistic related to the case (Yin, 2003), As Lincoln and Guba (1985) mention, this phase constitutes the “lessons learned” from the case, which for me, fermented over multiple reviews and reflection.

Historical documentation. Data was collected in two stages, before the visit from

September 2018 to April 2019, and then onsite, in May 2019. During my initial visit in

September 2018, I made arrangements with Delaney Martin and Eliza MacDermott to acquire the written internal archive of related materials that the New Orleans Airlift had catalogued for me in advance. These materials consisted primarily of online media features, both written and video highlights from external media sources. They also provided me with an internal written document that highlighted the origins of the MBV. Once compiled, I did a thorough review and analyzed all prior historical data and writings about or authored by The New Orleans Airlift organization, specifically about their MBV project. There are several press references written on the MBV, since its inception in Fall 2016, which the organization provided to me. Before travelling to New Orleans in May 2019, I gave a full review of this data set, to help me best understand the organization. My analysis looked specifically for material that helps shaped the narrative around the development of the site. Through coding this data set of online video backgrounders and pre-readings, I was able to categorize themes related to sub-questions, and areas that I wanted to further explore during interviews. This analysis also allowed me to best align my interview questions (Appendix F) to my main research question.

As mentioned above, part of my study reviewed all prior audio & visual productions about or created by The New Orleans Airlift organization, specifically about their MBV project. 59

Similarly, this analysis helped me craft a narrative around the development of the site, and its related social benefits. There are hundreds of tourist videos up on their Instagram site alone searchable through the hashtag #musicboxvillage, and also some key feature videos produced by

New Orleans Tourism that highlight the site.

Audio and video footage. I acquired video footage (hand-held and 360-degree) of the three days of play observation, as well as related audio footage. I also videotaped footage from open hours and gathered audio recordings of each interview. In observing the free play, I set up the site for recording audio, 360-degree video and hand-held video footage. Throughout each session, I remained as inconspicuous as possible, keeping focus on various groups and their play patterns.

Interviews. In setting up each interview, I asked the New Orleans Airlift staff to email connect me with each participant, and I was able to coordinate each interview from there via email, phone or sometimes in person. I chose the participants by doing a naturalistic audit

(Bowers, 2009) of the cast and crew in the universe of the New Orleans Airlift. Through initial discussions with the key personnel at New Orleans Airlift conducted in person in September

2018 and via regular Skype/email discussions leading up to my trip in May 2019, I compiled a list of key stakeholders to interview for this case study, from a list of criteria including: related educators, scholars, founding members, staff at New Orleans Airlift, board members, city planners who helped approve the project, contributing artists, families from the neighbourhood, and local musicians. For a complete list of interview participants, my personal reflections on each of the interviews and their contributions to the project, please refer to Appendix A. There were stakeholders that I met or heard about who I did not feel met my criteria for an interview.

In other cases, I requested interviews, but logistics made it a challenge. 60

When I returned in May 2019, I had already built a significant interviewee list, but also paid attention to my discussions, which helped me build upon that list, adding Quintron, Tif

Lamsen, Bryan Bailey, Rick Snow, Marilyn Payne and her children, and also lining up interviews with both grade school participating teachers, so listening and improvisation came into play. In the end, I was able to interview 22 different stakeholders who best related to my sub-questions and categories linked to the function of the MBV. I began each interview with the questions listed in Appendix F, following up with probing questions whenever possible. These questions were directly linked to my sub-questions and the constructs I was seeking to understand. The interview participants were all instrumental in developing the initial vision for the Music Box Village, and then also seeing it through to fruition. Interview transcription data became my main source for extracting theories about Music Box Village that were clearly percolating among members of the organization, and a through line became noticeable to distill from my observation and reflection in the interviews.

Interviews and the deep understanding that my participants had of their own stories

(Creswell, 2005) was one of the more valuable data sources of which I could extract themes, as outlined in the following chapters.

Aaltio and Heilmann (2010) assert:

The data gathered through case study enable rich and varied descriptions. Stories and interview quotations from the data are very common; especially in the first stage of analysis they help in simplifying the extensive data for further processing. In the later stages of processing, the data are further summarized, and the researcher draws conclusions, for which the data are searched. (p. 7)

Through multiple reflections on the transcribed interviews I conducted, my themes and theories deepened with each pass. 61

Observation

In May 2019, I visited the Music Box Village in New Orleans, and observed two classes of grade four students from New Orleans, Louisiana, about 50 students playing freely on the musical houses for a period of three consecutive days (May 15, 16, 17, 2019), one-hour sessions each day, with the last day being a guided experience followed by a student survey. I videotaped their play, using a hand-held camera and 360-degree camera placed strategically in the middle of the space, to capture basic movement, and flow of the children. The village is also wired for audio recordings in each house, which I recorded. Among other things, I was looking for creative sparks in the children, counting number of smiles, laughs, any happy gesticulations, number of minutes spent on each installation, and return visits. I plotted the paths of a few select students each day and follow up with interviews of them at the beginning and the end of the experience.

Although I was aware that when people are being recorded, they sometimes perform for the camera and change their behavior, the “Hawthorne Effect” (Levitt, 2011). However, with the discreet placement of my 360 camera I was able to acquire footage of the entire playground from a fixed vantage point, and my roving hand-held shots were kept inconspicuous. I was also not introduced as the researcher, and so, was able to keep relatively low key throughout the three- day play sessions. My filming in the research space was not a major factor, as the students were all so mesmerized by the space itself, that my observation or the influence of a camera became moot.

The participating class from an elementary school in New Orleans, Louisiana was chosen in collaboration with the New Orleans Airlift, who book classes to visit and partake in their programs throughout the year. Their school has a prominent violin and choir program, so the 62 children came with some variation of prior formal music education. On May 24th, I also observed and led a class experience with 25 grade two students from another school in New

Orleans, Louisiana.

The safety concerns with this study were nominal, if any. Children in any playground are at risk of injury. I ensured that students’ identities were kept anonymous throughout the process, as per the consent form (Appendix E).

Analysis

As Lincoln and Guba (1985) mention, this phase constituted the "lessons learned" from the case. In analyzing the primary data sources that I had compiled, I found evidence for my sub-questions by analytically coding the prior reading, viewing and listening. This process helped concepts such as radical collaboration, benefits of free play, the space as educator, and creative expression through repurposed art, become more evident.

From there, the May 2019 interviews and audio/video recordings were treated the same, extracting learnings and common themes from each of these processes through sorting and organizing my transcriptions and video footage notes. As Bresler (2005) recommends, I was

“listening for texture, for layers of meaning, for subtle dynamics, for dissonance and consonance” (p. 15) in the interviews and observation of the play sessions.

Through qualitative content analysis, I looked for what Merriam (2009) refers to as

“insights in which ‘situations, settings, styles, images, images, meanings and nuances are key topics’” (p. 205). The analysis was inductive, where “although categories and ‘variables’ initially guide the study, others are allowed and expected to emerge throughout” (p. 205). Some of my prior experience and pre-conceived notions around the benefits of a musical playground are inferred in my research question and sub-questions, around positive impacts the space may 63 be having on those it affects. Meaning discernment followed, through reflecting and synthesizing, of which I will unpack in the following chapters.

I prepared the data for analysis: videos, audio, transcriptions, surveys, journal notes, photographs, pre-reading and evolving themes pre-visit, and then developed a coding matrix and analysis chart to analyze after the study was conducted.

During the research phase, the entire time I was organizing the data into computer folders and duplicating the files daily to a stand-alone hard drive. My interview transcription data was a total of 166 pages, over 20 different subjects. I listened through the interviews once, making first impression notes. From there, using transcription software, I reviewed and edited the interviews formally cleaning them up for more formal analysis. Then I reviewed each transcription again, with my more focused lens of developing themes, as they each related to my three research questions. I began to highlight and colour code the interviews, categorizing them into sub-themes, then funneling them further into global themes.

I also documented how these themes reflect or differ from experiences reported by other researchers in the literature, and informally discussed some of my initial thinking with particular interview participants, to gain their feedback on the direction of my theories. I ensured that my sub-themes were substantiated by multiple sources. In Chapters 5, 6, and 7 the following table example is shared, which helped me structure each chapter.

Table 2

Table 2. Outline of Sub-Themes Extraction

Topics Discussed Sub-Themes Identified

64

In a similar way, I analyzed the audio and video footage of the children playing in the space for three consecutive days. I viewed and listened to all of the footage on multiple passes.

Each time, jotting note, and eventually leading to me charting my observations and saving the footage that fit into my themes.

I also made use of “member checking” (Creswell 2012, p. 259), asking three key participants to check the accuracy of my analysis. I emailed the participants, with related documents attached that contained my analysis of the data I had collected from them. I asked each participant to review the documents for accuracy, and whether or not my overall themes and findings were fair and representative. All three participants were satisfied with the accuracy of my findings and representation of them.

Limitations

Some of the limitations I faced in this study were related to who I was able to confirm interviews with. I came close to interviewing a couple of the founding artists, but it never happened due to continued scheduling challenges, even after multiple attempts following my visit to New Orleans in May 2019. I did have one interview participant rescind their interview via email, months later, for no stated reason. That being said, I gained their perspectives through other interview participants, and from direct collaborators.

The video footage I took with my hand-held camera was taken as best as I could observe in the moment, paying attention to engagement levels, play patterns, and other points of interest.

I followed up with a review of my 360-degree camera footage from days one and two. On day three of play observation, my 360-degree camera ran out of batteries in the New Orleans heat, so

I relied more heavily on my hand-held camera for that day. The audio footage that I took of all three days of unstructured play did not reveal much of interest, for although every house was 65 wired with microphones for the MBV’s live performances, with all houses rattling at the same time, it came out as an undecipherable final output. Furthermore, through the single case study model, I was not able to generalize on my results and themes being universal.

Delimitations

I was physically in New Orleans from May 12 to 27th 2019, so there was a set delimitation of time, of which I navigated successfully, with only one pending interview to conduct afterward, with a displaced artist living in Detroit, who I visited in September 2019.

Before heading to New Orleans to conduct the research, I had placed a delimitation on race relations in America, and also the effects of Hurricane Katrina on the city. These two factors, and the topic of gentrification, although prevalent in all of my interviews, had to be deliberately contained within the context of my study and what I was seeking to understand.

Chapter Summary

I used an instrumental case study model to observe the impact the Music Box

Village is having on its neighbourhood, from an educational, creative, and community-building perspective. I used historical and observational methods to develop theories and themes around the space.

In the coming chapters, I will unpack these themes and learnings from my observation of children playing freely in the space, study of written, and audio-visual historical data, journals, video and audio footage I took on site, over twenty interviews with stakeholders, working on a musical production in the park, and more. 66

Chapter 4: The Music Box Village and its Development

Historical Background 2008 - 2019

In this chapter, I explore the origin and development of the Music Box Village (MBV), its supporting organization, the New Orleans Airlift, and describe its constituent “houses.” As outlined in Appendix A, with my personal reflections on interview participants, in this chapter, I examine how their unique career paths and collective expertise helped forge such an original space in the MBV. This cohort of research interview participants consists of visual art connoisseurs, international recording artists, expert curators, civil servants, influential board members, musicologists, sound artists, parents, students, educators, all key stakeholders that, together, helped realize something as special as the MBV. Each of these unique participants was instrumental in helping inform the MBV project, either directly or indirectly.

2008 – The New Orleans Airlift and initial efforts. The New Orleans Airlift, a collective of like-minded artists and a registered not-for-profit organization, was formed in 2008.

It was founded by Delaney Martin and Jay Pennington to help them realize large-scale social art projects in the City of New Orleans and beyond (Martin Interview, 2019). In the words of their co-founder, Jay Pennington (2019) they named their organization after the Berlin Airlift, spawned from an event that honoured its anniversary, and propelled them to a new level of collaboration:

We came up with the idea for the project while we were both in Berlin. It was the 60th anniversary of the Berlin Airlift. So, it seemed fitting and New Orleans seemed like an isolated place, much like Berlin was, post-World War Two. Yeah, that was the origin of the idea. We [Delaney Martin and Jay Pennington] met some people while we were there who seemed to really want to help New Orleans artists come over and visit Berlin in mass. So, we had the idea of this a project called New Orleans Airlift where we would, like, essentially help New Orleans artists come to a place that was more stable, you know, 67

and then, and then return home with resources and attention. (Pennington Interview, 2019) From the New Orleans Airlift website (2020), here is a clear description of the organization’s mandate: “Airlift projects honor tradition alongside innovation, leading our artists, culture and communities in meaningful new directions” (“New Orleans Airlift”, 2020). The organization helps highlight lesser known, underground artists from New Orleans with artists of more international stature, crossing communities, and forging new ones. The New Orleans Airlift helps produce exhibitions, workshops, festivals, performances, and collaborative projects. From their website, the organization also builds unique, and unassuming communities (2020):

Airlift also brings influential artists from abroad to participate in collaborative endeavors with local artists in our own community. We believe that collaboration between artists and across communities shares resources, empowers learning and unites disparate groups in common and powerful goals. (“New Orleans Airlift”, 2020)

One of New Orleans Airlift’s main pillars was the development of the MBV as an alternative music space. The organization valued the rich experience of traditional second line parades in the city (Martin and Edgar Interviews, 2019). The multitude of musical influences in the city soon led them to a key moment when they realized that this structure would not simply be a stage for musicians to play their instruments, but that the house itself could be the instrument (Martin

Interview, 2019). They would create an entirely new structure that musicians could climb on and interact with; an unlikely structure that would have instruments and sound built into it, half sculpture, half house, playing to an audience that would watch from the sidewalks and street.

This idea combined two pillars of New Orleans culture: music and architecture, and helped create a point of entry for the “inventor class” of the city that New Orleans Airlift wanted to spotlight (Perkins Interview, 2019). 68

Later that year, at an early meeting with the city’s office of Historic District Landmarks

Commission, whose job it is to keep new construction consistent with the historic New Orleans neighborhoods, they encouraged New Orleans Airlift founding members to pay close attention to the street the house would be on, Piety Street, a street of 19th century double shotgun homes defined by what the head of the Historic District Landmarks Commission called a “rhythm of door, window, window, door - door, window, window, door - door, window, window, door”

(Perkins & Martin Interviews, 2019). Even the architecture in New Orleans has rhythm. All of these notions and influences came into play with contributing artist Swoon’s model for

Dithyrambalina - a musical house. One of the original collaborating artists, Swoon, dreamed up

Dithyrambalina to host performances with musicians playing its many balconies and walls. It was also envisioned to serve as an actual house, with a bedroom for visiting artists and a gallery space downstairs.

Its founding members imagined parades leading to the house and then musicians playing its many balconies and walls - but it was also envisioned as a real house with a bedroom for visiting artists and a gallery space downstairs (Martin, 2017).

2010 – The house on Piety Street. In 2010, an old New Orleans creole cottage was purchased by musician and DJ, Jay Pennington. This legendary house in the Bywater neighbourhood of New Orleans would unknowingly become the pilot model of the Music Box

Village, co-led by artist Swoon (Callie Curry), Delaney Martin, and Taylor Shepherd. One of the group’s initial intentions was to build a performance hall. The group’s knowledge of local musicians and how to navigate the arts scene, from London to New York, brought a level of innovation to the project, which attracted funders and other important stakeholders to want to get involved. 69

Inspired, and with the encouragement of the neighbourhood, Pennington turned it into a unique, do-it-yourself music venue, where the house became a musical instrument. Jay

Pennington is one of the co-founders of the New Orleans Airlift and imagined the space could be both a headquarters for the organization, and a performance space for music (Pennington

Interview, 2019). This space quickly became a do-it-yourself space for creative expression, a local destination for New Orleanians (Bailey Interview, 2019).

The house collapsed while under renovation, and a new project was conceptualized as a

“musical house” (Martin interview, 2019). At the same time, Swoon worked on the barge board wheat paste fence, and made a mini model of Dithyrambalina, one of the eventual house concepts of MBV.

2011 – A shantytown sound laboratory. The concept began to expand, from the successes of the Piety Street model. Eventually, Delaney Martin would conceptualize The Music

Box: A Shantytown Sound Laboratory – with smaller art pieces, individual “houses” that were not residential but purely instrumental. Earlier names for the concept reveal different aspects of what it was intended to be, in this case, a sound exploration laboratory, hinting at the adventure playground model, with the word “Shantytown.” Joan Almon (2013) defends the word while making a case for the importance of the adventure playground model in more American cities:

The final objection mentioned is that they are unattractive. It is true that they often look like a shanty town, but a charming child-built one. In the end this seems like a minor problem compared to a generation growing up without a wide range of play opportunities. (p. 22)

Over twenty-five artists, including professor and composer Rick Snow, came through over a period of 3 months to work on several new musical structures. These collaborative building 70 teams often included musicians, builders, engineers, and mechanics, connecting varying skills and capabilities, and forging atypical creative relationships (Martin Interview, 2019).

After more prototypes and discussion, the project was finally born, and its explosive collaborative nature was born along with it. Over the course of about three months in 2011, close to 25 artists came in and out of Pennington’s modest yard on Piety St. in the Bywater neighborhood of New Orleans to build The Music Box, A Shantytown Sound Laboratory

(Pennington Interview, 2019). Some artists were accomplished out-of-towners like Brooklyn’s

Aaron Taylor Kuffner, the creator of the Gamelatron musical instrument. Quintron, a local legend, inventor and musician, built an instrument called The Singing House that played the weather and changed musical notes driven by the light of the sunrise and sunset.

Later that year, Alita Edgar informally joined the New Orleans Airlift team. Edgar was an old friend of Swoon and had helped her bring several art projects to life in Brooklyn. Edgar also knew Delaney Martin and Jay Pennington from when they all lived in New York. When

Edgar (2019) came down to observe the project in 2011, she “loved it and ended up moving here” (Edgar Interview, 2019). Her role with New Orleans Airlift began casually on a project- by-project basis, as a fundraiser, a visual artist, a production assistant, a grant writer, she wore a lot of hats in those first years. Edgar would help Martin and the team write the deal in the negotiations to get the financing of the permanent property in 2016. She signed on as an official fulltime member of the Airlift team several years later, helping the organization bolster its board of directors, working on more elaborate fundraising strategies and more. Her role has been instrumental in acting as a balance between Pennington and Martin.

As stated on the New Orleans Airlift website (2020), it is evident how pivotal this project was in captivating the imaginations of New Orleanians: 71

Over the course of nine months, 15,000 visitors came to interact with invented instruments that were embedded in the ceilings, walls and floors of multiple structures, and 70+ musicians from New Orleans and beyond performed orchestral concerts on the installation to sold-out audiences. (“New Orleans Airlift”, 2020)

These events in the lot on Piety Street included visits from notorious musicians such as Thurston

Moore, Andrew WK and several others. This helped give the project more notoriety, and further establish their collaborative model of international artist paired with a local. Martin (2019) acknowledges this important mix of celebrity with local voices:

I will say that I think having this little tiny sprinkle of celebrity has also been part of the DNA and it's not just to be flashy or say we had a celebrity. It’s to have an unsigned person in New Orleans who's a musician, to have the experience of working with these people. Right? (Martin Interview, 2019)

Early supporter and ethnomusicologist Daniel Sharp, from Tulane University also noticed the great exposure the project was getting, partly due to the shine of their guest artist lineup. It was an opportunity, as Sharp (2019) explains, to shine a light on deeper social issues of the neighbourhood and New Orleans at large.

When NPR would talk to Jay [Pennington] and things, blight was a lot more on people's minds because, and it was part of their story, this idea of turning blight into wonder because there were so many post-Katrina there. There's an aspect of this story that is like the story of the Music Box is very connected to the, the kind of the move from a post- Katrina moment to a post post-Katrina moment. (Sharp Interview, 2019)

By the end of this 9-month long experiment, New Orleans Airlift, Swoon and the team of 25 artists had come to realize that they had outgrown their original site where lines for performances had wrapped around city blocks. The group also all decided to incorporate the successful village concept into designs going forward. A single house now seemed kind of obtuse compared to the 72 spatial-sonic experience the village had allowed for (Martin, 2017). There was no one view or one way of hearing the performances, with audiences sitting all around the village on stoops, inside structures and anywhere they could find a seat or place to stand. This was a really unique way of experiencing a performance and the group didn’t want to lose that magic.

2013 – Prototypes and outposts. After closing the original Music Box, opportunities to create outposts of this New Orleans-inspired project took Airlift as far as Kiev, Ukraine and as close to home as Shreveport, Louisiana. According to Martin (2019), the model has exported well with each outpost attempt: “I mean we've got so many great friends these different times we've gone to Shreveport, Tampa, Atlanta, Massachusetts. Kiev” (Martin Interview, 2019). As these outpost models were being developed by New Orleans Airlift, they were concurrently designing concepts for sizes, sounds, and installations of new houses.

The Shreveport installation project was important in many ways, as the team had the opportunity to collaborate with Hardy Fox, one of the members of the elusive and experimental band, The Residents, who were an early influence on Pennington Shepherd and others in their collective (Pennington, 2018). It also allowed Shepherd to include one of his early mentors, from Michigan, the experimental musician and sound artist, Frank Pahl.

2015 – City park roving village. City Park, a 1,300-acre public park in New Orleans,

Louisiana, is the 87th largest and 20th-most-visited urban public park in the United States

(Harnik, Martin and O’Grady, 2014).

In 2015, a temporary installation of the Music Box Village appeared in New Orleans City

Park, making its first appearance in the city since 2012. The public once again fell in love with the project with over 10,000 people visiting over the course of 6 weekends (Martin Interview,

2019). In addition to public hours, thousands of children attended field trips and the 73 performances brought another list of notable musicians, including William Parker, Solange

Knowles, Bruce Barnes, Josh Dibbs of Animal Collective, Wilco, and Arto Lindsay, to name a few.

2016 – A permanent home for musical architecture. After months of real estate searching, negotiation and securing funds, the current site on North Rampart Street was purchased, and the construction began in April 2016. Later that year, they would open to the public. The space is a “perfect fit” (Edgar Interview, 2019) for the project, with a one-acre public space for the houses, and an adjoining 13,000 square foot former metal fabrication shop which facilitates the work of maintaining and growing the installations. As per the New Orleans

Airlift website (2020), “Our permanent home has allowed us to continue this ongoing experiment in ‘musical architecture,’ bringing more collaborators and audiences to it every year” (“New

Orleans Airlift”, 2020).

The new site sits underneath the boughs of a magical one-acre forest along a railroad track next to a canal leading to the Mississippi river. The sounds of this musical village are accompanied by periodic ship horns, shunting trains, and the honks and whistles of drawbridges going up and down. The village adjoins a 13,000 sq. ft. former metal fabrication shop that allows the work of maintaining and growing the village to continue. “It is the perfect place for the

Music Box Village to have landed” (Martin, 2017).

Later that inaugural year, Leah Hennessy joined the New Orleans Airlift team, first working in their education programs, while learning the organization. From there, Hennessy quickly began to support its programming, eventually moving into the role of Artistic Director.

Finally, on October 28th, 2016 the Music Box Village opened its doors to the public. 74

The Music Box Village as a Form of Creative Expression

I see it as an art project. I don't see it as a venue. I see it as an evolving experimental art project that wants to grow around a central framework. I'm pretty stubborn around the framework, you know, people have been like ‘I have an idea for a musical loom’ I'm like, musical looms sound great. Go build it elsewhere. Like we did musical architecture and that's where I get kind of like strict about it because I feel like I don't want to turn it into a junkyard of sounding things. Delaney Martin (Interview, 2019)

Pennington collaborated on this project with his co-founder of New Orleans Airlift, Delaney

Martin, an installation artist and social instigator herself, creating grandiose spectacles in New

York, London and other cultural centres, before being captivated by New Orleans. Delaney

Martin began to attract other artists to the project such as Taylor Lee Shepherd, a renowned sound artist and mechanical tinkerer (Martin, 2017). Collectively everyone was inspired by the history of the creole cottage, the everyday presence of music in New Orleans, and the city’s under-celebrated class of tinkerers, inventors and avant-garde musicians (Bailey Interview,

2019).

Radical Collaboration – Leading to Community Development

The whole endeavor quickly took on a tenor of civic cooperation, where everything from building codes to instrumentation was considered within a framework of “radical collaboration”

(Martin, 2017). The first fall and spring season brought 30,000 people to the site along with incredible musicians like Norah Jones, Gogol Bordello, Preservation Hall Jazz Band and more to explore and create unique new sounds and ways of experiencing music.

The vision to grow a permanent sonic playground, performance venue and laboratory for musical architecture and cultural experimenting in New Orleans was well underway. As Alita

Edgar (Interview, 2019) outlines, every year is a challenge to ensure the organization is fundraising in a responsible way. From applications to the National Endowment for the Arts, to 75 corporate sponsors over the years, to four or five Kickstarter campaigns, the entire team has worked together to ensure they remain sustainable.

The Villagers – Connecting the Dots

In this section, I outline the professional background of each interview participant, and how their unique voices connect to the MBV project. Within this group of unique contributors, we find a team that came together to create something truly unique and inspiring to the world of sound art, to its block in the Bywater neighbourhood, to the world of experimental music, to the world of community building, and more. Each individual helps unravel what makes a place like the MBV so special, and they each demonstrate how the space truly functions as a village. From the founders and members of the New Orleans Airlift collective, I revealed the philosophical drivers that helped conceive the idea. From the supporting stakeholders, I better understood the role it plays in the city. Finally, from the contributing artists and stakeholders, I grasped how the space works as a resonator of creative expression.

Founding members.

Delaney Martin, Co-Founder New Orleans Airlift. Alongside Jay Pennington in the founding of New Orleans Airlift, is co-founder and visionary Delaney Martin, a world-renowned artist, mobilizer, and difficult to peg down to one field or artistic discipline (Edgar, Bailey, and

Perkins Interviews, 2019). Martin (2017) has a strong background in launching international arts projects with such artists as Swoon (aka Callie Curry), and “came to New Orleans in 1998 on a road trip, drove into the Garden District and just said to my friend, well I have all my stuff, so

I’m just going to move here.” From the New Orleans Airlift website (2020), “her work often engages the historical and cultural specificity of people and places to create spectacular, immersive environments marked by frequent collaborations and performance” (“New Orleans 76

Airlift”, 2020). Martin’s unique skill set ranges from being able to leverage the purchase and real estate deal of MetFab in 2016, to collaborating with the Smithsonian in negotiating the details for Elevator Pitch, the installation of their most recent house. She can pivot and speak the different business languages of lawyers to law-breaking artists alike (Bailey and Shepherd

Interviews, 2019). Martin is educated with a Master’s in Art History from London Consortium in England.

Jay Pennington, Co-Founder New Orleans Airlift. Jay Pennington (2019), one of the co-founders of New Orleans Airlift, hails originally from Texas, where he was exposed to many unique artistic concepts at a young age.

I got lucky. I grew up in Houston where there's a lot of good free, conceptual art. There's this place called the Menil Collection, which is the largest privately held collection of Surrealist art that's available to the public and the world. Yeah. And it was open for free every day, seven days a week, you know? And so, I spent a lot of time there and Rothko Chapel and a lot of different places where art was just available. Like Houston just had oil money and spent it on art, you know, and, and so I feel very lucky in that sense. I also was in symphonies and my background as a drummer was everything you could possibly do as a drummer. So marching bands to punk bands to symphonic percussion. Just anything you could put your mind to. And I think that that's how I look at everything now. I got a broad education as a kid. I'm able to just share some of the breadth of that with people just feels really good. (Pennington Interview, 2019)

Pennington (2019), a musician, and great connector of artists, saw an opportunity as he settled in

New Orleans in the early 2000’s.

I'm a musician. Delaney Lived in London at the time. I was working a lot as an art handler and all over Europe doing big art fairs and stuff like moving art for a living. That was my, my summer job would be go to Europe. My winter job would be working in America, the like art Basel and the things as jobs. I was just the guy hanging stuff. So, any way we got to talking, we founded New Orleans Airlift as an effort to help New 77

Orleans artists kinda get out. And then we quickly realized people were coming into New Orleans as artists and asking for opportunities to work with New Orleans artists. I had people contact me and say like, ‘Hey, do you know Sissy Nobby, do you know Big Freedia, you know, Katey Red, can you help me get in touch with them? I want to do with some songs in New Orleans’, blah, blah, blah. And that seemed like, you know, another good, it seemed like a in a sense, just like a good bridge to build, right? (Pennington Interview, 2019)

Working with legendary New Orleanian musical artists such as Big Freedia, Jay Pennington is lauded as one of the forefathers of bounce music (Welch, 2018), working under the artist name

DJ Rusty Lazer.

Taylor Lee Shepherd, Technical Director, New Orleans Airlift. Taylor Lee Shepherd is a renowned sound artist and the Technical Director in the MBV. He is one of the founding members of the project. As per the New Orleans Airlift (2020) website:

Taylor Lee Shepherd has been the lead sound artist for New Orleans Airlift since the inception of The Music Box. Shepherd, along with Delaney Martin and Swoon formed the very early collaborative meetings around building a musical house and has advised and influenced the process and the realization of the project. (“New Orleans Airlift, 2020)

Shepherd, originally from Detroit, worked with sound artists such as Frank Pahl in his early days, and began travelling to New Orleans quite frequently. Finally, a couple of months after

Hurricane Katrina, Shepherd ended up travelling to New Orleans, and like so many, never left.

In November 2019, Shepherd performed a solo piece, bringing the entire Music Box

Village to life, using looper pedals installed in each musical house. Here is more background on

Shepherd’s role, from the program notes for his solo performance The Flight of Icarus (program notes, 2019):

Taylor Lee Shepherd is the founding sound artist of the long-running Music Box project of New Orleans Airlift. He contributed to the original seed of an idea for musical 78

architecture and has had a heavy curatorial and building hand at all of the project’s outposts and installations along the way. At the current and now permanent incarnation, Music Box Village in the Bywater, Shepherd acts as Technical Director, keeping dozens of artists’ interactive experiments functioning day to day. No one knows the Village and its potential better than he.

New Orleans Airlift – members of the collective.

Leah Hennessy, Artistic Director, New Orleans Airlift. From the New Orleans Airlift website (2020) Leah Hennessy’s “creative practice combines tools of improvisation with jazz, blues and folk influences to play with and investigate the tension between traditional forms and experimental expression. As a curator, Leah’s work focuses on promoting pathways for multi- disciplinary collaboration and creativity—particularly as it relates to fostering local arts and culture” (“New Orleans Airlift”, 2020). From 2013-2015, Hennessy was co-director of Gallery

263, a not-for-profit arts organization that provides a contemporary voice for the arts in

Cambridge, MA through an eclectic array of public programs.

With a Master’s in Contemporary Improvisation from New England Conservatory, Leah

Hennessy came to the New Orleans Airlift in September 2016, from having significant curatorial experience in Massachusetts, she was immediately accepted into the Airlift family. Her background as an educator and arts curator make her well-suited for the role of Artistic Director, in which she collaborates with Jay Pennington.

Being a white transplant, the topic of gentrification is especially sensitive to Hennessy.

Her curatorial decisions, collaborating with Pennington in programming the musical productions of the space, are informed by her relationship to the organization and the city of New Orleans, as a transplant. 79

Hennessy (2019) defines New Orleans Airlift as “an artist driven non-profit organization

. . . very steeped and focused on collaborative work, between people of New Orleans and people with a national or international presence. And we collaborate to create experimental public artwork” (Hennessy Interview, 2019). From interviewing Leah, I noticed that her musical vocabulary included Anthony Braxton and other outside-the-box musical thinkers, that she has worked hard to defend her brand of weird music, and that the MBV embodies this, with experimentalism in the foreground.

Alita Edgar, Director of Strategy and Special Projects, New Orleans Airlift. Alita

Edgar joined the New Orleans Airlift team in 2011 and has since performed many roles for the organization. Edgar was connected with the artist Swoon (Callie Curry) from early days and also knew Delaney Martin around that same time. From the New Orleans Airlift website (2020),

Edgar’s biography reads:

Alita brings over fifteen years’ experience in production, fundraising, publicity and events in the arts underground of New York City and New Orleans, with a key role in arts organizations such as Flux Factory, the Madagascar Institute, Swimming Cities, Rubulad, and the Boggsville Boatel. Her work crosses the fields of costume design, speakeasy, performative/historic circus and carnival tradition, hospitality, and trespass theater with collaborative group the Shadow Parks Department. She holds a B.A. in Clinical Psychology from Smith College and a Masters of Science in Historic Preservation and Urban Planning from Pratt Institute. (“New Orleans Airlift”, 2020)

Similar to Martin, Pennington and so many members of the New Orleans Airlift team, Edgar helps connect communities, such as the similar Madagascar Institute in Brooklyn into the MBV network. 80

Christian Repaal, Shop Manager/Lead Fabricator. Christian Repaal joined the New

Orleans Airlift team in 2009 supporting Delaney Martin and Taylor Lee Shepherd on some art installations, and never left. When the permanent space for MBV was acquired, Repaal was a crucial contributor in getting the space ready for the public, and setting it up, from lighting to the wall that surrounds it, to the aesthetics of the houses, Christian Repaal had a major influence on the overall space.

Eliza MacDermott, Director of Public Programs and Community Engagement, New

Orleans Airlift. Education Coordinator Eliza MacDermott moved to New Orleans in 2012, and joined the New Orleans Airlift a couple of years later. With a Master’s degrees and a strong background in International Development and Philosophy, Eliza MacDermott brings a level of depth and rigor to the organization’s educational programming and community-building. Her part-time seasonal roles with New Orleans Airlift were an obvious barrier to the larger potential impact MacDermott could make on the organization. Nonetheless, considering this, her impact is even more significant.

Key contributing stakeholders.

Elliot Perkins, Executive Director, New Orleans Historic District Landmarks

Commission. The Executive Director of New Orleans Historic District Landmarks Commission,

Elliot Perkins (2019) has played a crucial role in building up the city since Hurricane Katrina hit.

I'm Executive Director of the historic district landmarks commission. I've been Executive Director since February of 2005. So, seen everything from when I became Executive Director before Katrina, which is interesting, and then all of a sudden, things got real and we lost most of our staff. Well after Katrina, because the city took such a hit for the revenue, that we didn't have the money to employee everyone. So, our staff was reduced to four people in the wake of the storm, trying to put the city back together. (Perkins Interview, 2019) 81

An artist himself, Perkins (2019) was sympathetic to the general purpose of the Music Box

Village, especially in those early days after Katrina.

So, the Music Box was really interesting in that, by day I do this. I also have an art studio, where I just make things for my own pleasure. When Delaney came to me, I kind of understood where they were going…Taking something that is just art, and trying to translate it into something a little more concrete. (Perkins Interview, 2019)

Rick Snow, Professor of Practice, Music Science and Technology, Tulane University.

From Tulane University, Rick Snow is a sound artist and professor. Snow has been one of the mentioned collaborators in the New Orleans Airlift model, having helped launch an early project in the City Park temporary installation of 2015.

From his Tulane University (2019) biography, it is evident how Snow’s background ties in nicely with the long list of Music Box Village collaborators:

Rick Snow creates multi-modal artworks of sound and light. Custom interactive computer sound and projection mapping instruments and installations comprise his most recent work. In this work he creates situations in which audiences discover a complex “alien” generative system with its own memory and habits. These situations create an interaction between participant and work engaging the active memory and movement of both the participant and the system. (“Tulane University”, 2019)

Snow was also one of the instrumental collaborators, paired with Christine SunKim in the 2019 permanent house installation of Elevator Pitch.

Bryan Bailey, Board Member, New Orleans Airlift. Bryan Bailey (Interview, 2019) is a business mogul in New Orleans, from real estate projects to film producer, his career path seemed as diverse as the city he worked in. Originally from Knoxville, Tennessee, Bailey has called New Orleans home for the last twenty-two years. 82

Bryan Bailey is a board member with the New Orleans Airlift, who was drawn to the project informally, in its early days, as he was working with a small production team doing documentary film work and one of his team members had supported the New Orleans Airlift with producing a Kickstarter video. Bailey began to frequent the Piety Street space, and befriend

Pennington, Martin and others on the core team, as he also knew Swoon. Eventually joining the

New Orleans Airlift board of directors and being involved with their business planning for over ten years, Bailey has helped Delaney Martin in acquiring their permanent space, and also with several funding pitches.

Contributing artists.

Quintron, musical artist and contributor. Quintron (aka Robert Rolston) is a musician, often performing as a one-man-band, or with his partner, the puppeteer, Miss Pussycat. In New

Orleans, Quintron is a celebrated nightclub organist and inventor, who has patented a number of his own inventions and often performs at his own private club, the Spellcaster Lodge. One of

Quintron’s most innovative musical inventions is Weather Warlock (2017), “a band AND a unique weather-responsive instrument, first revealed in the original Music Box installation and streaming the sounds of New Orleans weather” (“Third Man Records”, 2017).

Andrew Schrock, contributing artist. Having gone to Catholic University in DC and studied visual art, Andrew Schrock ended up in New Orleans after he graduated, and stay a while. In his early days in New Orleans, Schrock helped start up the Parse Nola art gallery, and made several connections within the city’s art scene. It was at this point that he connected with some of the main stakeholders at New Orleans Airlift.

Eventually, Schrock would collaborate on several projects with Airlift, including their

Kiev outpost, the building of their distinct wall, and the Chateau Poulet, alongside German sound 83 artist Klaas Hubner.

Currently based out of Detroit, Schrock has launched his own School of Everything which his website defines as “a bus, a studio and an environment for skill-share anywhere a bus can drive. Andrew has converted this 40-foot blue and white school bus into his mobile studio and residence, essentially his all in one art adventure command center” (“Schrock website”, 2020).

Tif Lamson, contributing artist. Tif “Teddy” Lamson is a local New Orleanian musician and recording artist in the internationally-known band Givers. Lamson has spent a lot of time working in the Music Box Village with Pennington and Hennessy in presenting a monthly series known as Teddy’s Twilight Serenade. She honed a pivotal collaborative partnership in her creative career through the local-international model that the New Orleans Airlift foster, in their pairing up Tif Lamson with Canadian recording artist Peaches, when she did her first performance in the space. The two have since collaborated on numerous productions, exported across Europe and beyond, which all trace back to their initial collaboration in the Music Box

Village.

General stakeholders.

“Ms. French” & “Mr. English” Teachers from a participating elementary school in

New Orleans, Louisiana. I interviewed both of the grade four teachers who participated in the study, Ms. French and Mr. English, teachers at a participating elementary school in New

Orleans, Louisiana. Although this participating school already had a great formal music program, with a strong strings and vocal programs, this exercise in unstructured play opened up a different side of music-making for the students. Mr. English (2019) already identified as a “soul musician,” and Ms. French (Interview, 2019) “always wanted to play the drums. Don't ask me why, but I always wanted to play drums. And when I saw the, the setup with the drums, like I 84 was automatically drawn to the Junk Kit, it reminded me of Fat Albert and the Gang!” (Mr.

English Interview, 2019)

Daniel Sharp, Chair of Music, Tulane University. Daniel Sharp is Associate Professor of Music, Ethnomusicology and Department Chair at Tulane University, and is currently writing a book about the Music Box Village from a pop music perspective. Sharp goes back with the project to its early days at the original Piety Street location, where he connected with Jay

Pennington, Taylor Shepherd and Delaney Martin.

Sharp (2018) took his 2016-17 research leave year to focus on documenting the collaborations within the Music Box Village at an instrumental time in the organization’s development. “For this ethnographic research project, I am interested in questions surrounding both the creation of the art and the curation of the project” (Sharp, 2018, p. 4). Sharp (2012), having spent significant time observing the Music Box Village, notes “I do see a flickering between the site being enchanting, and remaining haunted by the recent and distant past. The playfulness of the space as visitors explore coexists with the post-Katrina landscape of blighted houses and piles of rubble” (Sharp presentation notes, 2012).

Marilyn Payne, regular visitor during Open Hours. Most Saturday afternoons, during

Open Hours, it is likely to find Marilyn Payne and her two children Shakayah, eleven, and

Brendton, nine, playing in the Music Box Village. From the Bywater neighbourhood, Marilyn and her children often bring other family members and friends to play with them, and appreciate this unique space. Marilyn has lived in the Bywater neighbourhood for twenty-five years.

Payne’s children are creative, into dance and origami, so the Music Box Village is a great space to help foster this. According to Payne “Honestly speaking, they are getting what any other kid would want . . . peace of mind, and they get to learn about their culture . . . it’s not too quiet, but 85 it gives a peace of mind.” Payne (2019) sees that her children discover new elements in the playground each time they visit. “It’s very helpful to the community, it teaches you about your culture, your history . . . Native Americans and racial backgrounds that can be shared with the rest of America” (Payne Interview, 2019)

Houses in the Village

Each musical house in the MBV was designed by a different collaborative team, part of the 1,000 different artists that Pennington (Interview, 2019) highlights have contributed to defining the space. Refer to Appendix G (A Field Guide to Musical Architecture) for a visual depiction and more background on each house, including its contributors. Each of the houses can vary in size, but the average is around ten by ten feet.

Delaney Martin (Interview, 2019) did not intend for the visitor experience to be linear or prescribed. There is deliberately no interpretive signage in the MMB, as Martin (2019) wants the visitor to figure it out on their own terms “I don’t like signs, or instruction” in her words,

“when you come into the art gate, there's a newspaper, the Field Guide to Musical Architecture

[Appendix G] is my concession” (Martin Interview, 2019). This was exemplified by the participating students from the study, who each day when the unstructured play began, took different routes of exploration.

With collaboration in the foreground, each musical house adopts a unique take on sound art, with most houses pairing up a local and international artist. 86

Bowers Nest. Figure 2, the video clip below:

Figure 2. Bower's Nest.

Created by Russ Harmon, Bowers Nest encompasses a series of cut copper pipes hanging from the exterior of the house with hub caps resonating guitar strings and mirrors galore on the interior, one certainly gets transported into another world. The house is wired with amplifiers and looping effects pedals, which allow short musical phrases to be repeated and built upon.

This gives Bowers Nest diverse opportunities for sound sources in the park, from the pitched pipe and threaded screw percussion elements, to the sitar-like strings. Note the world music feel in the video excerpt, touching on mbira and kalimba-inspired instrument designs, using recycled materials. This house is user-friendly, and certainly highlights the element of repurposing familiar items into music, from car parts to pipes and hardware materials. Delaney Martin

(2019) provides vision for what a model such as the Music Box Village could represent in other countries:

I mean, can you imagine a project like this in India or Africa? I mean like example, like, you know, like a hook, what is it? Kokono Number One and all those like bands from Congo that like literally are making their own instruments from junk, like to kind of pair it with that. (Martin Interview, 2019) 87

Bowers Nest sits within the inner circle of the Music Box Village, and is a close hop to PitchBo

Shake House, and the Delphine, giving great opportunities for sonic experiences, even impromptu jams between the houses.

The Synphonium. Figure 3, the video clip below:

Figure 3. The Synphonium.

Created by artists Devon Brady and LiveWork Collective, The Synphonium is essentially a water tower, with organ pipes installed high in its tower. In their words “Water and air power and modulated horns and whistles inspired by trains and boats passing the village” (Appendix

G). A little more tucked away in the corner of the Music Box Village, this house offers a more peaceful experience, with the four soothing notes of the organ pipes, with a button that can trigger a waterfall all around the user, this house is best experienced alone. What it does not provide in pitch possibilities, this house still offers a lot to experience. 88

The Delphine. Figure 4, the video clip below:

Figure 4. The Delphine.

Created by artists SWOON and Darryl Reeves, in collaboration with New Orleans Master

Crafts Guild, The Delphine is an example of how Music Box Village can coalesce the City of

New Orleans. From the New Orleans Master Crafts Guild’s website (2020), they seek “cultural engagement to promote the indispensability of New Orleans’ unique building arts traditions through demonstrations, cultural events and collaborations with high profile artists.” This house is a staple in the park, situated right in its centre, an iron-worked “brass balcony” (Appendix G) taking various boat horns, triggered by levers, and also incorporates trombones, and air compressors, where the pitch is manipulated by foot-controllers. Lots of honks and brass band sounds emanate from this house, and it can easily fit four or more performers on it at once.

The Shake House. Figure 5, the video clip below:

Figure 5. The Shake House. 89

The Shake House, a collaboration between founding members Delaney Martin and

Taylor Lee Shepherd, consists of clapping clap boards and a sub floor station. With a popular electronic musical invention in its centre, Shake House features a rotating cylinder, and random synthesizer tones that can be manipulated by the user with switches. The video segment shows co-founder Jay Pennington giving a demonstration of the house and all of its functions.

Chateau Poulet. Figure 6, the video clip below:

Figure 6. Chateau Poulet.

A play on the word pulley, Chateau Poulet was created by German artist Klass Hubner and New Orleanian (now Detroiter) Andrew Schrock. It is a fan favourite, pardon the pun, as

Chateau Poulet works based on the users pulling down four different strings which trigger the fans in the upper part of the house to make different pitched whirlies sing. A very mysterious sound emanates from this unique house. The user experience for all ages is mesmerizing.

According to Schrock (2019):

the mechanics of the thing, it's actually from, we got inspiration from lawn mowers…so I was looking at machines that have really simple mechanisms to accomplish this and the clutch system underneath the riding lawn mower is like, just that. It's like it's two pulleys and you put them in as you put them like under pressure and you can speed and slow things down. Okay. According to how much pressure you add to it and it's like an amount of slip that goes onto the belts. So basically, it's like a series of belts that I'm attached to, 90

like one central drive motor and you pull on these ropes to adjust the tension and that like allows for this slip to repeat (Schrock Interview, 2019)

Chateau Poulet also seems to be one of the more popular draws, for children of all ages, given its user-friendliness, other-worldly sounds, and unique ability to see how it functions.

Western Electric 2. Figure 7, the video clip below:

Figure 7. Western Electric 2.

This popular house, by Nina Nichols and Matthew Ostrowski is a phone booth, near the centre of the Music Box Village, with rotating megaphone speakers on the roof, giving a Leslie speaker vibrato effect. During my stay, and notably during open hours, I witnessed many popular songs and rants being delivered from this smaller, phone booth house. The house also has a similarity to the newest house in the Music Box Village, Elevator Pitch, in that it was a repurposed space with a different function, other than a house. So, in both cases, a phone booth 91 and elevator become musical instruments. In this video excerpt, co-founder Jay Pennington gives a good overview of how the house can function within the Music Box Village.

Video clip, Figure 8 is an example, from the participating grade four class from New

Figure 8. Unstructured Play Excerpt.

Orleans, Louisiana, day two unstructured play session. Note how many kids can creatively fit into this popular house. Note also the uniqueness of a phone booth and microphone to amplify the human voice, which is a big draw in the park, hence why it also sits quiet deliberately in the centre of the park.

Drum Kitchen. Figure 9, the video clip below:

Figure 9. Drum Kitchen. 92

This house, on the upper level of Music Box Village was created by Ian Vanek and

Clayton Stephens of the band Japanther. A series of kitchen items, from hanging pots to cheese graters, installed among floor toms and other percussive instruments, it does what the title implies, and blends drums with kitchen staples. This house sits comfortably on the second level of the playground, a little smaller than the other houses in Music Box Village, Drum Kitchen gets a lot of usage, due to the familiarity of its layout, and great view for collaborative performance. Drum Kitchen also sparks the imagination of children of all ages to use household items for music-making, celebrating the kitchen party traditions of Acadian or Cajun culture.

Tintinnabulation Station. Figure 10, the video clip below:

Figure 10. Tintinnabulation Station.

A beautifully simple design by its creator Angelina Polacheck, Tintinnabulation Station consists of a large rope, hanging from a tree, with a lace dome frame around it, and hundreds of hanging bells that make sound as the user swings. In the words of its creators, “shake your grandmother’s attic full of lace, baubles, and memories” (Appendix G). A child favourite, this house is quite user-friendly and simple, yet there was always a lineup at it on all three days of play observation with students from our participating school study. Even though the experience seems intended for one user at a time, classes of students could sometimes fit entire friend 93 groups in the instrument. Once again, a smaller, more deliberately-confined space, this swing gets a lot of use every day the Music Box Village is open.

Inter-relational Messages and Patterns. Figure 11 below:

Figure 11. Inter-relational Messages and Patterns.

Created by Carl Joe Williams and Luther Gray in collaboration with Ashe Cultural Arts

Centre, Inter-relational Messages and Patterns is another installation which embodies the collaborative and community-building spirit of Music Box Village, modelled after an African market bang bang. This mobile sectional of oil drums was used prominently in the structured play sessions with our participating school of the research study. 94

Pitchbo House. Figure 12, the video clip below:

Figure 12. Pitchbo House.

This house, created by Alyssa Denis and Ranjit Bhatnagar features an amplified bass string, where the pitch is manipulated by its two sliding doors. Inside, the squeaky floorboards are also amplified using pickups, so the house becomes a wonderfully noisy racket that can also loop throughout the park using looper effects pedals and amplification. Experienced players such as Taylor Lee Shepherd and Tif Lamson can make this house sing incredibly.

Here is an example of Taylor Lee Shepherd building a loop using PitchBo sounds and then venturing over to Bowers Nest to perform with it, also note the shirt Shepherd happens to be wearing, of the band The Residents, who influence his work in the park. Figure 13, the video clip below:

Figure 13. Shepherd Performing on Pitchbo House. 95

Chief’s House. Figure 14, the video clip below:

Figure 14. Chief's House.

Created by Big Chief Darryl Montana of the Yellow Pocahontas in collaboration with

Gamelatron, Jeff Poree Plastering and Studio Inferno Glass is another example of community- building through music and sculpture. This house, much like The Delphine, connects artists of complimenting disciplines and trades to pull together something truly unique. The house also features several scales using cowbells, and also sampled audio clips from the Yellow Pocahontas using an electric drum pad.

Vox Murum. Figure 15 below:

Figure 15. Vox Murum. 96

This house was developed by Taylor Lee Shepherd. Vox Murum (aka The Voice Wall) is a vocal sample booth that permeates the Music Box Village, using effect looper pedals and samples. It was a very intriguing piece that was functional in September 2019, but had since been dismantled. Several elements were repurposed in other houses when I visited in May 2019, demonstrating how the space is always evolving. It is a living organism in so many ways.

Porch Life: Figure 16, the video clip below:

Figure 16. Porch Life.

This house, a two-storey mobile installation, build by Taylor Lee Shepherd, Christian

Repaal, and incorporating Quintron’s Weather-based instrument, gets a lot of exposure. It can certainly fit ten or more children at a time, from its metronome swing set, to its guitar string railing, to its beat-triggered steps, the Porch Life experience is one that has travelled to Aux

Claires Festival, Detroit, New Yok City and more. 97

Elevator Pitch. Figure 17 below:

Figure 17. Elevator Pitch.

Finally, Elevator Pitch, the newest house in the Music Box Village, a collaboration between Christine SunKim (pictured left) and Rick Snow will be unpacked in greater detail in the following chapter, as an example of how the Music Box Village fosters creative collaborations. This house, taking sampled voices of fourteen deaf Louisianans, resonates their voices as they are played back by triggering the buttons in the elevator. This activity of screaming in a resonant space in order to feel the vibrations of one’s own voice, is something that Christine SunKim wanted to highlight as a deaf artist.

Figure 18. Elevator Pitch.

This video highlights SunKim and Rick Snow, alongside members of the Airlift team

(Delaney Martin, Taylor Shepherd and Leah Hennessy) in explaining how the house works and the project was inspired (Figure 18, the video clip). 98

Chapter Summary

In summary, this chapter told the origin story of how the Music Box Village came to exist. Hinged on the specialness of the founding members of the New Orleans Airlift, a collective of sound artists and experimental musicians, this project was supported by a broad swath of New Orleans cultural developers, from the municipal government, educators, community members, professors, real estate business people and more.

From the pilot project, a house on Piety Street that outgrew the block, to the eventual permanent space on North Ramparts Street, I traced the evolution of this unique project, the

Music Box Village, as executed by the organization, an arts collective, the New Orleans Airlift.

Their acquisition of an old metal fabrication space in the Bywater neighbourhood, with a sanctuary for musical architecture, in these sounding musical houses that all come together, with the people that inspire their creation – creates a village of sound art itself. This chapter gives further background on each unique interview participant, pivotal in helping outline how a project such as this takes a village of inspiring, well-informed people, to make it into reality.

In the chapters ahead, I will examine how the Music Box village functions as a safe space for creative expression, a model for alternative music education, and also a vehicle for community building. 99

Chapter 5: The Music Box Village and Creative Expression

In this chapter, I discuss my findings on how the Music Box Village (MBV) creates a safe space for creative expression, fostering unique music, the creative voices of New Orleanian artists and beyond. I unpack my findings through data analysis, including, interview transcripts, observation of play, pre-existing data about the site, and journal entries.

I begin with a working definition of creative expression, primarily in education, but also applying to the multidisciplinary function of the MBV. I discuss how the MBV functions as a platform for sharing ideas and diverse productions in the form of composition, improvisation, and artistic collaborations. From there I discuss the MBV as a presenter, and how this sense of exploration applies to their programming mandate.

Whereas the above section derives more from theory, the next section is more driven by my data. From my data analysis, five distinct sub-themes emerged related to creative expression: the post-modern aesthetic, the overall design of the space, the preservation of experimentalism, the importance of local history, celebration and commemoration, and the organization itself.

Creative Expression in the Music Box Village

Paschall (1934) defines creative expression in the classroom as “the development of a thinking brain on the part of the student” (p. 149). Creative expression in music, helps its participants gain experience through composition or improvisation, working through a series of problems or challenges (Roesler, 2016). The MBV, through its open-ended, non-linear design, encourages improvisation and experimental composition using unique sounds and invented musical instruments.

As part of the creative process, Kratus (1990), claims that pupils engage in the following types of creative activity: exploration, improvisation, composition and creative performance. 100

The MBV fosters these different types of creative activities through their deliberate and modular design, where the playground by day can become a music venue or lecture hall by night.

Exploration

A village of endless musical opportunities, the MBV naturally insights exploration in its visitors, no matter what the age. According to interview participant Rick Snow (2019), the site acts as a zone to develop creative expression: “it can be counted on as a place to bring a group of students, a curriculum can absolutely be developed around bringing ideas of experimentation, exploration, open form music, improvisation to people of all ages" (Snow Interview, 2019). I noticed the site always buzzing with sound and energy during its Open Hours to the public on weekends. Eliza MacDermott of the New Orleans Airlift describes the Open Hours as follows:

When we're open for free exploration. Everything is sonic in some element. Some of the sounds are reminiscent of conventional instruments like percussion and horns and chimes, while other strings as well. Some are more just sounds, some of those sounds mimic the soundscape of our community like boat horns and whistles and truck whistles while others are just more of like noise. And that we welcome as much sound and noise making as you want to play or getting together and trying to get into rhythm with folks around you. So I also encourage people to like connect with the people on the house next to him and see if they don't want to speak to each other some way that that is, that is literally, that is, that is community-building at its core, right? (MacDermott Interview, 2019)

Taylor Lee Shepherd (2019) describes the early days of MBV as “a class of tinkerers” (Shepherd

Interview, 2019). Dr. Steve Mann also incorporates a similar approach in his collaborative work with the Creative Destruction Lab, set to inspire a whole generation of tinquiry, which Mann

(Yang Interview, 2016) defines to be tinkering as a form of inquiry. Ken Yang (2016), an associate of Mann’s states “if you’re not scared to walk up to a new kind of musical installation, 101 and allow the tinquiry…that’s a type of experience we don’t see fostered enough. Be a child for once” (Yang Interview, 2016).

Improvisation

According to Spring (2010), “to improvise is often to make a statement about freedom, musical and political” (pp. 4-5). The MBV sparks musical improvisation with its encouragement of improvisation, in every corner, from its inherent design, to the politics of the New Orleans

Airlift, they want to bring new communities together to converse, musically, or other. Interview participant, and musician Quintron (2019) states “yeah, there's a band based around this weather synthesizer. That improvises with whatever the music is putting out that day” (Quintron

Interview, 2019). His invention for the MBV is a synthesizer that changes based on the weather, and his band improvises along to its musical output. Quintron (2019) continues to say how impressed he is that the space itself attracts such world class improvising musicians, and how excited he is that there is a venue for celebrating this kind of avant-garde music:

Now there's a place where you can like realize these crazy ideas and where they have the funding to like reach out to Nels Cline or Michael Zarang or Hamid Drake or Peter Brötzmann or these like legends of free improvised music and bring them here and collaborate in a place that's exciting to people that have those sensibilities. (Quintron Interview, 2019)

Spring (2010) refers to the building blocks or vocabulary developed in improvisation, or what he calls “pre-composition” (p. 2). This idea of building blocks or vocabulary development is fostered in the MBV, a new language for music, derived from all of the new sounds the playground is wired up with. The table is set for a strange feast. Spring (2010) continues: “All improvisation has obligatory features, that is, points of departure, or models, which vary by 102 culture and genre. Musical points of departure contain musical building blocks, a kind of vocabulary upon which the musicians can draw” (p. 2).

Composition

Composer Anthony Braxton blurs the lines of improvisation and composition in his work.

From his 2007 keynote address at the Guelph Jazz Festival, Braxton outlines his development of a musical language:

I should also say that I never separated myself from total improvisation. In fact, I continue to be interested in improvisation as part of a construct that says known, unknown, and intuitive emanations all have equal meaning for the model that I'm building. The development of the language/music syntax elements of my material construct would, at some point, become the DNA of the new modeling system that I would start to work with (p. 2)

In my interview with Quintron (2019), he emphasized the need for structure, and how sole improvisation bored him, how he preferred to develop pieces for MBV that had a structure to work within:

There was a set of paddles that basically the main paddles were either you're on or you're off. Okay. Either find your way in. And it wasn't like a hard cut in and out. And John Zorn's done a lot of this, these game type of structures for improvisation Cobra. Cobra is with a famous one of them. (Quintron Interview, 2019)

This mentioned work by John Zorn (1984) incorporates musical games using models from sports and old Warner Brothers cartoons, to create a new musical language where the ensemble composes music collaboratively. I will discuss this further in Chapter 8 as it relates to the concept of radical collaboration.

However, similar to the concept where the space is personified as educator (Gandini,

1998) which will be discussed in Chapter 6, this section outlines the concept of the space acting 103 as composer. Morgan (1980) places importance on the space itself in the process of realizing music, and the role that a space can play in a composition. This links to the concept of spatial music from the early 1920’s, where the music engages with the performance space in a way that gives the piece depth and further meaning. Composers such as Ives (1912), Varese (1958) and

Stockhausen (1992) are of a few who explored this concept in their work. Other examples where the space itself plays a role in the musical output are outlined in Chapter 2, around musical installation.

The space as composer, as demonstrated in the MBV, where on multiple occasions

(Marsella journal, 2019) I witnessed the design and layout of the unique musical instruments influencing the musical output. In the case of MBV, I observed several factors that, as with spatial music, put the space in the foreground of the music making experience. For example, everything from the layout of the houses in the village, the fact that some sounds actually move around in the space, to their ever-changing analogue synthesizer projects, to the way the sounds travel, reverberate and interact. As Martin (2019) explains “those shows are magical to me…it's so helpful on our town because you don't know where all the sounds are coming from” (Martin

Interview, 2019).

Creative Performance: The Music Box Village as Presenter

The Canada Council for the Arts website (2020) defines an arts presenter as an organization that aims to “showcase important artistic work, strengthen artistic practice, and build bridges between artists and audiences” (“Canada Council for the Arts”, 2020). The MBV acts as a presenter in the City of New Orleans, partnering up with renowned festivals, such as the annual Jazz Festival in May, and the more subversive Noise Fest that follows it each year. The 104 work that MBV and New Orleans Airlift do as music and arts presenters sets the stage for creative expression.

In the New Orleans Airlift’s programming vision, interview participant, Daniel Sharp

(2019) credits “the way in which race and gender and musical style are all…intertwined. They've created a bunch of really incredible events” (Sharp Interview, 2019). Delaney Martin also tries to promote non-egotism through the collaborations that are prevalent in the space:

You know, as you start to do a project that has hundreds and hundreds of collaborators. And we're still not that particularly well organized but you know, it's, it's a huge learning curve and to not going to be embarrassed about that stuff and just squared away with the art part of me is part of it. And I absolutely get frustrated when people are like, ‘oh, you're an organizer.’ And I'm like, ‘you know, NO, why can't you see this art for what it is? the way I see it?’ But that's back to ego, you know? But also vision, if done right with compassion and love and trust of everyone around you (Martin Interview, 2019)

Through several interviews and observing multiple free play sessions in the space, I noticed that the MBV provides opportunities for decision-making, creativity, and world-class collaboration.

For example, the debrief sessions after day one of the participating school led to a discussion around a musical invention of their own, led by the grade four class. In the post play student surveys (Appendix H), several new inventions were mentioned, and a since then, more recently, the MBV has kept up the relationship, leading to musical instrument building workshops with the same school.

The MBV is a venue to some, a museum or gallery to others, it is as difficult to define as the diverse team that runs it. As scholar Daniel Sharp (2019) frames it,

The Music Box Village was born out of post-Katrina blight: The Music Box Village is this interesting convergence between experimental art / installation art on one hand, and then also finding these funding sources for community arts, non-profits and then also just community organizations in general. And then, add to that, the fact that when they first 105

started out, it really was a post-disaster moment, and so there are some parallels too to post-industrial Detroit (Sharp Interview, 2019) Born from the tradition of presenting unique artistic happenings, the New Orleans Airlift has always sought to present unique musical happenings in its hub space, the Music Box Village. Its co-founder, Jay Pennington and others within the programming team, dream for the day where audiences will buy annual concert passes, not for the artist draw, but for the venue, developing a sense of trust that whatever they put on their stage is going to be worth it. Pennington’s programming partner for concerts at the Music Box Village, Leah Hennessy (2019) claims:

I don't know if Jay said this to you, but how great would it be if we had one show a month and we didn't tell you about anything on it? You were just like, this is the show at the Music Box Village and you didn't know who was going to perform. And maybe, you know, it could be anything from like a solo performance by Brian Eno to.... (Hennessy Interview, 2019)

Before even finding their permanent location, the New Orleans Airlift was selling out concerts at

Pennington’s home, the house on Piety Street, where well known international artists such as

Thurston Moore were showing up to perform alongside locals. As they opened the permanent space on North Ramparts Street, Daniel Sharp (2016) writes:

The grand opening of the permanent location for the Music Box Village is fortuitously timed with my sabbatical year. The grand opening performances will take place in November and December [2016], including a celebration of the 100-year anniversary of Dadaism, featuring Ukrainian singer Eugene Hütz. (p. 3)

One of several celebrations of this subversive 100-year old art movement, in Dadaism, that so directly informs the MBV. Eugene Hütz, from the band Gogol Bordello, brings a punk rock

Roma aesthetic to the space, then a year later, followed by the demented quirky electro punk music of Peaches, always coupled with a local artist, in this case Tif Lamson. In some of these 106 collaborations, we see so well the model that New Orleans Airlift has honed unto its own over the last ten years of programming as a not-for-profit arts collective.

In the following video clip, the breadth and diversity of their programming is apparent, through the inclusion of local musicians alongside experimental composer, Arto Lindsay, and also internationally renowned singer Solange Knowles. Please click on this video clip, Figure 19 below, which includes footage from the City Park Roving Village installation, presented by New

Orleans Airlift in 2015:

Figure 19. Programming Overview

Development of Themes from Data Analysis

My data analysis revealed five sub-themes that apply to the construct of creative expression. See Table 2, where the following sub-themes are outlined, and expanded upon in each section afterward.

Table 2

Table 2. Sub-Themes Extracted from Interviews Related to Creative Expression.

Topics Discussed Sub-Themes Identified

Rick Snow On musical development: “I mean, Multi-purpose: The Re-Imagining of it's a video game in which you can explore in Old Objects any, it's nonlinear. You can go in any - The Benefits of Good Design direction you want to do whatever you want. - The A/V aesthetics of MBV 107

And this is a musical space where there's no - Visual Artists & Musical score, there's no, there's nothing written down. Innovation You go and you, you put your hands on something and see what happens. And then as you learn from it, you make music and you've learned to make music that kind of is your voice and it's voice at the same time.”

Christian Repaal on the visual aesthetics of MBV

Post-modernism: taking old houses and re- purposing them into new, interactive musical instruments.

Defending “the weird” in MBV (Martin) The Battle in the Village: Experimentalism vs. Traditionalism Russolo and Futurists (Shepherd) - Rebellion in Music

All the members of the organization are immune to experimental music and all foreign sounds are welcome Leah: “the way that the community celebrates Celebration and Commemoration and kind of celebrates almost in defiance of - Safe Space for Protest some of the challenges”

Chief’s House

Edgar, Hennessy and Sharp on protest Importance of local history Honouring New Orleans

Katrina (mentioned by every interview participant)

Snow: “when I worked with them on the city park project, I did get to see like what a huge team of people can get involved, all kind of contribute their talent to these different kind of aspects of, you know, what is a pretty remarkable multi-disciplinary sculpture, music…”

Hennessey and MacDermott (MBV would only happen in New Orleans) 108

Bailey on avant-gardism, and a board member’s The organization perspective

Edgar, Sharp and Martin on sustainability

Quintron on artistic respect, reputation

Multi-purpose: the re-imagining of old objects. The section begins with a discussion around the post-modern approach in repurposing old objects into new musical fodder, one of the primary tenets of the entire MBV project. On a daily basis, the MBV exposes people to new ideas and concepts related to music and sound art (see chapter 2), and as interview participant

Rick Snow (2019) states, “what better a form of creative expression than the building of several musical houses into a village?” (Snow Interview, 2019).

From the barge board and wreckage of post-Katrina New Orleans, emerges a vision in

MBV that breathes new life into these old objects and new relationships through collaboration.

In the MBV, creative expression is at its core, beginning with the repurposing of strange objects and sounds, other people’s garbage, and using it to make new music and art. In the words of co- founder Delaney Martin (2019):

Me and Taylor, we see something on the side of the road…we are always stopping to look at garbage. I don't think everybody on the team stops look at garbage as much as Taylor and I do. We are the garbage collectors. (Martin Interview, 2019)

According to Sawyer (2007) “the creative process becomes functional, however, within an enabling, ‘scaffolding’ environment’” (p. 148). The MBV in New Orleans sets up a natural environment that fosters creativity, both by setting up deliberate barriers, such as the actual physical barrier wall that contains the site, but also allowing for sufficient musical freedom through its layout and unique instrument design. They welcome foreign sounds and ideas into 109 the park. In this next section, I outline the importance of good playground design and how MBV encompasses these tenets as a form of creative expression unto itself.

The benefits of good design. Urban planning and wayfinding are as deliberate in MBV as they are in any actual city. The houses placed just right, and the user experience is intended to be open-ended, with no evident beginning or end. The MBV encompasses this logical, discovery playground design (Gill 2007), where the user’s intelligence is honoured in a way that allows for deeper learning and creative outcome. The musical installations are of a world-class caliber, with a local significance too, mirrored by the collaborative model of New Orleans Airlift, again part of a deliberate design structure. With its well-thought layout and installations, the MBV naturally acts as a scaffold for creative expression, just the act of visiting the space makes one naturally complicit in experimental music-making. In my interview with Jay Pennington (2019), he outlines this phenomenon, of normalizing the weird:

Yeah, it's definitely a little spoonful of sugar though. You know, like experimental music usually is the thing that's like trying to push boundaries, trying to make you rethink what music is. All that kind of stuff that are like, those aren't the kinds of things you think mostly you want to do on like maybe a date, you know? (Pennington Interview, 2019)

So, through normal outings, like a date, or a music concert presented in this interesting setting, the audiences and participants of New Orleans and abroad get a glimpse and a listen into a world of new sounds, musical concepts, experimentalism in music, that seeps into their new sense of normalcy over time.

The audio-visual aesthetics of the Music Box Village. Christian Repaal highlights some of his personal influences that played into the Music Box Village’s look and feel:

…and then Popeye village in Malta, which I haven't been to yet. But I've seen if you've watched the Robert Altman movie, they built an actual village to shoot the movie in and it's still there…And I have obsessed about it and watch the movies. So, one of my big 110

influences is from around this, some of the aesthetics that come in here. And then just I mean, just in general architecture, like it's all, it's varied forms, you know, like, I've always been into, I grew up in an old house in old farmhouse (Repaal Interview, 2019)

Not only is there a distinct look of the Music Box Village, but also its sounds, deriving from a very experimental aesthetic, influenced by Detroit punk scene among other anti-establishment movements. As co-founder Taylor Lee Shepherd (2019) put it:

I had a friend who is his uncle was like a, a club booker at a club at a St. Andrews Hall in downtown Detroit. We went there like in when I was 13, I saw The Exploited and I saw The Circle Jerks and all these like, you know, early, you know, the just punk bands that were kind of doing in their late eighties final tours, you know, to see all that, all that stuff way back then. And and and I met a group of friends that when I was later in high school, I was like 16 or 17 that turned me on to like Brian Eno like that was one of them. (Shepherd Interview, 2019)

Jay Pennington (Interview, 2019) and Taylor Lee Shepherd (Interview, 2019) both cite the experimental art collective The Residents as big influences on their musical development. In the

Music Box Village, Sun Ra Arkestra, noise artists like Thurston Moore and other influential weirdos get to collide with more commercial artists such as Wilco and Solange Knowles. The audio-visual aesthetics of MBV nurture creative expression in the playground, as they create an open, welcoming setting for creativity to thrive. In the following chapter, I will link this to welding and other educational paths that the organization are keen to continue fostering.

Visual artists and musical innovation. Over the years, there is a long line of visual artists who have approached music with an eye that is not steeped in traditional music theory

(refer to Chapter 2). Not to say that innovation in music does not come from traditional theoretical standards. However, at the MBV, experimental music, that of what Snow (2019) would call folk art is presented as high art. 111

The idea was that they would take things that are kind of art and might've been looked at as a little bit like folk art or something like that by the broader art community. They would sort of present that as high art and sort of bring those pieces, those creators to the people that sort of think of themselves as high art. (Snow Interview, 2019)

The correlation between visual artists who have made a large impact on the experimental music scene is significant. From Canadian composers such as R. Murray Schafer and the Nihilist

Spasm Band, to The Residents, and architects in Renaldo & The Loaf to name a few.

Greg Curnoe, a prominent Canadian painter, and founding member of The Nihilist Spasm

Band, helped form the band, by listening to an amateur high school band, one of the worst recordings he had ever heard, so from a seeming mistake, or by playing the wrong notes, a new genre of music was derived. According to one of the members of the Nihilist Spasm Band, Bill

Exley (2019):

It was so terrible, it was good. It was funny. I remember I brought the recording down to Greg’s [Curnoe’s], I said ‘you’ve got to hear this, Greg’ and we laughed and laughed. And I still think it’s one of the main things that got the Spasm Band going, ‘cause he thought ‘let’s do the same thing!’ (Exley Interview, 2019)

The idea of being deliberately bad at music, and the dawn of noise music is embodied in the work of The Nihilist Spasm Band. The connection to noise, via the MBV is important, as they have helped support the New Orleans Noise Festival (Pennington, 2018), and been an integral part of that scene, and the experimental music scene in the city overall. Another visual artist gone musician and sound artist, is one of the founding members of New Orleans Airlift, Taylor

Lee Shepherd, inspired by The Residents, Sun Ra, Luigi Russolo and others whose musical visions helped shape the space.

112

The Battle in the Village: Experimentalism versus Traditionalism

In a city dripping with traditions rooted in jazz history, the MBV functions as a counterculture space. A model for creative expression that demonstrates experimentalism to kids of all ages.

In several interviews and in my observation of play, I came across the recurring theme of traditional music in New Orleans, perhaps the more comfortable structure of the composed journey; versus as Spring (2010) coins it, the “riskier” option of improvised music, where the musical destination is not as obvious. This is not to say that the members of the New Orleans

Airlift are not some of the most open-minded, experimental artists that I have come across in my life to date. But the concept of traditional musical structure versus the more experimental path, perhaps the perceived uglier way of getting there, using unique sounds and process, was evident.

Given the city itself, well-rooted and known for its jazz history, the MBV sits like a museum of exploratory sound art within that, sometimes having to defend the uglier side of music-making, hence a form of creative expression.

I found this theme prevalent in my interviews of Jay Pennington, Delaney Martin and

Leah Hennessy related to certain events, where the desire to use the houses more as musical instruments, were ignored for the more traditional path of concert production. In these examples, the houses were treated more as staging, and traditional musical instruments were used instead as the comfortable default. On multiple occasions the visiting musicians in the space would try to find particular notes and scale structures to make their performance function within the park.

As Alita Edgar (2019) observes the way touring artists will take in the site on first visit, and how some will embrace the sonic opportunities it presents, in their live performances, and others will want a safer, more predictable outcome. 113

Some people's personalities are just like, I'm gonna run around and touch everything. And some people are like, I'm not gonna touch anything cause I don't know what kind of noise is gonna make. And I don't want to make an embarrassing sound, I'm just gonna see what that guy does. Cause I do everything, you know, I'm a little more controlled about what the noise is that I make in public place you know what I mean? And, and just different kinds of personalities and, and you know, musicians very much as you, they probably have said are, are kind of the same way where some of them are like super pros and they're not gonna make a noise unless it comes out the way they want. You know? And you know, performing in a certain level for them. So, I mean, I think the best we can do is like make an invitation, you know, and like encourage them. Some people are more open than others and some people, you know, if they get to have the time with it, I mean we didn't have any time with the Residents at all to even really get to invite that no one in this universe is going to say that is because they lack creativity no one's going there. They're on tour. On and off their bus pretty much. (Edgar Interview, 2019)

This discussion brings it back to the traditional, the constant pull of the more traditional jazz music that New Orleans is smothered in, and how New Orleans Airlift, although they embrace this rich history (Martin & Shepherd, 2019), they also stand for the experimental side of music that New Orleans also fosters. In playing my own music in the playground and working towards the Teddy’s Twilight Serenade event on my final day in New Orleans, I also experienced this approach to music-making, where the other musicians I was working with were pointing to certain notes in the one house, really trying to ground the music in key structures, and traditional

Western idioms. From my journal entry (2019):

It was interesting hearing Leah discuss the direction she’d like to give Tif in helping shape the Teddy’s Twilight Serenade event, to make it more improvisatory. Using the framework of songs, sort of limits it. I was comparing the teaching forms in the space to be similar, and think I might pick up on some of this thinking – the creativity in educational curriculum is on par with the consideration musicians give it, when 114

programming a night of musical presentation. Hence, my desire to write a piece for MBV, including kids in it, to help bridge those gaps. (Marsella journal, May 25, 2019) Rebellion in music. Much of the Music Box Village philosophy is counterculture, a constructive sense of anarchy. Almost all of the staff that I interviewed at Music Box Village, and most stakeholders saw what Music Box Village and New Orleans Airlift to be doing, was a form of protest, at times. Alita Edgar (2019) clarifies: “I think just by its very existence, a weird thing can exist. You know? If that's the protest that's like, you're allowed to have a place that's about like beauty and experimentation, you know?” (Edgar Interview, 2019) The MBV does an incredible job at swaying between beauty and perceived ugliness in music.

The perfect balance between rebels such as Shepherd and Pennington, and translators such as Martin and Edgar, who help expose their ideas to larger audiences, and validate them with politicians and donors. Shepherd (2019) has roots in counterculture activity from graffiti through to running an illegal ham radio station. Here, he outlines how he found his roots in New

Orleans, shortly after Hurricane Katrina:

…after Katrina, I came back and just have been here ever since but while I was here, there was a, I started, I was, I did a lot of like, when I lived in Detroit. I did a lot of graffiti and like street art stuff or whatever. And then when I came back, when I came here, I was still kind of doing that and then hit on a gallery here in a phase to be in the Marigny Bywater zone, and he was like, ‘Hey, do you wanna do a show?’ And he ended up giving me like the room in this gallery. Then I could just like turn over like every month or so. I would just like turn over a whole bunch of paintings and do a new little show and a quickly got really bored of it. Just like painting, you're sitting there not doing anything. If you're making these like kind of kinetic, like scroll that he scrolls through a long painting or like little boxes open up and stuff would happen, you know? (Shepherd Interview, 2019)

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This early support that Shepherd was shown from that gallery seeped into Shepherd’s new role as more of a shepherd to help foster local creatives in New Orleans to collaborate in the

MBV.

Celebration and Commemoration

MBV is a reflection of New Orleans, a city that embodies creative expression. In the words of Leah Hennessy (2019):

The community feels right for it. Just their openness and you know, people here just have, have a, I hate this word, I'm going to have too much like milling my brain for another word. Just they embrace life and living right now in the moment. And they embrace celebration. And like the special, I mean, what is Mardi Gras, but like a fucking Tuesday, wherever you, excuse me, where everyone gets dressed up and you know it's always funny to me to see my Boston friends and my, my family elsewhere and it's just Tuesday to them and here it's like the most colorful, most like, yeah, it's everything. It's a riot, you know? So the way that like and again this kind of gets back to place, but like the way that the community celebrates and kind of celebrates almost in defiance of some of the challenges that happened here. (Hennessy Interview, 2019)

The resilience of New Orleans is reflected in the MBV as well, as with every decision, it seeks to celebrate its city’s history, while remaining distinctly unique as an alternative music space.

Shepherd (2019) asserts “I would like to think that we're just engaging. Like we're not necessarily responding to the culture that exists, but just engaging ourselves into the traditions and the spirit that is here already” (Shepherd, 2019). For example, the Chief’s House, is a musical house which celebrates the rich history of the Mardi Gras Indian in New Orleans. Every year, MBV offers its space as a venue for hosting several events in the city’s renowned Jazz

Festival, while also supporting the more alternative Noise Festival, which happens right after

Jazz Fest. 116

A safe space for protest. MBV not only celebrates and commemorates, but it also lends itself as a stage for protest, when required. The organization has always acted as an ally in the city to racialized communities, and other groups in need of support.

Leah Hennessy (2019) claims that everything MBV programs has a link to social justice:

For us right now as programmers too, we're very interested in doing work that has an underpinning of social justice. That feels interesting, you know so working on developing those projects, which have long tails that, you know, it take some time to get it together and do it in the right way, but you also want to do it when the, when the matter feels particularly present or of the zeitgeist. So I, yeah, I mean I think it's interesting to all of us. And we're trying to figure out how to do that because it makes the work feel richer and deeper. (Hennessy Interview, 2019)

Daniel Sharp (2019) highlights the fine line the organization straddles related to protest:

Protest in the insistence of doing something other than the prefab mean, you know? Like it, it definitely comes out of a kind of bohemian cultural thing. Like Taylor [Shepherd] always loves talking about, this band [Crash Worship] that is just for like Taylor and for a lot of that scene that they just, they used to have like happenings. The whole thing sounded kind of Burning Man-ish. But that, like, he thinks back and I think this was like late nineties or something to, to this one particular band that would play in New Orleans. And I mean, he tells like these crazy stories, like he, like they would lock the doors and like, oh yeah, everything was just like, it sounded like really Dionysian. So I mean it's not any kind of easily legible protests and that, question ends up being further complicated by the fact that, you know, they have a board of directors and they like have like legitimate funders and, and it's so interesting when there's always a few of the like more adventurous real like art patron types sometimes that are like dressed very nicely and are very like gala, or whatever in the midst. And a thing that I love is that they try to pitch different events to like their different kind of sub-constituencies. And so sometimes they definitely have certain events that they think of as like blowing off steam and being able to be like, just are truly, truly countercultural (Sharp Interview, 2019) 117

Honouring New Orleans. MBV place a high importance on local history. Although nobody in the organization is originally from New Orleans, I think this makes them all very sensitive to ensuring the needs of the community are always met before theirs. For example, Jay

Pennington (2019) discusses how they went about choosing their permanent site:

We didn't move into that area because we realized whatever we'd be doing, we'd be taking up too much space, you know, taking too much oxygen. And especially like, we didn't want to be responsible for like any kind of like gentrification or funding issues relating to other non-profits in the area. We didn't want to be dominating anything and that would be embarrassing for us in every way (Pennington Interview, 2019)

The entire New Orleans Airlift organization are this socially-minded with all of their approach, whether it be their hiring process or their concerts, they always ensure that the city’s history is respected through the creative expression they foster.

In every one of my interviews, it was apparent how impactful Hurricane Katrina was on the entire city, and how it guided decisions to this day, whether it be in the education system, or related to local bylaws, one could not escape the name Katrina when discussing New Orleans.

Jay Pennington (2019) outlines just how far Katrina pushed the social divide in the city:

Bywater gentrified right after Katrina. It was like a lot of Black people moved away from this area for many different reasons. Some in, in the case of a lot of my neighbors on my block, it was people who just had better opportunities in other places and didn't realize there was so much opportunity in the world. Like they just didn't realize that there was, there were places where like the wages here are very low. I had a friend call me after Katrina and say, I'm living in Atlanta. I got a job that pays $10 an hour. I never thought I'd make $10 an hour, you know, in 2007, you know, which is $10 an hour is garbage money to survive. Sure. Actually survive. But he was shocked that he could make that. And he was like, my kids, they go to school, they have homework. It's amazing. Like this is a town that was like neglecting the shit out of its communities, especially the Black community pre-Katrina and getting away with it, you know? And then Katrina opened 118

that up and showed everybody what it looks like when you neglect an entire population of people and, and make their lives even more difficult. (Pennington Interview, 2019)

MBV honours the city’s history, as a guiding programming principle of their organization, as confirmed by one of its founders, Jay Pennington (2019):

We're at the end of the Bywater. We're right on the bridge to the lower ninth ward and that has spawned the project that we talked about earlier. The, the series of talks that have been happening are, are a function of this project called the bridge, which is us trying to be helpful in the sense that we're providing a space for discussion that we're not really engaged in where other people are engaging the conversation cause they're the voices that we all want to listen to. And we're making it possible for people to kind of talk about what it means to gentrify and what it means to take over new spaces and what it means to, again, like what it means to be an ally of the city of New Orleans, whether you're white or black or a transplant or a or a native, you know, and, and being in this location gives us this comfortable place for us to have a conversation about a neighborhood we're already involved in, lower ninth ward, as with neighbors and friends and people that we know. And then in our own neighborhood, which we perceive as already in terms of inequality, pretty decimated in certain ways. (Pennington Interview, 2019)

According to Leah Hennessey and Eliza MacDermott (2019) the MBV could only happen in

New Orleans. Although they have seen it travel with the Porch Life project, and various global outposts, they claim that it could only have been launched in New Orleans. I think every member of the New Orleans Airlift acknowledge the trauma of the hurricane, and being born from this need, as a way to help the city rebuild, and the uniqueness of the musicians and history of New Orleans, that it is no mistake this musical playground was born here.

The following section highlights how the New Orleans Airlift, as an organization, helps create a safe space for creative expression. 119

The Organization

As an organization, the New Orleans Airlift is designed to foster creative expression.

The origin story is well documented in Chapter 4. However, there are certain elements of the organization that directly link to their fostering of a safe space for creative expression and transgressive acts. As outlined above, the MBV makes space for protest, and supports a multitude of diverse communities whenever it can. As Edgar (2019) highlights, the organization is works within systems in order to best affect change

In and of itself, I think it's important to kind of mark it out as being socially a safe place for everyone to come. And intolerance isn't tolerated here. We want everybody to be able to come here. And that includes people who have different beliefs than us and, and you know, if they even will come here, we feel good about that. We just did a project in the UAE for example though funded by the Sheikh's family and the government of the Emirates that we were in and, and certainly oil money and things like that. But, you know, speaking to other international artists there and they were like, yes, sir. I mean, we're in the art world. Everybody's concerned about what money is funding, like where the money's coming from and all these things. And yes, certainly worth knowing what the context is and all of that. But they were like, look at this society. Like, if we didn't participate in this, then yeah. You know, people here wouldn't have any of this art. They don't, wouldn't have access to any of this. Cause, you know, they're not getting it on TV. They're not getting it in their day to day life. So the fact that this art foundation is willing to fund and bring in 90 artists from all the world who are all going to say things and you know, do things not in step with this like fairly narrow religious culture, you know, we're like, all right, well it's, it's a privilege to be invited and be able to say something over there. (Edgar Interview, 2019)

The innovation found in the work of New Orleans Airlift has been prevalent since Pennington and Martin formed the not-for-profit in 2008. Like with any arts organization, the fine art of remaining sustainable while remaining on track with its mandate is not foreign to New Orleans 120

Airlift. All of my discussions with the management team revealed not only how it seemed to function financially, but also how they value sustainability. This all links back to creative expression, for a solid awareness of funding restraints, and subsequent resistance to limitation, leads to creative output when done properly.

To create something like MBV took the collective grit and perseverance of all the New

Orleans Airlift members, notably Jay Pennington and Delaney Martin, who delved into real estate deals in order to bring the project to its full potential, as highlighted by board member

Bryan Bailey (2019):

…one of the things that's really impressive with all that is, is Delaney. She effectively became a real estate developer and unwittingly for herself. But I watched – I do real estate development. So, when she was doing the METFAB deal, I didn't have the bandwidth to do all the work, but you know, I worked very closely with her for a couple of years. And was basically like, ‘look, this is what you need to figure out’ and you know, we get some information and we were looking at a bunch of different properties. She kept coming back to this one and I'm like, ‘well this is what you need to figure out’. And every step of the way, like I would give her a list of like, ‘if I were doing this, this is what I would do next’. And she'd come back to me a month or six weeks later and she would have checked every box and I'd be like, ‘fuck, this is impressive’. I mean, she was so determined. (Bailey Interview, 2019)

MBV also have a reputation in the city, and outward, that helps their model flourish. It not only gets them external invitations to bring their Porch Life project to the well-known Eaux Claires

Festival in Wisconsin in 2018, but also helps them secure everything from artist bookings, through to new relationships with the United Arab Emirates, to the Smithsonian and their

Elevator Pitch project. As Quintron (2019) outlines, the MBV stands up for the underdog artists in the city: 121

They are the first organization that started actively seeking and offering money to local and out of town free improvisors jazz, jazz musicians that do not play Trad and experimental tinkerers, builders and, and very serious like lifelong devoted artists but that are working in a field that is not generally a big money-maker outside of a couple gigs in new Europe and festivals, weird festivals here and there. But if New Orleans never had that scene and they are the heartbeat of it now (Quintron Interview, 2019)

Organizational reputation is a solid pillar in which the New Orleans Airlift grows from. As board member Bryan Bailey (2019) states:

And maybe someone that wouldn't have been interested in the sort of nascent, flailing sort of very outlier Airlift of 2010 might be the right person that takes them from this point to as a board member from this point to like making them the preeminent sort of, you know, multicultural, multidisciplinary arts organization of the, you know, south that is enough to attract you know, million dollar grant from the Mellon Foundation, which you need to let people to walk in the room (Bailey Interview, 2019)

The funding model in which the New Orleans Airlift functions seems heavily-based on individual and corporate donations, as well as family foundations and grass-roots social media campaigns, such as Kickstarter (Edgar Interview, 2019). They have had part time staff over the years, to help with fundraising, but ultimately it seems to fall heavily on the main management team of Martin, Edgar and Pennington. Pennington (2019) outlines how a project can come to life, in a way that reflects the City of New Orleans, in its very storied lore:

I got introduced to somebody who was working on a project here for here in New Orleans around jazz fest. It was a Microsoft-based project where they were building a recreating 1 million square feet of culture. That was the project. And their idea was that they would take artists and they were like, this is the question I was asked at a party: ‘If you were going to take like one artist or another and another artist and put them together, have them create something different than what they would normally do on their own, what would you do?’ And I was like, that's all I ever do. Like that they literally defined my 122

practice, I mean within the Airlift directly. And no one ever really asks you what your dream project is and something that's more collective like this, you know, like are they not the nobody asked. But I realized that like, my dream projects are unfundable and you know, and by the, by this organization and these people came to us and asked this question, this person asked me this question at a party who I'd just met. And I was like, oh, I would take these legends of vogue culture voguing the kind of like dance style and also just a massive independent culture of its own and bounce culture, which is New Orleans based dance culture. And if I could, I would take both of those cultures and put them together in one arena. (Pennington Interview, 2019)

This concept of having “unfundable” artistic ideas, funded by a major donor such as Microsoft, and building community from there, is how this subject of organizational sustainability leads to creative expression and subversive acts. It is evidently a priority to the organization through the examples above, that they accept money that funds an artistic vision which includes an element of social justice, community building, and knowledge sharing.

Chapter Summary

Sub-question one points to an exploration of the context for creative expression, how the

MBV fosters unique artistic voices. “Creative expression” sits in the context of formal critical music performance culture, perpetrated by elite expectations. It is evident in the findings outlined in this chapter, that the MBV provides opportunity for decision-making, functioning as a creative hub in the City of New Orleans, a venue for experimental musical performance. In the cases witnessed or referenced, this hinges on uniqueness of artistic voices, on forms of composition, improvisation and their overall programming model, as an arts presenter.

In summary, the MBV uses a post-modern approach in repurposing old objects into new musical fodder, one of the primary tenets of the project. This approach leads to creative pursuit, in the form of exploration, improvisation, composition and creative performance. Their 123 deliberate non-linear design and intent for how to experience the playground acts as a form of creative expression. The New Orleans Airlift organization, among other leading principles, evidently stands for experimentalism in music and education. Their staunch defense of the weirder side of music is as deliberate as the playground’s design, and how it all ties back to setting a stage for experimentalism and creative expression. Indicators include awareness of funding restraints, resistance to limitation, actions like transgressive acts, encouragements to risk, and conscious challenges to aesthetic norms.

MBV is a space that fosters one-of-a-kind collaborations with world class artists, local and international. It fosters and encourages a space for creative expression and new ideas, and presents progressive social concepts through an innovative sound art display. In the next chapter, I examine how the Music Box Village functions as an educational space for learning experimental music.

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Chapter 6: The MBV as an Educational Space

From a student interview after day one of unstructured play: Eliza MacDermott: “What would you call this place?” Grade Four student: “Freedom!”

One of the main lenses of which I sought wanted to observe the MBV was from a music education perspective. The second sub-question I sought to understand relates to how the MBV musical playground functions as an educational space. To gain this understanding, I set up three consecutive days of unstructured play sessions with around 50 grade four students from a participating local New Orleans school. I also made this construct a focal point of all my participant interviews. Although education is not its main priority, it remains a strong outcome, evident to founding members of MBV and its external artist stakeholders.

To begin with, I analyzed certain sub-themes, pulled from each interview that applied directly to the construct of education. These sub-themes helped me shape this chapter accordingly. In Table 3, the following four sub-themes were extracted: how informed the entire

New Orleans Airlift team is; order in the village, and the recurring concept of structured versus unstructured forms as they relate to music education; free play in the village including the all- ages appeal of the space, how it engages a multi-generational learning model with an importance of risk placed in playgrounds and music education; and finally with an analysis of the impact the space had on the participating children.

I end this chapter by outlining curricular implications that a musical playground could have on the field of music education.

Development of Themes from Data Analysis

Table 3 125

Table 3. Sub-Themes Extracted from Interviews Related to Music Education.

Topics Discussed Sub-Themes Identified Sound art in music education, anything goes. An Informed Approach to Music Education Leah references City Museum in St. Louise, an - Messing Around with Sound: immersive playground experience of its own – Sound Art in Education look in up! - Multiple Intelligences - Invention Jay, Leah, Delaney, Quintron & Anita all - Expertise of the Team mentioned Meow Wolf in Santa Fe - Education comes naturally

Quintron and his John Zorn-style conducting paddles

Airlift, early days, introduced Rick Snow to the concept of Folk art as high art

Shepherd: “The word informed keeps coming up” [citing Eno, Russolo and others]

Shepherd: Figures the most brilliant person in the project dropped out of high school! Everybody has an education, formal or informal… Delaney Martin and keeping continuity, a Order in the village (structured vs. centralized vision in MBV unstructured) - An alternative learning space Participating teacher: Helped ground and focus kids who she knew had behavioral challenges (structured & unstructured play)

The request by the participating Gr. 4 students to add a piano in the space. Conventional instruments rearing their head!

Day three, when structured met unstructured, one teacher was surprised when it fell so well into place.

Snow: “if a whole generation of people were able to at an early age, appreciate this type of chaos and beauty and chaos and understanding of different levels of organization of not just sound, but presentation and collaboration, then that would, that would be a special thing for, you know, those of us who grew up in 126

regimented high schools and music schools and spaces that were highly judgemental about creativity and that kind of situation beyond.” The uniqueness of the space, and what that does Free Play for education, Quintron: “All kids are going to - All ages appeal (multi- at least want to bang on it for a minute. And generational) then the, the, the challenge of bringing people - Physically & Musically risky together to play those kind of things together - Space: The Third Teacher is like, I don't know, it's like tapping into some kind of level of education and collaboration that other methods of teaching and playing music together can't get to.”

Snow - What the MBV is doing to kids: “Then you look at the Music Box, and you see how you come into that space as a young kid already kind of in a city that surrounds you with music. And then this is a place where you get to experiment with making sounds on, you know, 15 plus unique instruments in a totally nonjudgmental space. You know, where you're allowed to be playful, you're allowed to test things out, play, you know, Bang on things, laugh, run around, chase each other, you know. So that's like one aspect that I think is really kind of special.”

The space itself as educator

Not just for kids (Pennington)

“You feel like a kid” (Perkins)

Hennessy has very similar ideas to Pennington and Perkins regarding imagination, creativity, and all-ages attractiveness, in her words: “I think the music box village is a place that inspires, inspires just like limitless thinking, you know and is a place that engenders, a sense of play, you know for all aged people to just like go and experiment with something. And I think that those places are somewhat rare, you know it's that place where it meets for, for adults and for children”

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Perkins “I think it's really important to try to, you know, not get lost in the rules”

Perkins “…Just anarchist enough!” Compared to other examples who were just too offside. Participating teacher: “They’ll remember this Impact forever” - A Musical Equalizer: From Special Needs to Performance Anxiety - Student Learning (before and after the experience) An Informed Approach to Music Education

This section helps connect a musical playground to the field of music education. It highlights how informed the New Orleans Airlift team were, throughout the process, from first encounter, through to each interview, I continued to unravel how their collective inspiration, their love of sound art, and experimentalism all made its way into the playground. I also learned how naturally the space lends itself to education, almost without any direct prioritization from the organization.

Messing around with sound: sound art in education. The concept that anything can be used to make music is one of the main tenets of the MBV, celebrated in every house. As

Pennington (2019) firmly asserts, in the foreground of the MBV is the notion that music can be drawn from anything:

you just see the opening up of like people's minds to the idea that where they live is noisy. But that's not bad. That how they shape that sound is up to them a little bit. Some people may understand this thoroughly and some people don't fully understand it, but then they go home and they realize that the squeaky floorboards are – the sound of a thing is a musical sound. (Pennington Interview, 2019)

The MBV allows children of all ages the opportunity to experiment with strange new sounds, and try music-making from a much different approach than that of the traditional music classroom. This approach follows Tyler’s (1949) assertion that "It is what he does that he learns, 128 not what the teacher does" (p. 63). The MBV’s Director of Public Programs, Eliza MacDermott

(2019) puts it this way:

what we provide here that's different is the ability to experiment, the ability to drop all of the rules like the typical traditional rules and give kids or even adults like a space to be in, push their own boundaries and to have just a different relationship with sound and structure and everything that you can't do that everywhere. You know, if you have the expensive sound equipment and a gymnasium where everything echoes, it's very stressful for the kids. And for the instructors to depart from the very regimented practice of teaching music. (MacDermott Interview, 2019)

This free exploration, putting the student first, in helping chart their path, in a well-thought, informed space, is one of the many things the MBV excels at.

For the participating grade four students in this case study, the concept of noise was normalized after their three-day visit, as the word was used in a positive, musical context. One of the participating students (Student Interview, 2019) reported that it was important that they were playing with their friends, the communal aspect of the space resonated. This messing around with sound, is in line with what composer and educator R. Murray Schafer (1977) refers to as “fumbling with sound” and the soundscape, which as he puts it “is no accidental biproduct of society; rather it is a deliberate construction by its creators, a composition which may be as much distinguished for its beauty as for its ugliness” (p. 237).

As we learn that maker-centred learning experiences have a lot to offer the sector, spaces such as musical playgrounds become more important for connecting with a larger community of learners. From Gardner’s (2015) Project Zero initiative:

downtowns are developing makerspaces and fablabs; municipal libraries and churches are presenting opportunities to make, hack, tweak, iterate, and invent; and employers are wooing prospective employees by celebrating their company’s practices of innovation, invention, and collaboration – the hallmarks of maker culture. (p. 1) 129

Multiple intelligences reflected. Howard Gardner’s (2011) theory of multiple intelligences is well-reflected in the MBV, as it incorporates socially-important ways of problem solving. Gardner (1997) states “If we all had exactly the same kind of mind and there was only one kind of intelligence, then we could teach everybody the same thing, in the same way, and assess them in the same way, and that would be fair” (“Edutopia”, 2009). However, Gardner

(2011) outlines how children learn differently and how it is important to present concepts from multiple perspectives, to go deeper in education. All eight of Gardner’s (2011) multiple intelligences are naturally represented in the MBV. From the obvious, such as, musical- rhythmic, visual-spatial, verbal-linguistic, bodily-kinesthetic, to the more subtle such as logical- mathematical, interpersonal, intrapersonal, and even naturalistic.

In the words of Alita Edgar (Interview, 2019), member of the New Orleans Airlift collective, she highlights how the space is an important nature spot in New Orleans:

I think it really is a magical spot. It's, it's like it's on the border, it's on the water, it's on the levy at the foot of the Mississippi. Like all its site is a very charged site certainly. And you know, those trees that are out there are very old trees and New Orleans really doesn't have a lot of trees cause the swamp. Right. So, if you noticed around the city, I mean we have live oaks but just sort of other kinds of trees are kind of far few and far between. There's a lot of, they're not a lot of shade out there. Well that's the houses are made of barge board cause they would float, the boats would come down the Mississippi and they would take the boats apart and make houses out of them because otherwise they would have to keep going deeper and deeper into the country to get cypress trees and bring them back to New Orleans. It's just been kind of a brackish place. Having trees is a big deal to me. And that space has always been very, very special. And people come there and, and do rituals and you know, it's also been like kind of open (Edgar Interview, 2019) 130

The MBV promotes movement and kinesthetic learning, as is the outcome of a more standard playground. It also fosters invention, interpersonal and intrapersonal learning, which will be discussed in greater detail later in this chapter, in the analysis section.

Fomenting invention. In music, from messing around with sound, even making mistakes, we derive new ideas and collaborations. On the bus rides back to the participating elementary community school in New Orleans, Louisiana, both homeroom educators, “Mr.

English” and “Ms. French,” reported that several of their students were talking about what sort of musical instruments they might build or invent (interview English & French, 2019). Eliza

MacDermott and the New Orleans Airlift team picked up on this expressed desire of inventiveness in the debriefs after each of the unstructured play sessions. They noticed that students were suggesting different musical inventions of their own. This was a goal, realized by

Airlift member Eliza MacDermott (2019):

I want to have a group of students. I want to have, you know, several things happen, you know, over time if I could, which would be a student designed led build project. I mean the, that intrinsically adds a lot to the skill development (Interview MacDermott, 2019)

Now, almost a year later, in March 2020, the students from the participating elementary school from New Orleans, Louisiana are returning to MBV to participate in a new build of their own, using primarily kitchen-based materials, and wanting to build a Drum Kitchen.

More recently, Gardner’s work in maker-centred learning environments also plays into the MBV. Although the MBV, Pennington (2018) does not consider it a maker-space, “we’re not a maker space, it’s rooted in conceptual art, that’s where it differs” (Interview Pennington,

2018). However, via Gardner’s Project Zero think tank at Harvard University (Clapp, Ross,

Ryan & Tishman, 2017), we are reminded that: 131

students learn a tremendous amount through maker-centered learning experiences, whether these experiences take place inside or outside of makerspaces and tinkering studios. There is no doubt that students learn new skills and technologies as they build, tinker, re/design, and hack, especially when they do these things together. However, the most important benefits of maker education are neither STEM skills nor technical preparation for the next industrial revolution (p. 7)

Sound art, a contemporary form of expression, which uses sound as its primary medium, was adopted by early examples such as Luigi Russolo, and the Dadaists, whose philosophies are well- reflected in the MBV. Russolo’s intonarumori, a series of homemade noise machines from the early 20th century, are paid homage with each house in the MBV. One of the principles of sound art is to mess around with sound, as the MBV naturally does. Shepherd (2019) gives this excerpt from Russolo’s (1913) Book of Noises to every new member of the New Orleans Airlift team, a dirty, one-page photocopy that he’s scribbled in marker with the following quotation:

Noise Sound Types 1. Roars, thunderings, explosions, hissing roars, bangs, booms 2. Whistling, hissing, puffing 3. Whisperers, murmurs, mumbling, muttering, gurgling 4. Noises obtained by beating on metals, woods, skins, stones, pottery, etc. 5. Shouts, screams, shrieks, wails, hoots, howls, death rattles, sobs 6. Screeching, creaking, rustling, buzzing, crackling, scraping (Shepherd handout, 2019)

Sound art finds itself in different levels of music education, from grade school and high school (Marsella, 2017) to university level programs (Rogalsky, 2017). MBV becomes a public laboratory for curious sound artists of all ages. The way the MBV is set up, it creates a safe, and low-risk environment to experiment with sound.

In observing children of all ages play in the MBV during their Public Hours sessions, if presented in a unique way, one naturally forgets the perceived ugliness of strange new sounds, or 132 noise, and becomes more engaged with the exploration of those sounds. The play becomes more prevalent, and the sounds of traffic, clanking, banging, boats, and sirens prevail. In other words,

Shepherd’s celebration of Russolo reigns; noise and experimentation with sound are normalized; if you build it, they will play.

Expertise of the team: a collective vision for a new sound. As Bereiter and

Scardamalia (1993) claim “expertise requires enormous amounts of knowledge-far more than anyone, even the experts, had supposed” (p. i). In observing how the MBV came to fruition, one factor that stands out from the New Orleans Airlift team, is how informed they all are, from

Pennington (Interview, 2019) citing John Cage exhibits of his youth in Texas to Delaney Martin

(Interview, 2019) describing how she and Shepherd were inspired by the writings of Luigi

Russolo. According to Alita Edgar (2019), the New Orleans Airlift functions as a collective:

“We operate fairly. Yeah. We operate pretty collectively” (Edgar Interview, 2019). Their expertise is shared among the collective, and their collaborative model brings in the best international minds to share ideas and different trains of thought with well-paired locals.

The MBV and its aesthetic was not accidental. Their collective educations include graduate-educated scholars through to an anarchist apprenticeship model in the New Orleans

Airlift team, all informing the greater good of the place and what it represents. As Elliot (1992) confirms, expertise in the New Orleans Airlift team is reflected in a group of action-based achievers.

A person can know a lot of information (informal knowledge) and still not be an expert. Expertise is essentially action-based. Implicit in these thoughts is the next: expertise is knowledge that is exquisitely adapted to solving specific kinds of problems in specific domains of practice. Expertise, in short, is situated knowledge. (p. 7) 133

Jay Pennington (2019), exposed early in his life, to the concepts of John Cage, feels that the

MBV, with its deliberate field trip program, does a good job at expanding on some of Cage’s concepts on defining what music is:

We do have a field trip program that really goes out of its way to like teach kids, not only just the basics of music theory, what's a wind instrument, what's percussion instrument; but also trying to teach them a little bit about conceptual art. The notion that like art can be based on memory and art can be based on a shared experience or whatever. It doesn't have to come from just some mystic well of like artistic inspiration. You know, the world around you is rife with its own creativity, you know, and that kind of thing. So we teach kids that, you know, the sounds of your ceiling fan can be turned into music, and that's really the fun part of the whole thing is watching people realize that, whether it's kids or Tony Allen from Fela's band, realizing it for the first time. You know what I mean? It's something that somebody like John Cage was very good at expressing. Very good at sharing with people in a real visual and enigmatic and fun way. And I think that what we're doing is a direct continuation of the idea that music is everywhere. And that if, you know when the, when you're at the concert hall and you're listening to the classical piece and the guy sneezes during the one moment that the music stops – that's the music. (Pennington Interview, 2019)

Similarly, Delaney Martin (2019) outlines how she came to sound art:

Taylor introduced me to Russolo…for me, the town is almost getting too musical...I definitely err on the side of the strange noises. When we first started this project I was like, you know, are we going to be able to make real music out of these instrumental houses with these strange sounds? And…we did. I mean, okay. There was maybe a cello or the first performance that held things a little bit. I'm okay with one melodic instrument that maybe ties but when the balance gets shifted. I get, I get depressed. (Martin Interview, 2019)

There is a struggle in the MBV, to preserve the experimental roots that were carefully planted. Edgar (2019) outlines how defending the experimental side of music in the MBV is 134 supporting the underdog, “I think we're always pushing, you know, we're always pushing to keep it experimental. Honestly. Traditional is just so big and like so powerful” (Edgar Interview,

2019).

Martin (2019) outlines her vision for the MBV long term, where kids who grew up in the village become its future virtuosos:

What I really like to see is it to become like a real part of children's lives that they really grow up with. You know, like I want Music Box virtuosos who grow over time. I want it to be like a really crucial part of people in the Gulf south, not just New Orleans. Like I want it to be like the field trip of the south. You know what I mean? Like, instead of like going to Washington DC and going to the White House, I want to be like children in the Gulf region, come visit the Music Box and it's maybe not quite amazing enough to attract people far and wide yet. But you know, I would really like to see it be that and kids can like have experience of co-centric circles where they might come for a field trip and then they'll tell their family about it and then we'll get to know their families and then they'll become teenagers and they'll docent and then there'll be really talented kids and there'll be our musicians or there'll be our house builders or they'll take over Taylor's job or Christian's job, you know? So that is what I really like to see here. And I'd like to see it not turn into a venue and to keep its integrity around being so weird, but also so magical that you've totally forget you're in an experimental situation and you're just like, whoa, there's people around me, there's sounds around me. That's been the trick from day one. Jay always said that. When you trick people coming into experimental music. (Martin Interview, 2019)

Leah Hennessy (2019), who comes from an experimental improvisatory music education, treats the houses as musical instruments. She believes the musical houses are an example of how music can be taught differently:

You know, they are instruments. Taylor could give lessons! I completely believe in teaching you know, reading music and things like that. But for me, no disrespect to that 135

path...but as a fellow music educator and someone who spent time, I mean, that's my, all of my education personally. (Hennessy Interview, 2019)

Taylor Shepherd (2019), one of the main forces behind the actual building of the houses in the MBV, dropped out of high school, and was led by sound artists and experimental musicians such as Frank Pahl, and the teachings of Brian Eno. “I dropped out of high school.

There we go. And I went to an alternative high school and got my a got my high school diploma.

Yeah. A year late. Yeah. And that was it. And then got into construction” (Shepherd Interview,

2019). The alternative path to Shepherd’s unique skill set is admirable, it consists of apprenticeships, equal visual arts practice as he was musical, and was semi-legal at times (see chapter 4), but a lot of the heart and soul of MBV is either built or maintained by him. “All the little drawings that you see, that's all me, yeah” (Shepherd Interview, 2019).

Education comes naturally. Although not its priority as a diverse cultural hub in the

Bywater neighbourhood of New Orleans, the MBV does play a significant role in subversively educating its patrons, through the unique presentation of experimental music and sound art. As one of its founders, Jay Pennington (2019) admits:

MBV is essentially tricking people into coming to an experimental music concert. You know, like where, if somebody said, ‘hey, will you come to my experimental music concert?’ Most people would be like...no one's coming. But when you say, ‘will you come to this magical space that is like imbued with like uncommon sounds that reflect the musicality of the place? (Pennington Interview, 2019)

Order in the Village: Structured Versus Unstructured

The next sub-theme that emerged was the struggle to defend the experimental side of the playground. Although MBV sits naturally outside of structured music, as highlighted in Chapter 136

5, the influence of the City of New Orleans, or perhaps a human desire to add structure to everything, also made itself prevalent under the construct of education.

An alternative learning space. The MBV offsets the more traditional learning settings for music in the city, such as more formal music lessons, church or more structured learning models in school, including drumline, string programs, etc. New Orleans, being an outlier city unto itself, where parade culture and outdoor music making is typical. In the words of one of our participating school teachers, “Ms. French” (2019): “We have a lot of guys here like Trombone

Shorty that's actually from the neighborhood…it's [MBV] unique and innovative. I think it, it opens up the minds of the kids. Not only the kids, but teachers like how we can make music with recycled things, household things” (“Ms. French” Interview, 2019).

The space functions as an alternative space for learning, where any given week, welding programs for girls could be coupled with a sewing workshop or lecture series on Black spirituality in New Orleans. The organization takes a very multi-disciplinary approach to present new ideas and always programs from an informed standpoint. Eliza McDermott (2019) highlights how female driven the collective is:

And when I hire teaching artists and when I hire a staff, you know, I definitely make sure that no opportunity is like gendered in any way. Like ‘Oh, you want to do a build?’ Okay. Yeah. So, I just did a Tool School for Girls, for example. So anyway, stuff like that as important to us testing if it makes sense. And I think it's one of those essential things about our staffing (MacDermott Interview, 2019) Observation of unstructured play. For three consecutive days, for 2 hours per day, around 50 grade four students from the participating school in the renowned Treme neighbourhood of New Orleans came to play in the MBV for the first time. Working with one of my biggest allies in setting up the research project, Eliza MacDermott, I observed the grade four children exploring the space. They divided into two groups, one group spent an hour working on 137 structured bucket drum ideas just outside the MBV with a guest educator, Corey Carter a regular hire on the MBV teaching artist roster, who has a strong base in American drum core music; while the other group played freely in the MBV, with no direction, other than to just to explore the space. We did a debrief after each daily session, with some show and tell and reflection happening. During these sessions, students had suggestions to build musical instruments themselves, and one described the experience as “freedom.”

The musicality of the students was quickly evident, on day one when I noticed a student gravitated toward the junk drum kit, and played it for a large portion of the hour-long session. In a later interview, I discovered that he was a drummer in his church and loved to do nothing but lay down a beat; he was in his element. Of all the children I observed over the three days, this one child did the least exploration throughout the playground, and for the most part, remained fixed to this junk drum kit. Click on Figure 20 below, a video clip of unstructured play, with a focus on the junk drum kit:

Figure 20. Video Clip of Unstructured Play.

Some students travelled through the space in groups, going from house to house, experiencing it together, others seemed to take it in a much more lonesome, individual way. The

MBV, and its organic, yet deliberately open design, gives the choice and order of play, to the whim of its user. The students from the school of this study were able to roam freely, could run 138 frantically from one house to the next, or focus on a house or instrument for longer periods.

Upitis (1989) asserts, when the choice is left to the student, the meaning of the experience deepens:

He quietly but firmly replied, ‘No, I'd rather play with the synthesizer.’ I doubt that he would have been as quick to make that statement in a classroom. But by making that statement, it was obvious that he, and not I, was directing his learning. Just as he, and not I, would choose whether he uses the swing or the slide in the playground. (p. 27)

Figure 21 below, a video clip of a student playing on their own:

Figure 21. Playing in Solitude.

Another theme was related to the social aspects of play, where some kids experienced the park in small friend groups, while others approached it more alone. Some kids played in a seemingly more focused manner, those perhaps with more musical experience, spending more time on a particular house. Whereas others went from house to house, more freely and quickly, less focused. On day three, Corey Carter entered the park, leading a few students in a more structured ostinato rhythm, while other students, alongside Eliza MacDermott, perused the houses more freely, adding musical ideas on top of the ostinato, even working out natural call- and-response ideas. 139

When the free play was happening on the third day observing the students from the participating elementary school from New Orleans, Louisiana, with the back drop of the steady rhythm, it allowed the kids who wanted to be part of the backdrop to do so. However, there were so many other smaller moments, like the two kids on the Porch Life metronome swing set, the one child zoned out at the top of Porch Life, all these micro environments in the playground that one can get lost in, yet still feel connected to the overall sound of the overall playground – it really does function as a musical village.

In Table 4, two main themes are extracted from the coding of audio-visual footage. Sub- themes extracted include structured versus unstructured play, and free play observations.

Table 4

Table 4. Sub-Themes Identified from Audio-Visual Recording of Play Sessions.

Concepts Observed (audio-visual recordings) Sub-Themes Identified

Video Clip 1: Kid on the junk drums, gravitated Structured vs. unstructured play towards the instrument. Drummer in his church, according to Mr. English. Totally comfortable there. Cory in the park (from day 3), doing standard call Structured vs. unstructured play and response stuff with the drums in a circle. Worked well. Student not really enjoying the call & response Structured vs. unstructured play (2:28 of file MAH02614) Video Clip 3 is a great display of what happened Structured vs. unstructured play on day 3, with the structured and unstructured combining.

So much natural exploration. When asked what does it inspire, it’s amazing Structured vs. unstructured play how so many kids seem to push it back into confirmed constructs that they know (drums, guitars, violins)…not the “outside” stuff Interesting how the “we will rock you pattern” Structured vs. unstructured play bled into the other houses at first…ie. hitting the pipes in the same rhythm 140

When the free play was happening on the 3rd day, Structured vs. unstructured play with the back drop of the steady rhythm, it allowed the kids who wanted to be part of the backdrop to do so, but then there were so many other smaller moments, like the two kids on porch life metronome swing set, the one kid zoned out at the top of porch life, all these little environments you can get lost in, yet still feel connected to the overall sound of the playground, that really worked well Also noticed the group of kids dancing and loving Free play Shake House for its electronic aspect, and how they associated that with EDM and DJing MAHO2600 pack of kids crammed into the phone Free play booth! Taking turns. Pretty neat. MAH02619 interesting how the one girl Free play conducted, naturally calling 3-2-1 let go, then pull (triggering Poulet) Smiles when the “we will rock you” steady pattern Free Play from the larger group but the 4 chosen kids who - Enjoyment of the went to play Chateau Poulet. Great smiles! experience, positive response MAH02585 – body language, freaking out, Free Play jumping up and down with excitement. - Enjoyment of the Discovery is in the foreground, total freedom experience and acceptance (by the MBV folks) to hit - Social observation of free things, and play! You notice kids really moving play fluidly through the park, and some very lonesome explorations, where others approach it in pairs or groups. R0010112_er VR footage shows that the horn Free Play organ kept kids attention for spurts, and they - Social observation of free really run through the playground, captivated by play some of the instruments (swing) for longer bouts, and others (horn organ) for lesser periods of time. The play can be lonesome for some, but very collaborative and communal for others (caters to both styles of personalities). You see Mr. Smith tempted, and he does begin to conduct the kids at the horn organ. Structure rearing its ugly head! Debrief (audio): what would you call this: Free Play “FREEDOM” (participating student). - Enjoyment of the experience The kids who want to bang on the junk kit are free Free play to hit it as hard as they like. The introspective 141

kids who want to discover the subtlety of Porch Life can also do the same. Finally, the phone booth, and staples that allow kids to speak, sing, scream and use their voices is also a hit. Observed lots of friends, flowing through the Free Play park, experiencing it together (e.g., Two girls on - Social observation of free the horn organ, doing the same rhythms and play hand formations over their different horn handles. Interviewing the kids on the last day (audio), they Free Play really absorbed the notion that anything goes - Anything goes with music making, and that instruments do not need to be expensive (which removes this mis- perceived notion, that in order to make meaningful music, lots of money needs to be spent)

Upon reflection They felt excited, free, happy, Free Play many loved the noise aspect. Liked that there - Anything goes were not many rules Vygotsky’s (1966) notion that “in play a child is always above his average age, above his daily behaviour, in play, it’s as though he were a head taller than himself” (p. 18) is embodied in the MBV, as its concepts are constantly pushing the envelope of sound and sound art. Although many of the members of New Orleans Airlift do not refer to the MBV as ‘a playground’, because it is fenced off, and not always accessible to the public. However, many public parks also hold a curfew, and The MBV does function as a playground, in that when children are playing on it, it resembles recess time in a school yard or any public playground.

The free play did not display much musical connection, continuity or tie-in until the final day, when in the last hour, we combined the structured and unstructured models, bringing the bucket drums into the playground, and letting the play unfold naturally. What happened from there was that those students who prefer structure were free to hold down a beat with Corey

Carter, alongside their homeroom teachers, “Mr. Smith” and “Ms. Jones.” While those students who preferred the more unstructured experience of music making were free to play wherever 142 they liked. This made for a perfect storm of rhythm and noise. It was fascinating to see the repeated rhythm hold down a sense of structure, while the other children played freely on top of it, even managing to find the solace of individual play, witnessed on day one, in video clip

Figure 22.

Figure 22. Structured and Unstructured Elements Combined.

A week later, I visited the participating school itself, to interview the teachers and pick up the students’ reflections. One of the two participating teachers to experience the MBV for the first time, along with their grade four class from the participating elementary school in New

Orleans, Louisiana, said that the MBV sparked the creativity in his students:

They see a lot of, you know creatives, young and old playing on buckets, pans, whatever they get their hands on to create some type of sign so they'll deal with there were I showed a few videos of that cause they was asking about it. (“Mr. English” Interview, 2019)

As Upitis (1989) asserts, in any playground there is a structure, communication, evaluation and learning occurring. This was certainly evident in observing free play in the

MBV. As Upitis (1989) observes,

Anyone watching a group of children play on a slide will quickly realize they work out a set of rules that they all more of less agree on and abide by. In some instances, there is initial conflict, but frequently there isn't. The same thing evolves after a surprisingly short time when a group of children cluster around the piano. In fact, I have found that these 143

sorts of operational structures develop much more quickly and to the satisfaction of most children if I leave the children to themselves rather than presenting them with what I view as a fair and detailed plan. (p. 24)

Take this example, a video clip of collaboration and structure when learning how to manipulate the sound of Chateau Poulet, notice the one student trying to conduct the experience, counting 3-

2-1 to get the group of four kids to work together, this links back to Quintron’s take (2019) on how to play the park “I love structure. Free for all free chaos is boring as hell. I don't like it when

I'm seeing adults who are trained at it doing it and I don't like to participate in and at the music box, I like to create patterns and structure” (Quintron Interview, 2019). The video clip below, in

Figure 23 demonstrates this:

Figure 23. Adding Structured Elements to the Play.

The one student who was not able to match the ostinato rhythm being laid down by Corey

Carter and their school colleagues, soon migrated over to The Delphine, now with two days of experience in manipulating the houses, knew they could draw more out of that house musically.

The student actually mentioned this to me, as to why they chose to move here instead. 144

Listen, albeit a chaotic soundscape, for the lead drum pattern in the background, and matching rhythm as played out by these two students on the horns of The Delphine in video clip below, Figure 24:

Figure 24. Structured and Unstructured Elements Combined.

Through the above example, I was able to observe firsthand, what Upitis (1989) acknowledges as the swift communication mechanism practiced by children playing freely in a playground:

Another feature of the playground is that children have a communication network which makes electronic mail seem archaic. If there is something worth knowing or seeing, you can be sure than in minutes every child on the playground will be privy to that delicious morsel of information. (p. 25) Free Play

The sub-theme I was most expecting to observe was free play. After all, we set up the play sessions to be unstructured, wanting to learn from this unguided exploration of the MBV.

This section unpacks these observations.

All-ages appeal (multi-generational). From observing the participating school, it was quickly apparent in all three days how equally excited the teachers and parent chaperones were to play in MBV than the grade four participants. During the Open Hours sessions, it was the same. I quickly realized how what Pennington (Interview 2019) and Hennessy (Interview 2019) 145 had both remarked on, that the MBV sets out to engage children of all ages, was evident. As

Elliot Perkins (2019) from the Historic Landmark Society of New Orleans asserts MBV “makes you feel like a kid” (Perkins Interview, 2019). The space never talks down to any age group, it appeals to the highest level of community builders, sound artists, playground fanatics and more.

Pennington (Interview, 2019), along with other colleagues from New Orleans Airlift maintains that although it is not a deliberate educational organization or institution, the MBV plays an educational role in the city, for children of all ages, not pandering to children in any way. As Elliot Perkins (2019) asserts, the MBV opens the imaginations of children no matter what their age:

It's the embodiment of imagination I think, is really what I feel like it is other-worldly in some ways. You feel like a little kid like running through, you know, literally when I'm there, I'm like running through like rattle, rattle, rattle. Clank clank clank! Woo woo woo! You can't help become a kid again and it's like a giant tree house kind of. It's so playful. (Perkins Interview, 2019)

The imaginative aspect of play is one of the most powerful learning tools that children can use in order to make sense of their world (Vygotsky, 1967). As John Dewey (1907) outlines, play is an essential element in the feeding of a child’s imagination, which leads to a developing of their world view:

The question of the relation of the school to the child's life is at bottom simply this: shall we ignore this native setting and tendency, dealing not with the living child at all, but with the dead image we have erected, or shall we give it play and satisfaction? If we once believe in life and in the life of the child, then will all the occupations and uses spoken of, then will all history and science, become instruments of appeal and materials of culture to his imagination, and through that to the richness and the orderliness of his life. (p. 72) 146

Hirsh-Pasek and Golinkof (2003) support the notion that “The level of children’s play rises when adults play with them.” (p. 208) This is in line with Jackie Wiggins (2005), who affirms:

If teachers can provide opportunities for peer and teacher scaffolding to occur in the context of artfully designed instruction, within a supportive work environment that empowers and values independent thinking, students should be able to develop the skills necessary to understand how to revise and extend their initial compositional ideas. (p. 36)

Pennington (Interview, 2019) is unapologetic, in that, if the space is designed properly, it will appeal and communicate its purpose to children of all ages in an organic way, not forced or contrived. This is very much in line with the philosophies of Waldorf education, and the teachings of Rudolf Steiner (1922) who believes in the co-learner model, as follows:

The teacher who lets the anthroposophic knowledge of man work upon his thought and feeling, comes, as we have seen, to a kind of artistic vision of the growing child, who is to him as individual, as full of mystery and enigma, as is every great work of art. But this is not all. Out of such a vision of the child proceeds also the manner in which the lesson is handled, the actual art of teaching. Not that the teacher consciously converts the knowledge of the child that he has acquired — whether by study or by his own observation — into educational formulae, into pedagogic maxims. (p. 74)

Pennington (2019) affirms the MBV approach – it does not talk down to children, it treats them as equal in the game of learning.

What I like about it is that I see the same thing happening to them that I see happening to adults. Like I don't see a unique kid thing. It's a, and something I have to remind myself of all the time because when we ever, we talk about the educational elements of the MBV, and those initiatives, you always want to couch it in terms of children. But fuck that shit. I mean everyone needs the same kind of education (Pennington Interview, 2019)

Similarly, on creativity and its all-ages attractiveness, Leah Hennessy (2019) asserts: 147

I think the MBV is a place that inspires limitless thinking, and is a place that engenders a sense of play, you know for all aged people to just like go and experiment with something. And I think that those places are somewhat rare, you know it's that place where it meets for, for adults and for children (Hennessy Interview, 2019)

This natural adult to child mutual learning space is in line with Lennerd & Lennerd (1992) who point to its benefits in European cities, “where the design of public settings enhances contact among people of different ages and backgrounds” (p. 47) and the danger of unknown adults does not stymy a community’s ability to learn and grow together. The MBV aims to teach children of all ages, and fosters a learning environment that is inclusive and inter-generational, similar to that of the Yucatec Mayans, as described by Gaskins and Miller (2009):

Instead of having imaginary circumstances and friends, they play through various real- life situations that reflect everyday life of the Yucatec. For example, children go through the steps of making tortillas, weaving, and cleaning clothing. This relates to not having Age Segregation. Unlike children of the industrialized middle-class who play mainly with children of the same age, The Yucatec Mayan children engage with all ages, exploring activities of daily life. (pp. 5-21)

Sometimes this guerilla approach, steeped in the punk rock aesthetic, can even be a little dangerous. With each fall, the team at New Orleans Airlift learns from it, another tenet of any good playground, as Christian Repaal (2019) highlights:

And this little kid ran up the stairs and then he just kept going because we forgot to put upgrading up underneath of that house. So, there's this space big enough for a three-year old to run through. And he did exactly that. He ran through it. And luckily, I had a whole bunch of sand on the ground from the, from the concrete and I'm poor. And so, there was this big pad of bum sand and the kid just fell flat on his back! (Repaal Interview, 2019) 148

Physically and musically risky. In considering the physical safety of a playground, it led me to also consider its musical safety. Not in the sense of decibel levels, although local bylaws should be respected – more so related to the confinements of the Western scale structure, and the potential dangers of lurking outside of it.

Most modern playgrounds attempt to incorporate some sort of musical element, such as a prefabricated, cheap-sounding xylophone, or a basic metal tube to sing into. Musical elements began to make their way into playgrounds in the early 1970’s with educators such as John

Grayson (1972) incorporating sound sculptures into playgrounds to help deaf children experience the joy of sound vibrations, a theme similar to Christine SunKim (score, 2019) and her Elevator

Pitch in the MBV. By introducing new and innovative musical materials, such as boat horns, different tuned strings, and weather-controlled synthesizers, to name a few, MBV is expanding on the limited creative outcomes of a toy-like outdoor xylophone. This is in line with Lev

Vygotsky’s (1978) zone of proximal development for young learners, as the MBV reduces “the distance between the actual developmental level as determined by independent problem solving and the level of potential development as determined through problem solving under adult guidance or in collaboration with more capable peers” (p. 86).

The MBV counters the prefabricated, safety to a flaw, model that is prevalent in North

American cities and incorporates elements of the Scandinavian “adventure playgrounds” (see

Chapter 2) with music, to give a unique educational experience to its users. In observing children playing in the MBV, it was apparent that their musical skills were being developed in a unique way, based on the playing field, and the students were keen to participate in this discovery. If play and engagement levels are high, the foreign sounds in their creative palette are quickly normalized, and the act of making collaborative experimental music becomes almost 149 routine. Through doing this, it was apparent that the students’ musical safety was not compromised, and the benefits of an adventure playground are mirrored in a musical adventure playground, where the notes can be different, outside the Western scale, and a new music can be achieved.

Space: the third teacher. This section explores the notion that the MBV space itself acts as an educator. The environment as "third teacher" is a tenet of the Reggio Emilia approach in education. Loris Malaguzzi, the founder of the approach, considered the three teachers of children to be adults, other children, and their physical environment. Gandini (1998) also adopts this concept of the learning environment as the "third educator" (p. 168). As the Reggio Emilia approach in education was born from the aftermath of World War II, the MBV was born from the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina.

The MBV teaches children how to rethink or re-approach play itself. With little to no guidance at all, a child can explore new sounds and ways to make music, with others or on their own. Gardner (1993) points to the importance of a children’s museum model, where the child has the ability to learn independently, yet deliberately from the space:

In the new institution of the children’s museum or the science museum the youngster can try out his or her skills in a variety of situations, again to conduct experiments, to relate the formal terminology and equations of schools to their relevant domains. An individual who lives in a children’s museum kind of environment is much more likely to understand the concepts and principles to which he is introduced. (p. 33)

As Elliot (1992) confirms “teachers and learners, in turn, are controlled from afar by the published script” (p. 12) or in this case, the deliberate design of the space. In the case of the

MBV, through its programming and physical layout, it creates a discourse in the community that 150 educates both directly and indirectly. Rick Snow (2019) also links the MBV to the lineage of post-modernists:

I think that when you look at what Cage and the Fluxus composers, you know, we're kind of rediscovering perhaps, you know, this idea that any sound can be thought of as musical and any, you know, organization of that sound can be appreciated. Whether it is organized in these like really highly structured ways of classical music or even pop music versus these more chaotic aspects of chance music or aleatory or you know, polystylism or just poly you know, two things totally independent happening at the same time. That's where we are when you come into a playground. (Snow Interview, 2019)

More like the Sørensen (1931) junk playgrounds of early 20th Century Europe, the MBV experience is not prescribed, and more of a choose-your-own-adventure model. Rick Snow

(2019) on musical development, unstructured play and the shared voices in the process:

I mean, it's a video game in which you can explore…it's nonlinear. You can go in any direction you want to do whatever you want. And this is a musical space where there's no score, there's nothing written down. You go and you put your hands on something and see what happens. And then as you learn from it, you make music and you've learned to make music that is your voice and its voice at the same time. (Snow Interview, 2019)

Quintron (2019) asserts that the MBV is a space that fosters creativity and educational development, like no other:

I know what it does to me creatively to be confronted with an instrument that is not designed in the 12-tone scale or arts like one of a kind thing, but it makes sound almost everybody's gonna want to spend a little bit of time with that and anybody musical is gonna want to spend a bunch of time with it. All kids are going to at least want to bang on it for a minute. And then the challenge of bringing people together to play those kind of things together is like, I don't know, it's like tapping into some kind of level of education and collaboration that other methods of teaching and playing music together can't get to. (Quintron Interview, 2019) 151

Upitis (1989) confirms the importance of playground learning, and how it can lead to a deeper understanding and help them solve real life problems in the future:

What each person learns, child and adult alike, is as unique as each individual. But my conviction that children are learning comes not from testing them after they have played in the playground. It comes from watching them solve the problems that they naturally encounter in the environment. (p. 26)

When it comes to developing solid risk assessment skills, and an adaptive learning environment, the MBV certainly does this. During their Open Hours on weekends, docents, local New

Orleans musicians help visitors learn new approaches and keep things relatively safe. But for the most part, the space leads and inspires musical adventure. The next section examines how curriculum development might further reveal educational opportunities within the space.

Impact

This sub-theme of impact focusses on what take-aways the participating students had from the experience.

A musical equalizer: from special needs to performance anxiety. Related to children with special needs, founding member Delaney Martin (2019) highlighted that the MBV resonates with children who have special needs.

We have great experiences with kids on the spectrum because the playing of the houses really engages them that by playing with them, you are communicating with them. Parents report that the experience has helped deepen their own communication with their kids. (Martin Interview, 2019)

From the three days observing grade four children from a participating New Orleans elementary school in Louisiana, there were no real behavioral challenges, other than on day two of the study, a group of about five children were playing a little too freely on the second floor of one of the houses, and one of the parent chaperones stepped in to discipline them, and they had to sit out for 152 the remainder of the session. There was a threat that those particular children would not be allowed back into the space for the final day. However, on day three, they returned and were perfectly fine, playing in dissonant harmony with the rest of the cacophony. From my journal entry (2019) on day two:

Observation day two of the grade four kids happened today. In the first session (“Group 2”) some more violent, raucous play was observed. I overheard that one of the kids was hanging from the 2nd level of the Pitch Bow house, which look like monkey bars, and it was a dangerous scene. Eliza reported that the problem kids were crying later and forced to apologize by their teacher. The chaperone parent mentioned in leaving that those kids would not be attending tomorrow, Eliza quickly discouraged her from pursuing this action, as all kids, especially those, are welcome. We’ll see how that pans out tomorrow, and perhaps, as Eliza noted, this is why this group of [participating school] kids is so well behaved, perhaps the less behaved kids were left behind? (Marsella journal, May 13, 2019)

Eliza MacDermott hosts several annual visits from Camp Able Nola, a local agency that serves children with special needs. The group often attend weekly Open Hours sessions, and were present on one of the days I observed. Although I was not able to speak with them directly, it was evident that they were comfortable in the space, and content to spend the afternoon.

The MBV acts as a musical equalizer in a city so rich with music history, from Second

Line Parades through to noise music. Rick Snow (2019) has noted:

There's also something kind of strangely equalizing about bringing musicians into a place like this. So you could bring someone who's a, you know, highly trained musician or even highly trained jazz musician and ask them to play this strange house and all of a sudden everyone's a novice and it's just your kind of innate creativity and the ability to get over the hump of not necessarily knowing exactly what you're doing and still enjoying this…It lets someone like a violinist from the philharmonic come in and have 153

fun with my child who's four years old, so they can have a duet and they both feel comfortable together. (Snow Interview, 2019)

Quintron (Interview, 2019) feels that the MBV levels the playing field for musicians of all levels and backgrounds to play together, removing the performance anxiety that a lot of other musical contexts seem to foster naturally. For example, the university music seminar, song writing circles at music festivals, open mic sessions in any given city, etc. Quintron (2019) alludes to these pressured settings as he outlines what the good design of the MBV naturally deflects:

It levels the playing field between virtuosos and people who are just gifted with music or have a good sense of rhythm, it totally levels the playing field for those people to work together. Cause there's oftentimes a real intimidating vibe when you're working with some people who can read and some people who can't read music on some people, they're on their instrument that they have spent their, you know, they were born with it in their hands. And then some people that are not so good but they've got they're great songwriters and they've got good ideas or whatever. It takes all that away. And it frees up thinking, especially for the virtuoso types. It, I think it's even more beneficial for those kinds of people. (Quintron Interview, 2019)

Student Learning: Before Their Visits

I surveyed all of the grade four students both before and after their experience playing for three consecutive days in the MBV. It was all their first time in the space, along with their teachers, who were interviewed above. When analyzing the play of the students from the participating elementary school from New Orleans, Louisiana, it was apparent that free play on the instruments was one of the space’s most natural states, and the children improvising offered them an opportunity for decision-making, as they listened more attentively and gravitated towards the musical houses they preferred the most. 154

Thirty-one out of fifty participants filled out the survey before they participated in the three-day play experience. Here is what I learned from the students and their perceptions of

MBV from their surveys before having visited the MBV:

Perceptions of MBV. Before having played in the MBV, 84% of the surveyed students wrote positively about it. Prior to visiting the MBV, one student (Survey, 2019) described it as

“unique and fun, because they used recycled materials.” All but one of the respondents seemed keen to explore the space. 16% of the students used the word “fun” as a descriptor.

Another student (Survey, 2019) described it as “a masterpiece, a true work of art.” It was not lost on them as to how ambitious a project and undertaking this project was. And the unique aesthetic, as outlined by one of its builders, Christian Repaal (Interview, 2019), of the New

Orleans Airlift, was picked up by the students too. One student (Survey, 2019) compared it to

“the tv set of Moose Village.” In fact, several of the students described it as an actual village, some picked up on how “brown” or natural the setting seemed.

Prior musical experience. 81% of the participating students in the study said they had prior musical experience. As one of their participating teachers reminded me in my post interview, many of these students lived in the Treme neighbourhood of New Orleans, and if they were not getting their musical experience at school, through their mentioned band and string program, they were most likely gaining musical exposure from 2nd line parade culture, church, or other external influences.

Six percent of the students said they like to rap, thirteen percent cited drums specifically, and sixteen percent mentioned singing.

What the students thought about this musical space. The students did not think much about the MBV prior to visiting it, however in the post surveys and reflections, most students 155 mentioned their intention of returning outside of school hours, and the school itself were keen to foster a more long term relationship with the New Orleans Airlift, that could involve musical instrument invention and deeper collaboration with the students.

Musical tastes of the participating students. The participating students’ musical taste varied, listing hip hop, country, pop, darkness, orchestral pop, Korean music, the Soviet anthem, and more. Some mentioned instruments, such as trumpets, keyboards, and guitar. Others mentioned artists like Taylor Swift, Ariana Grande, Aviva and NBA Young Boy. One participant (Survey, 2019), mentioned “I listen to a beat noise.” Quite a diverse swath of musical tastes from this group, reflective of the city the grade fours are growing up in.

What the students like (or dislike) about their school music classes. The participating students’ criticisms of current music classes varied, from three of the participants citing that it was “bossy” to another three calling it “boring.” From the participating teachers, I did learn about the strong strings and band programs offered at their school. Overall, this program seemed well-appreciated by the students, there was no pulse of resentment whenever it was mentioned.

What the students liked about the structured play experiences. 94% of the surveyed students gave a positive response to the question related to structured music education, however I do appreciate one student’s feedback (Survey, 2019): “Probably a lot better than the other when it comes to safe…but safe is boring.”

What the students liked about the free play experiences. While 90% of surveyed students were positive when asked about free play, one student (Survey, 2019) simply claimed that they liked “EVERYTHING!” about free play. This supports Wiggins (1999) who asserts that “students need opportunities to make music on their own – without unnecessary teacher controls” (p. 35). As one of the participating students wrote “I like them because kids might be 156 bored, but not if they’re at a park,” alluding to the fact that playgrounds are the antidote to boredom.

On day two of the free play with participating students from an elementary school in New

Orleans, Louisiana, I observed this electronic dance music-style party happen inside Shake

House, where a different type of play, a mimicked social element, more genre-based made its way into the playground, in Figure 25, the video clip below:

Figure 25. The Social Aspects of Play.

Most students had some prior musical experience in a formal music class, as the participating elementary school from New Orleans, Louisiana offered a robust violin and viola program and reported that their taste in music was varied. Most of the students reported that they disliked structured play experiences and preferred the idea of playing freely.

Student Learning: After Their Visits

In my observations, the twelve features of play, as outlined by Tina Bruce (2011), were exercised in the unstructured play of the participating New Orleans grade four students. From the list of twelve features of play (Bruce, 2011), I observed children using firsthand experiences from life; children making up rules as they played in order to keep control; children symbolically representing as they played, making and adapting play props; children choosing to play at will; children playing alone; pretending when they played; playing with adults and other children 157 cooperatively in pairs or groups; having personal play agendas; children deeply involved and difficult to distract from their deep learning as they wallow in their play and learning; children trying out their most recently acquired skills and competences, as if celebrating what they know; and finally children coordinating ideas and feelings and making sense of relationships with their families, friends and cultures (Bruce, 2011, p. 117).

Related to this framework, I observed students using firsthand experience with sound art and raw musical exploration with strange, new sounds, notably on Day One of their visit. I observed rules being made up on the spot, related to the play, as per figure 4. I observed pretend play scenarios, where a house became a dance club, and participating students imagined a narrative beyond the playground, demonstrated in Figure 25 video clip above. On multiple occasions, I observed natural solo and team play among the students, and their perceptions of music, and understanding of its potential, expanding before my eyes in real time. And so on, I observed the deeply-seeded culture of New Orleans reflected in the play, from the musicality of the young participants, through to the understanding of the Mardi Gras Indian commemorating in

Big Chief’s House.

I also noticed David Kolb's (1984) Experiential Learning Model in action, from day one of the play, through to analyzing the surveys, one can trace the stages from a “concrete experience" of interacting with the houses freely on day one, to reflective observation at the end of each session, where participants were demonstrating that they understood how the sounds were being produced in each house; to “abstract conceptualization” where by the end of the experience, the students were dreaming up bizarre musical houses that they were inspired to invent. Creativity in motion. 158

Of the fifty participating students, only seventeen filled out the post-experience survey.

The students experienced enjoyment in the pure physical activity of playing in the park. Many students reported that they would like to build their own musical instruments in the future, and the prevalent theme that emerged was that anything can be used to make music. 100% of the students surveyed reflected on their experience in a positive light, and said that they intended to return to the space at some point in the future. As well, one student (Survey, 2019) claimed their perspective on swings was changed, through playing on the Tintinnabulation Station, a reference to playground activity. Finally, they all felt happy when playing in the MBV, one student described it as “freedom” (Survey, 2019). That was a powerful and gratifying moment, to hear the word freedom used by children to describe the free play model they were exploring. The students picked up on how much fun everybody was having together in a free and accessible space. They acknowledged that their perspective on music and how to produce it could be changed.

Curriculum Development

John Dewey (1902) describes curriculum as:

a map, a summary, an arranged and orderly view of previous experiences, serves as a guide to future experience; it gives direction; it facilitates control; it economizes effort, preventing useless wandering, and pointing out the paths which lead most quickly and most certainly to a desired result. He envisioned ‘the child and the curriculum are simply two limits which define a single process’ (pp. 1-31).

The MBV seems limitless for curricular ideas and projects that it can lead to in the realm of education, and beyond. As Rick Snow (Interview, 2019) reminds in this section, from grade school, through to university, the space inspires collaborative projects. Elliot (1992) calls for a 159 more organic approach to curriculum, where teacher, in the case of MBV, the space and its builders, are the curriculum:

A basic principle of reflective teaching practice is this: ‘a curriculum’ is not a written plan developed and distributed in linear steps. Instead, a curriculum is something people (students and teachers) experience in specific situations in virtue of a teacher's knowledge and intentions. In this view, the teacher is the curriculum (p. 12).

Hennessy (2019) makes a strong case for developing the proficiency and musicianship of students of all ages to “learn the houses”:

That tool unlocks so many doors, you know, and the ways in which young people are now, so tech savvy and you know, you put like Ableton live, if you, if you teach them those things, like they, they pick it up and now like field recordings, this weird sound can come into, their making like it's not just about learning an instrument proficiently, which is still very important. You know… But it's opening up all of this other and you know, you can learn these houses proficiently and keep exploring these houses (Hennessy Interview, 2019).

Although there does not seem to be a budgetary or organizational priority placed on it, the MBV is well-poised to develop a one-of-a-kind curriculum for its space that could change the way we consider music education in general. Their approach naturally places more emphasis on free play, and is subsequently less regimented. In The Music Education Paradigm (Marsella, 2004) I make a case for why noise-making with young students can yield positive results in the community. This ripple effect was happening naturally in New Orleans, where the street performance element, with Second Line parades was a prevalent pillar of its culture, was already a norm.

Hennessy (2019) elaborates on the importance of MBV as a source for developing musicianship in an alternative setting: 160

And I think that like it's tied into something that I find is either central at what you're teaching your kids in your curriculum, or it's not. And to me that is like the primacy of the ear, right? Like, how are you developing your ear and your sense of pitch and your sense of rhythm. Because all of that, like if you're really developing your ears, you're developing your sense of like what is musical sound as well? And this thing takes that to like a new level. Like how am I hearing these different things? How am I hearing how nature like impacts the soundscape? You know? (Hennessy Interview, 2019)

While observing the grade two class from another participating elementary school in New

Orleans, Louisiana that visited for a one-off session, some kids remarked on Elevator Pitch when they heard the sounds emanating from it. ‘Is that how deaf people sound?’ they asked, related to the pre-recorded screams Christine SunKim had used as samples for each button in the elevator.

This leads to the ambition set by Eliza McDermott and others at New Orleans Airlift to develop specific curriculum to help hone the unique experience for learners of all ages. From a curricular standpoint, the MBV is a unique space to run educational programs in. As a space, it lends itself well to unstructured play settings, such as its Open Hours on weekends, where there is often a docent there to help educate visitors about each musical house, but overall, the play and experience is very fluid and free. A regular weekly Saturday visitor to Open Hours, Marilyn

Payne (Interview, 2019) said how much she liked it for her kids to explore and feel safe around music. Then the structured elements that MBV evokes for performances, from Quintron’s John

Zorn-inspired card system of conducting, through to Leah Hennessy conducting the opening performance of Christine SunKim’s (score, 2019) Elevator Pitch concert.

The universe of new sounds presented in each house of the MBV is so unique, that it naturally sets up a need for a new curriculum. New Orleans Airlift member Eliza MacDermott

(Interview, 2019) has been working loosely on writing this curriculum, derived from her experience in leading multiple education groups through the space. The houses embody their 161 own tonality, each with a different planet in this seemingly endless galaxy of sonic opportunities.

Rick Snow (2019) is seeing the idea starting to catch on in other communities:

…and they export the idea to other cities and other cities are sort of starting to pick it up. I do know a few other artists in town that are also highly interested in social practice art. So, there are other people that are kind of trying to bring different communities into the art space that are not traditionally kind of in that, as I said before, that kind of ‘high art’ world (Snow Interview, 2019).

Leah Hennessy (Interview, 2019) is also of the opinion that the MBV is not a playground, she feels that it is more nuanced, she treats it more like a canvass for creatives and composers: “So I think like that sense is really important. I think it's really important for artists to be pushed outside of their conventional instruments and the experience of writing something for this space is truly unique. You know, like what if you're letting it [the space] lead?” In the words of Rick

Snow (2019), collaborator and contributor to the MBV, most recently as part of the Elevator

Pitch project:

A curriculum can absolutely be developed around bringing ideas of experimentation,

exploration, open form music, improvisation to people of all ages, you know, so you

could bring, I mean, they're already bringing kindergarteners and, but I could see myself

bringing my students in and they’re, you know, in their late teens and early twenties and

then I can't see any reason why you couldn't bring a group of graduate students in here

when they're in a seminar about experimental music and say, look, all of you might be

excellent performers on classical guitar, you know, electric bass, piano, clarinet. Well, in

this village, none of you know how to play anything and now we're going to go, figure

out how to make music together (Hennessy Interview, 2019). 162

Teaching creative sustainability. In line with the STEM learning approach, not only does MBV teach sustainability from repurposing old barge board from Creole cottages, and materials re-used into musical instruments, but it also sees its educational programming in the same way, empowering youth in exposing them to these new ideas and programs that teach instrument-building.

The Georgia Tech School of Music, and their renowned Guthman Musical Institute

Competition, as per their website are: “dedicated to identifying the newest and greatest ideas in music. Every year, we invite musical inventors from around the world to share their creations and ideas about the future of music” (“Georgia Tech School of Music”, 2020). This concept, of inventing new musical instruments, at the college level, and also with younger grades is something that is celebrated at MBV. What was planted as a seed of an idea during my study in

May 2019 with the participating school, is now being developed in a deepened partnership with the school. They are now co-inventing instruments with teacher-builders being provided as support by New Orleans Airlift, to build a drum kitchen. The space itself inspires this notion that the participant too can create their own sound art projects, either offering to contribute them to

MBV, or for this community to expand. After finishing my study, I received this email from

Delaney Martin (2019) that welcomed future collaboration “Rich, pitch us now whenever you have an idea, you’re family” (Martin email, 2019).

Chapter Summary

…experimental music usually is the thing that's like trying to push boundaries, trying to make you rethink what music is (Pennington, 2019).

In summary, the MBV functions as an alternative educational space, from its multiple perspectives as a music venue, presentation space, playground, it presents a unique opportunity to develop new curriculum to help maximize its potential for affecting social change, within the 163

City of New Orleans and beyond as a tourist attraction. Four main themes were derived through analyzing the data, including an informed approach to music education, the balance between structured and unstructured play, free play and impact of the space on its users. Created by experts in the field of sound art and experimental, rebellious music, this project is delivered by the New Orleans Airlift, where the space itself becomes the teacher, through its well-thought design.

The MBV functions as a space that naturally teaches sound art to students of all ages, and through this exploration, reflects many of the different forms of intelligence, as per Howard

Gardner (2011). This musical adventure playground inspires invention, it sparks the imagination, much like a children’s museum model might, and it teaches sustainability, and other important STEM-related pillars, such as collaboration, physics, and inadvertently, math. The next chapter unpacks how the space functions as a vehicle for community development.

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Chapter 7: The Music Box Village as a Vehicle for Community Development

I think community is people talking to each other, involved in each other's lives, doing, working on the same things, you know, or at least reacting to the same things. You know, and it's very easy for people to live in a neighborhood and come and go, in another house at nine and five and never meet their neighbors. Never. You know, and that's, that's not community…community is when there's stuff going on! Elliot Perkins, New Orleans, Historic District Land Commission, 2019

This chapter outlines how the Music Box Village (MBV) functions as a vehicle for community development. It begins by examining the concept of community music and community development, and how a space like MBV and the New Orleans Airlift organization functions within these parameters. In the related research sub-question, I sought to learn who benefits from a musical playground, including cities, schools, children, youth, special needs communities, and others. I wanted to learn what social challenges a musical playground could help resolve, outlining the ways in which it helps coalesce a community.

Through my interview analysis, I discuss findings from New Orleans politicians who supported the project, and how other key community members helped realize such a phenomenon. I analyzed and extrapolated on certain sub-themes that were pulled from each interview that applied directly the construct of community development. My interviews and pre- reading on the MBV were the main data I used to derive my findings in this chapter. These sub- themes shape the chapter accordingly. In Table 5 below, I examine three key sub-themes: community music and community development, assets, and knowledge sharing. 165

I end this chapter with a discussion around implications and an exemplar model for a musical playground in other cities, using their Porch Life mobile project to illuminate this concept.

Development of Themes from Data Analysis

Table 5

Table 5. Sub-Themes Extracted from Interviews Related to Community Development.

Topics Discussed Sub-Themes Identified Place-making (Martin & Pennington) Community music - Accessible arts Music as the equalizer, accessibility to music - Community Development

Punk anarchists mixing with conservatives – music as the middle ground, MBV as the safe meeting place

Socially responsible (not taking away from other organizations in the Lower 9th Ward)

Perkins: “Districts evolved organically over time,” locks in with Pennington’s interview regarding communities, and how they evolve themselves over time

Perkins: “I think community is people talking to each other, involved in each other's lives, doing, working on the same things, you know, or at least reacting to the same things”

Hennessy is socially-minded, as are the entire team: “it’s great seeing the panel dialogues affect the change”

Snow on Community building with other social groups, through the houses: “this piece (Elevator Pitch) is, as far as I know, I'm just kinda peeking around. Yep. It's the only one that has really been conceived as a kind of like a specifically addressing a community that probably has, you know, had the chance to experience this space” [accessibility] 166

Shepherd: Word of mouth is a great way to coalesce the community

Shepherd touches on community health

Schrock talks about how collaborative and integrative they were when building TRUST in the community Hennessy: “the way that the community Assets celebrates and kind of celebrates almost in - As Connector – Creative Cross- defiance of some of the challenges” Pollination [celebration & commemoration] - Community-minded (post- Katrina social effects, Resilience [of the city] – Katrina (gentrification) gentrification) - Intergenerational & intercultural The Airbnb transformation of the Bywater - Commemoration neighbourhood (Pennington) - Disruptor

Quintron says they (MBV) are not responsible for gentrification, not on the wrong side of it. Connectors (e.g., Quintron was not on my list until I spoke with Jay Pennington, one text and 45 minutes later, I was at his studio improvising an interview)

Intergenerational & Intercultural Outpost model (the musicality of a place) An Exemplar for Other Cities to Adopt mentioned by Delaney, Jay, Andrew, and - Porch Life others

Rick Snow “they export the idea to other cities, and they pick it up” ambassadors of weird!

Snow: “If we want to really go beyond, I think what I would dream of is, you know, something like this in every city in essence, a place where you have a playground that has a group of people managing it that are open to experimentation and sound and community building and people having a chance to appreciate one another in that space.”

Schrock: “that's so not average, that place I would love for it to be normal”

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Community Music

Community music begins with the concept of allowing access, whether it be to a quality music education, or the ability to make music together in a free, open space. This growing field of study is an intersection of social justice and music education, usually leading to positive change and impact via the communal linkages it fosters (see Chapter 2).

So, a community music model could include subsidized music lessons like Regent Park

School of Music in Toronto, the Roots of Music program in New Orleans, or the Sistema program in Venezuela and other cities across the world. It also includes a space like MBV in

New Orleans, which provides access to sound art and alternative music concepts to 12,000 visitors per year (“New Orleans Airlift”, 2020).

Accessible arts. One of the many benefits of the MBV is how accessible it is. Although there is a wall that surrounds it, and it holds regular hours, when the space is accessible during

Open Hours, it really embraces its patrons, and makes them know that any idea is worth pursuing. This concept of accessibility is not lost on Alita Edgar (2019):

…taking the piece on tour is kind of funny cause you know, we got to go to Aux Claires and let thousands of people make noises and that's pretty cool. You know, too, is to go to a sound art festival, where nobody's allowed to touch the sound art and we’re the only pieces of art that they're allowed to touch, you know, that or besides the professional musicians obviously. So, like that's pretty, pretty good. I like, I like those a lot, you know? (Edgar Interview, 2019)

The uniqueness of the MBV and their ability to do positive outreach is acknowledged by sound artist, composer and professor Rick Snow (2019):

Of the organizations in town that are arts organizations, they're the top, when it comes to one being a really just engaging and inviting space for members of the community from 168

all walks of life, all neighborhoods from the city. The programming is totally unique. There's nowhere else in town that's doing anything like it (Snow Interview, 2019).

Christine SunKim, and her collaborative musical house, Elevator Pitch helped coalesces the

Deaf community of Louisiana, with one project that commemorates their voices and honours them. This is community building, as SunKim, along with Rick Snow, and with the support of

Smithsonian Institute and New Orleans Airlift, gave a platform to an underserved community

(SunKim score, 2019). The MBV plays a role in connecting musical communities as well, from traditional jazz bands that New Orleans is known for, through to noise bands and experimentalists, such as the local noise festival in the city, and other international names such as

Thurston Moore (Pennington Interview, 2019).

Other public access models in community music, such as Play Me, I’m Yours, an initiative to put pianos into public spaces in the United Kingdom have shown to help “build a sense of pride within the community and it brings different neighborhoods together. It really reflects and promotes all of the different artists, groups, communities involved in the project and enables individuals to feel part of something” (Jerram, 2016).

The MBV, like Play Me, I’m Yours, builds community through an outdoor musical collaboration. The noise factor is not a negative one, but rather, a conduit for community development, “we can choose the noise in our neighbourhoods” (Marsella, 2016). According to local Bywater resident, Marilyn Payne (2019), she asserts: “it’s not only safe, but it’s positivity…it’s very helpful to the community…it brings a peace of mind” (Payne Interview,

2019). A place so noisy, amidst a community that reciprocates those noises with boat horns and trains, and a patron, who oddly finds peace of mind when frequenting during Open Hours.

In Kertz-Welzel (2016) we find a critique of community music, calling it too vague in its scope: 169

Taking a closer look at this definition, it is hard to understand what community music exactly is. Does it concern all kinds of music-making? Is it not simply another term for amateur music-making, emphasizing its social and political significance? In fact, it is difficult to determine what differentiates community music from other kinds of music- making. The ambiguity of community music is a well-known problem (p. 116).

However, at the core of this criticism is a fear of the outside world, and the musical equalizer that unconventional community music models can provide. Again, enters the relationship between traditionalism and experimentalism. This outsider approach to music education, or community music is where MBV comes in; with the space itself, as outlined in the previous chapter, acting as educator. This points to an informal approach to communal music-making, with the playground in the role of musical equalizer. 170

Community development. It is important to better understand and explore various models in community development and how these models may apply to community music, which is where a place like MBV and an organization like New Orleans Airlift come in.

Community development, as defined by Green and Haines (2016), is the fostering of a sound infrastructure that will eventually lead to a healthy community (p. 5). They outline specific elements that impact this infrastructure, from economic to social, and political development, that help a community thrive (Green and Haines, 2016).

Theodori (2005) defines community development as “the process of building and strengthening community” (p. 665) and community as “a place orientated process of interrelated actions through which members of a local population express a shared sense of identity while engaging in the common concerns of life” (pp. 662-3). Simply stated, communities can consist of people with a shared interest (Chua, Madej and Wellman, 2011). The ability to create strong local resources in a community requires “social ties and relationships that enhance the ability of residents to act collectively and address concerns” (Green and Haines, 2016, p. 11). Community offers a place for people to learn the value of cooperation and civic virtue (Green and Haines,

2016).

In the debate of place versus people, I see great importance in the two. I used to think that it was all about people and how they help define a place, giving it a living character.

However, in seeing certain models over the years, for example, in Regent Park, Toronto, where clean, accessible space for running music programs has provided a solid platform for social change; I am beginning to appreciate the obvious value in place. I remain firm, that the public still need to easily access space, on their terms, in a meaningful way, which is often a difficult 171 task to do well. As Green and Haines (2016) assert “many would argue that building strong social relationships is essential to both human and community development” (pg. 7).

When defining community, I also embrace the stance of Theodori (2005), who acknowledges place, interrelated actions around a common interest while building identity around the common concerns of life. We are constantly growing multiple extended families, networks and communities to try and make sense of the world around us, and hopefully improve it. Community development is at the core of a strong and empathetic society. It seeks to improve a situation, a neighbourhood or a mindset, and practices the act of resilience.

I agree the above definitions and will now apply them to the MBV in New Orleans, one of the most resilient cities I have had the chance to visit.

Assets

Assets, as defined by Kretzman and McKnight (1993), are “gifts, skills, and capacities of

‘individual associations and institutions’ within a community” (pg. 9). There are seven forms of assets, as outlined by Green and Haines (2016): “physical, human, social, financial, environmental, political, and cultural” (p. 12). Much of these assets lead back to people in a community, or attempting to help it. Every community has a unique set of assets, equally as complex as its challenges. Effective community development takes a creative approach to maximize and magnify those assets to help combat the mentioned challenges and bring forth positive change in a community.

Through my study, I was able to better understand the assets that I assumed MBV encompassed prior to my research; unravel new assets that became apparent through my observations and interview analysis; and distinguish what assets MBV shares outwardly for the benefit of the community. This approach considered personal assets, physical assets including 172 emergency supports, food, housing, and transportation; social assets including civic participation and networks; human assets including health, life skills, financial literacy, and education

(Weaver et al., 2010, pp. 35-36).

The obvious cultural assets of New Orleans begin with a rich history of jazz music, one where the music floods the streets every Sunday for Second Line parades. Equally challenged by its physical assets in the American South, susceptible to serious storms and flooding and natural disasters. The racial inequities of America are also reflected in New Orleans. Such a complex city, equally blessed as it sometimes seems cursed, underwater, yet on a different cultural plane, resilient, yet starving for infrastructure funding.

Through the research, a revealed asset was how politically active the New Orleans Airlift is as an organization to the community at large, sharing resources to several groups in the neighbourhood. Through the research, a revealed cultural asset was their close relationship with noise music and experimentalism, bounce music and one the genre’s founding members, Jay

Pennington (2019), who asserts:

I mean all of the most famous artists in New Orleans right now are gay rappers, you know, like where else is that happening? Not, not saying it's not, but most gay rappers as a, as a, as a notion or concept in the artistic world are marginal in other cities, they're performing to a crowd of likeminded individuals, usually Big Freedia, Katey Red, Sissy Nobby, they're playing for everyone globally and are not that like their, their queerness or whatever is a foregone conclusion and everyone just accepts it and doesn't question it (Pennington Interview, 2019).

Effective community development takes a creative approach to maximize and magnify those assets to help combat the mentioned challenges and bring forth positive change in a community, or what Tom Burrup (2006) calls creative community building, “finding the broader identity of place and connecting people across sectors” (p. 9). 173

The New Orleans Airlift builds community in a variety of ways. The social networks or groupings it has helped forge include a four-lecture series to help coalesce racialized communities in New Orleans, young builder workshops; music education programs; their employment team including docents and other local musicians they support; New Orleans’ noise and experimental music scene, indie music scene, jazz, bounce and other genres celebrated; as well as New Orleans’ Deaf community, autistic community and other neuro-diverse communities.

As connector: creative cross-pollination. MBV acts as a cultural pollinator, tying together many sectors and demographics in its organic approach to community building through music. As its co-founder Jay Pennington (2019) describes it:

I would look out into the crowd and see literally a billionaire, art investor that I knew and a crust punk, like kids sitting side by side talking, laughing, being kind of like, you know, where are, we, what is this? What or what is this thing? Have you been here before? I've never been, you know, like having these conversations that I think are, I think that's the crux of like what you want to be happening. It is for everybody that's in the community. There's just more people than anyone can imagine in any community. And I think, the goal of the project is to try to get all those people to talk, in a human way first and then we'll get around to the issues that we need to get around to (Pennington Interview, 2019).

Jay Pennington, one of the New Orleans Airlift co-founders, alongside Delaney Martin, embraces this creative cross-pollination, where they help forge artistic intersections between not- so-obvious communities. Rick Snow (Interview, 2019) appreciates that this collaboration often happens outside of the gallery space, through Airlift’s providing a unique canvas to present work in the space of the Music Box Village:

All of these sort of people that are doing interesting and creative things, but not in that kind of like, you know, gallery space that people that go to see art are expecting, you 174

know, but then they will come to a place like Airlift that, you know, is, knows how to present that to them and, and bring those communities together (Snow Interview, 2019).

Snow (2019) notices how much better the organization is getting with each collaboration, most recently with the pairing of up-and-coming fashion designers with creator of bounce music, New

Orleanian artist Big Freedia, on January 13, 2020. The City of New Orleans, stacked with its assets of live music, deep cultural history and in this case a rich community of musical experimentalists, also faces equally complex challenges, from the ramifications of Hurricane

Katrina, still felt nearly fifteen years later, to the more systemic social problems inherent in current-day America, including racism, poverty and crime.

MBV does its part to help address the complex challenges not only in the Bywater neighbourhood, but in New Orleans, and throughout the United States. Through hosting vulnerable and honest conversations on Black spirituality in New Orleans during my stay, I was able to witness how a relatively white-facing organization works hard at allyship and balancing this inequality. Through the very decision to remain in the Upper Ninth Ward, the New Orleans

Airlift made space for other more diverse and indigenous organizations to work in the Lower

Ninth Ward, this is another example of how responsibly the organization functions within the city (Pennington Interview, 2019). Daniel Sharp (2019) gives full credit to how socially aware the New Orleans Airlift functions: “the connection to the community while at the same time like keeping this experimentalist aspect of it alive. That's something that I, you know, I just kind of stand in awe of what they've been able to achieve” (Sharp Interview, 2019).

Community building capitalizes on a local neighbourhood's assets, inspiration, and potential, with the intention of creating public spaces that promote people's health, happiness, and well-being. The MBV has developed a reputation, among those in the field, of embodying these values. As co-founder Jay Pennington (2019) claims “we had place-making organizations 175 who were like coming, you know, coming to us for that kind of development” (Pennington

Interview, 2019). Followed by educational programmer Eliza MacDermott (2019) who sees great potential in the MBV model:

more by the principles I think within this place and what it represents and the potential here for community building. But also, because I think those as concepts like, you know, working collaboratively and democratically and investing in community or just things that it's nice to see them married to the art (MacDermott Interview, 2019). Eliza MacDermott (2019), whose focus is partly to develop educational programs in the space, and who also works tirelessly in the development of Open Hours, is “interested in the democracy within the art institution” (MacDermott Interview, 2019) and sees great potential in the MBV as a vehicle to build community.

Martin (2019) treats the space as an actual village, and sets standards accordingly: “I'd like to see it grow and evolve like a real village over time. And keeping its integrity around the framework and not just spanning out into like, oh, it's just a sound thing. So, I'm kind of strict about that” (Martin Interview, 2019). MBV’s founding sound artist, Taylor Lee Shepherd

(2019), does not see the space as directly affecting the community’s health of New Orleans, but more as a reflection to engage with it:

…having the experience of being able to just have this joyous outpouring of making music, making sound in a safe place like that is really important. But it's inspired by New Orleans itself. Like people take to the streets and play music. Like walking around with the trumpets and snare drums daily. Second line culture is a Black New Orleans tradition. That's like just a wonderful, anarchic, living folklore or street culture that you know, is, is walking down the street. We'll have 500 people playing bog brass band music, dancing, celebrating African culture. So, it'd be like New Orleans culture celebrating the neighborhoods, celebrating family. Dancing on rooftops and shit. Those were amongst the things that inspired us to do what we're doing in a lot of ways. Without having had that influence – rather than to like claim that we are making the community 176

healthy, I would like to think that we're just engaging ourselves into the traditions and the spirit that is here already (Shepherd Interview, 2019).

Community-minded. As co-founder Delaney Martin (2019) framed it, initially they were not looking to be so community-based, but working through the process of MBV changed their perspective on why they all make art.

…and so doing the Music Box, as I say where I was, it was a new, already a new mode with all these people, but we were trying to make some me as weird as we wanted it to be and it wasn't like this will be a good community art, it was that last thing on my mind and then we opened her doors and the community reaction to it was so broad and so wide and the weird tattoo face kids and the rich people sitting next to each other at our shows with like little kids from the neighborhood. It totally changed my whole outlet on how we make art. And also made me realize that community art and did not have to have this talking down aspect to it (Martin Interview, 2019).

Martin’s newfound appreciation for the impact of community art was also reflected in my pre- reading:

With their new, permanent home, they are seeking to recreate the positive effect on a more long-term basis. They are thinking differently about their relationship to and role in the community. Rather than just being a group of artists executing a temporary installation in a neighborhood, they are exploring how they can become a part of the community (Takeshita, 2013, p. 3).

Eliza MacDermott (2019) outlines how socially complex the project is, and how it aims to play a pivotal role in bettering its surrounding community:

Yeah, it's hard because we're really self-aware that our, our board of directors is majority white men eat a lot of transplants ourselves. Also on the core staff. Even though we're in a historically Black neighborhood and especially when that's seen so much marginalization by the economy here and the politics of the city. But then also obviously Katrina and post Katrina and, and we're, we're right on the industrial canal that flooded a 177

lot of the city. So, you know, geographically you feel very sensitive sort of sitting where we are. How, you know, however, the idea is to take this building that's been vacant, that's right next to all of these abandoned, you know, Navy base that's in turns into sort of a danger zone over the last few years. Camps of, you know, transient people, a lot of drugs over there, they're like turning it into a community art space that's free (MacDermott Interview, 2019).

Issues of race, gender, and class affect the New Orleans Airlift as they made decisions daily, but it does not seem to deter them from their goal of community connection through collaboration.

Post-Katrina social effects. There is a historical context to community building, as outlined by Kingsley, McNeely and Gibson (1997):

Value cultural strengths. Our efforts promote the values and history of our many cultural traditions and ethnic groups…The starting point is to learn that history and learn who the players are. Community builders understand that a neighborhood’s starting phase – when a few interested people and/or institutions have been identified that want to do something but little is yet underway – is the one that must be handled most sensitively (p. 64).

The MBV was a dream developed in post Hurricane Katrina New Orleans, as Daniel Sharp

(2019) frames it:

there's an aspect of this story that is very connected to the, the kind of the move from a post-Katrina moment to a post post-Katrina moment. Right? In that so the creole cottage fell, they had all this lumber, all this barge board, this beautiful wood – and they decided to make this incredible thing with their friends (Sharp Interview, 2019).

However, Sharp also acknowledges that this collective of white transplants in the Upper Ninth

Ward needed to be as socially sensitive to the climate when they began working more formally as an organization, shortly after Katrina. Sharp (2019) continues:

It's positioned in a tricky way in terms of at like a fault line of gentrification. I mean, the, the gentrification word wasn't as kind of front and centre in the discussions back then 178

because it was more recovery, right? It was, it was recovery and dealing with all this blight in the city. What I admire is that they are very aware of how delicate their situation is in the community in terms of you know potentially being these like weird artists types that are the storm troopers of gentrification or whatever. And I feel like in every way possible, they have thought deeply about how to not fall into that. To like, not just pay lip service to a connection to the community, but to like figure out all sorts of different ways in which this could become like this hub (Sharp Interview, 2019).

The social challenges to the New Orleans education system since Hurricane Katrina, with the charter school system and differing qualities of education across different neighbourhoods

(Merrow, 2013) is somewhat mitigated by community-building initiatives such as the MBV and their supplemental educational programs. Hurricane Katrina displaced thousands of families, before the hurricane, “homeownership rates were high (over 60 percent), with many low-income

African American households owning their homes free and clear” (Turner & Zedlewski, 2006).

Nearly all of the interviewees I spoke with all mentioned this monumental moment in the city’s history, how it displaced so many locals (over one million from the Gulf Coast), and the effects on this the largest diaspora in American history. For most members in the New Orleans

Airlift, they are white socially-minded transplants trying to be on the right side of history with their mandate. In Alita Edgar’s words (2019):

I mean New Orleans is so amazing and the, the culture here is so rich and we benefit greatly from that. So you know, the least we can do is pay people, you know what I mean? If there's funds being generated out of it, like and honestly like open up the decision-making power and things like that as best as we can (Edgar Interview, 2019).

Daniel Sharp (2012), in his presentation to the Society for Ethnomusicology, situates the MBV within the demographic line of New Orleans, outlining the sensitivity around race in the

Bywater, “which in 2000 was 60% African-American and in 2010 is 30%” (Sharp presentation, 179

2012). According to Sharp (2012) the Bywater neighbourhood “has become increasingly known as a bohemian neighbourhood full of artists.” According to Pennington (2019), the MBV chose the Upper Ninth Ward in order to make space in the Lower Ninth Ward to more indigenous organizations:

we didn't move into that area because we realized we'd be whatever we'd be doing, we'd be taking up too much space, you know, taking it too much oxygen. And especially like, we didn't want to be responsible for like any kind of like gentrification or funding issues relating to other non-profits in the area. We didn't want to be dominating anything and that would be embarrassing for us in every way (Pennington Interview, 2019).

Although the MBV makes strident attempts to bridge this evident racial divide through so much of its programming and administrative decisions, there is still work to be done, according to

Delaney Martin (2019), who gives this honest assessment:

However, the makeup of our staff is just – it's an abomination. And we have had Black employees, but we haven't been able to keep them largely because they're not a bunch of white kids who think what we're doing is really cool and willing to be part of it and bend over backwards and not make as much money (Martin Interview, 2019).

After the hurricane, according to Eliza MacDermott (2019) of the Music Box Village,

women are, you know, only in 20% of homes zoned (residential), but in New Orleans, after Katrina, a lot of houses were re-inherited by women who don't have the skills or the tools to be able to do home repairs. And so, are having to trust contract workers from wherever to come in and do some kind of basic carpentry work. So, the long-term sustainability of girls being empowered to know how to build or craft something goes beyond the art thing and into social justice, and just community building (MacDermott Interview, 2019).

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Intergenerational and intercultural. MBV integrates children of all ages with the local

Bywater community, with all-ages concerts, Open Hours encouraging parent/child play, not talking down to children in their educational programs, and a healthy dose of risk in the play, as outlined in Chapter 6. As outlined by Lennard and Lennard (1992) a lesson to take from

European cities, this intergenerational integration hits many of their outlined targets for the ideal city:

- A network of safe, traffic-reduced, or traffic-free places and streets that allow children to explore their neighborhoods and cities. - Periodic access during the day to one or both parents, made possible by bringing living and working places closer together, or providing safe, fast and inexpensive transportation between them. - The opportunity to observe other people, of all ages and backgrounds, and adults and children engaged in a variety of work activities and social relationships. - Visually interesting characteristics of the built environment that arouse interest (e.g., varied textures, colors, materials, shapes and forms). - Exposure to a variety of public events that generate surprise and delight, including street entertainment. - Occasions and celebrations that include children and that reinforce a sense of history and interest in their community and its traditions. - Contact with nature in all its forms - water, earth, plants, animals, sun, wind, rain and snow - so that children can understand and learn to love nature. - Meaningful and aesthetic urban context; easily accessible forms of public art that are mentally stimulating and invite public participation. - Social and physical arrangements that promote trust and a sense of justice, such as public places where the presence of unknown adults guarantees protection and safety for children, and where the design of public settings enhances contact among people of different ages and backgrounds (p. 47).

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Taylor Lee Shepherd (2019), who has lived in New Orleans since Hurricane Katrina hit, outlines how their permanent space is in the perfect location, as it is zoned for exactly what they are doing, making noise and playing with sound:

We found the location where we are, you know, it's an industrial zone edge of the neighborhood. We don't have street frontage where the historic district has jurisdiction. We're zoned for what we're doing, we've been up front with Historic District Land Commission and then also with safety and permits to say ‘we're building these things, we're gonna run everything by an engineer’ (Shepherd Interview, 2019).

Their compliance with the City of New Orleans, and also vice-versa, the City’s support of the project is what has allowed it the ability to firmly plant its roots in the Bywater neighbourhood.

Delaney Martin (2019), when asked about some other arts collectives in the city who were breaking the law, said she preferred being on the lawful side of disobedience, doing subversive activity, but within the system. “Yeah, I know those guys. I did a project with them once where I was like, oh my God, you're too insane. Yeah. They're a little too insane. He's criminal” (Martin

Interview, 2019). When speaking with Elliot Perkins (2019) from the New Orleans Historic

Land District Commission, he appreciated this approach from the New Orleans Airlift, as their model is more sustainable: “and it's real, it's real. And that, and that's the difference is transitioning this thing from taking the anarchy out of it just to the extent of, you know, making it legitimate” (Perkins Interview, 2019). 182

Commemoration. Related to commemoration: The musical playground could be designed and tailored for the place and neighbourhood it is built for, also considering how to honour an important figure or event from said community. The MBV does just that, with one of its first orders of operation being to build a wall, especially given the current political climate in the United States of America, this act might seem to be one that connotes division. However, the collaborative spirit in which this wall was built, not only fit the necessity, but also helped coalesce the community even further. As one of the wall’s builders, and Airlift collective members, Christian Repaal (2019) clearly states:

I mean Fuck Donald Trump. No, really fuck Donald Trump, but, but, but, but, but this wall, I mean, yeah, it's amazing. I just I had this idea that it that we can – we needed a fence, but then I had this idea that if we build a fence in a way that we can build onto it, that you know, it becomes a stronger thing that we don't have to worry about the wind and things like that. And then and then gives us a structural base, the whole whatever we want to put on it (Repaal Interview, 2019).

The MBV also commemorates the longstanding tradition of the Mardi Gras Indians of New

Orleans with its musical house Chief’s House, built in collaboration with Gamelatron, Jeff Poree

Plastering & Studio Inferno Glass, honouring Big Chief Darryl Montana of the Yellow

Pocahontas.

Andrew, Schrock, the co-builder of Chateau Poulet also helped in the building of this magnificent wall, that surely keeps the playground safe, also divides it from the general public when the MBV is closed, but also acts as a symbolic gesture, as it is solely built from repurposed metal, it provides hope (Schrock Interview, 2019).

Disruptor. John Haycock (2015) points to the role of protest music as public pedagogy:

Protest music as public pedagogy, has come from Wright and Sandlin (2009). These authors argue that popular and media culture act as a ‘facilitator of, and catalyst for, self- 183

directed learning’. What this article adds to knowledge in this regard, is a theorization of what takes place behind the notion of public pedagogy; or what, specifically, goes into making protest musicians ‘facilitators of’ and protest music a ‘catalyst for’ adult learning (p. 439).

The New Orleans Airlift, although it embodies protest, and acts as a social disruptor, always does so within the system of New Orleans law, and keeps collaboration in the foreground, whether it be artistically, or institutionally.

Elliot Perkins (2019) of the New Orleans Historic Land District Association applauded the Airlift for playing by the rules, and still making a big difference in the city.

You know, we had this very fanciful tree house that was all done, you know, and which was, you know, terrifying because like…these people had hauled all these like McDonald's play equipment up into the tree and like, you know, it had rope walkways and it was like, from someone who regulates and they were having giant parties, but that's not going to last like that got shut down like that because like, how could you not, if we're, we're here to regulate safety, you know, if you're at all successful, we're going to see what it is (Perkins Interview, 2019).

The New Orleans Airlift embrace Shantz (2010) and his notion of constructive anarchy, working from within the system to dismantle it. In the words of one of the Airlift collective’s main contributors, Alita Edgar (2019):

I think our thing is, is sort of like, I'm not going to say apolitical, but it's, we try to create a neutral space because situated where we are, right? We're in a blue city in a red state in the south and the deep south and also like a very Caribbean city with like all different, you know, a very wild history and like it's just extremely diverse in its way and all those things. And that's all been part of the Airlift ethos as well as like, we're about connecting people and we're talking about really different people and we work with a lot of non- artists, you know, and we're like, okay, we want these classic car guys to be comfortable with, you know, a bunch of freaks and we want the lake fishermen to be comfortable with 184

the, you know, gay flag corps, like whatever... I mean, of course they're never going to be truly comfortable, but like they all did an art project together and we had a place where they could have that experience. You know, we've talked about it quite a bit and you know, we, I think pursue that stuff on our personal time and like aren't as vocal about it personally and as active about it personally as we want to be. But like in and of itself, I think it's important to kind of mark it out as being socially a safe place for everyone to come. And like, you know, intolerance isn't tolerated here. And like, you know what I mean? It's like that poster that's like, Oh, well, we want everybody to be able to come here. And that includes You know, people who have different beliefs than us and, and you know, if they even will come here, we feel good about that….You know, if that's the protest that's like, you're allowed to have a place that's about like beauty and experiment, you know? (Edgar Interview, 2019)

Schrock (2019), who participated in several collaborations with New Orleans Airlift and within

MBV, also makes this same case for why art matters, as it is the perfect testing ground for connecting different philosophies and approaches to problem solving. “I mean, if I were to make like a pitch: art matters, y'all. Because there's like these really odd connections from people from totally different worlds that we're not totally different worlds, but people may have never met, given at least the space to, to experiment together” (Schrock Interview, 2019).

An Exemplar for Other Cities to Adopt

New Orleans Airlift board member, Bryan Bailey (2019) sees the contrast in his hometown of Knoxville, versus his home of the last twenty-two years, New Orleans:

But upon reflection, like that environment was very stifling. So, coming to New Orleans…wow. You know, it was a very welcoming experience where New Orleans is historically kind of a city of outcasts. It's a transient port city and it's there's this sort of underlying current here. Now you can get into your little pockets of different social groups and, and have the same judgments and bullshit, right? But there's an underlying current here that is, as long as you're not hurting other people, like you are welcome to be here and be whoever you want to be. It's very accepting as a community, which I 185

love…there are only two experiences where I've seen like an extremely incredible cross section of the different, you know, populations of this city like that are mind blowing where you have, you know, business leaders and like, you know, you're old school, multigenerational, uptown, blue bloods mixed with you know, multigenerational creoles and Blacks in the community that had been here. And, and seeing them all convene in a very egalitarian way to experience expression of art and culture in this community is super (Bailey Interview, 2019).

The model of MBV could help transform other cities in American and beyond, functioning similarly as a vehicle for community development. According to Snow (2019), “if we want to really go beyond, I think what I would dream of is something like this in every city in essence, a place where you have a playground that has a group of people managing it that are open to experimentation and sound and community-building and people having a chance to appreciate one another in that space” (Snow Interview, 2019). MacDermott (2019) also supports the notion that through experimental music making and collaboration, the MBV bridges communities:

Some are more just, just sounds, some of those sounds mimic the soundscape of our community like boat horns and whistles and truck whistles while others are just more of like noise. And that we welcome as much sound and noise making as you want to play or getting together and trying to get into rhythm with folks around you. So I also encourage people to like connect with the people on the house next to him and see if they don't want to speak to each other some way that that is, that is literally, that is, that is community building at its core, right. So, you've got strangers collaborating fit together (MacDermott Interview, 2019).

Eliza MacDermott (2019) sees great potential in this model as a template for community building, that sits differently than traditional parks or playgrounds for bringing people together:

a sculpture garden or a park, a playground, they're also distinctly what they are, they have an essence…And the Music Box Village doesn't, there is a bar here, there's tables out together for people encouraged to sit with one another. You're playing, you're making 186

noise and you can potentially make music. You can do it independently and you can play in a group. I think as a template, it offers a lot for people to come together to do a thing where if you're in a park, you're going to walk down your path and you're going to, be with whoever you came with (MacDermott Interview, 2019).

Snow (2019) sees the benefit that the MBV can have on musical development, even taste if it became more of the normal landscape in cities:

if a whole generation of people were able to at an early age, appreciate this type of chaos and beauty and chaos and understanding of different levels of organization of not just sound, but presentation and collaboration, then that would be a special thing for those of us who grew up in regimented high schools and music schools and spaces that were highly judgmental about creativity and that kind of situation beyond (Snow Interview, 2019).

Schrock (2019) affirms this desire to see the model replicated in as many cities as possible “I think there's so few places like it and there's, I would love there be a million more, a place where there's like experimentation is valid, exploration is valid” (Schrock Interview, 2019).

Schrock (2019) continues, simply put that if a models and communal meeting place like

MBV were replicated in various cities, “obviously it’d be peace on earth…that's a space where people can communicate and talk about their dreams, things happening and we're no longer strangers” (Schrock Interview, 2019).

Other examples of a moderately similar model include Meow Wolf, in Santa Fe, New

Mexico, which, albeit a more for-profit model, has many similarities in that it attracts performing musicians, and blurs the line between experiential playground, and music venue. Leah Hennessy

(Interview, 2019) also cited the City Museum of St. Louis having similarities in that it is an immersive experience, however nothing is quite as unique as the overall approach that MBV aims to preserve, led by the deliberate vision of Delaney Martin. 187

MBV functions as a creative music hub in New Orleans, and looks outward to the multiple projects that stem from it. From the outposts in Massachusetts, Tampa, Kiev, and most recently, the sister city of Orleans, France, where they were commissioned to install a similar experimental phone booth installation that is a pillar of Music Box Village (Pennington

Interview, 2019). The space acts as the creative music hub that Jay Pennington outlines,

You know, like experimental music usually is the thing that's like trying to push boundaries, trying to make you rethink what music is. All that kind of stuff that are like, those aren't the kinds of things you think mostly you want to do on like maybe a date (Pennington, 2019).

Porch Life – a possibility zone. As mentioned above, the New Orleans Airlift has also launched permanent outposts in other international cities, each with different approaches, and much smaller in scale, however, a glimpse into what could be. Also, the example of the mobile village, in their Porch Life, project, a roving version of one of the houses that has travelled to

Detroit, New York, and elsewhere in the United States saw how it could integrate within the varying soundscapes they visited. Alita Edgar (2019) explains how they would like to see the concept developed in other cities:

Well, and you know, we've built outposts in other places and things like that. I don't know. I mean, I think we definitely want that to happen. And once, like once or twice a year, we get a minute to think about That kind of thing. And, and you know, but we've thrown it out there a little bit and you know, I have amazing friends in Detroit and New York, another and San Francisco and other places that I think, you know, would love to have like a little possibility zone like that, you know? Yeah. Even if it's just a fragment of a bigger concept (Edgar Interview, 2019).

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The Porch Life project shows firsthand how well the MBV model resonates with other cities. In the words of Leah Hennessy (2019) who was on the crew for three of the four summer tour dates:

It's like it's spreading imagination. That thing that's like really rich and the performances felt spot on for what we were trying to do. And a few of them were looking at as like things that we want to bring back here to the site of future programming. And then it was also great to like take it to Coney Island and pop it up on the boardwalk and like, oh my God. Like you've got the like leather bellies guys that are like tanned out in their sixties and like you've got kids, you've got your Brooklyn friends, you've got like everybody just coming to experience this house. And I kept thinking, man, you know, it's, it's loud out here at Coney Island. Like, yeah, we're right next to some amusements. We're right there next to Nathan's. Like it was just like, everything's happening. But at the end of the second day when we packed her up, I, there was like an absence. We had actually been contributing to that soundscape and that felt really amazing to me to have impacted it in that way. Like what a perfect place to be (Hennessy Interview, 2019).

Figure 26 below features footage of Porch Life in its stationary state, being played by children from our participating local research school:

Figure 26. Porch Life. 189

The impact the City of New Orleans has had on the success of the MBV cannot be undermined. From specific key stakeholders that work at the municipality, to the public in general, it was certainly born in the perfect place. Alita Edgar (2019) agrees:

I think the fact that we're in New Orleans makes is a, is a big I don't know if the word is like inspiration or, yeah. Determines a lot of the, the vibe or, or whatever. So yeah. But Detroit certainly has its own wealth of amazing music and architecture and all that stuff. Every, every place does, if you really look into it like they have it, does it get to flourish? Does it get like a little platform or not? You know, a lot of times not, you know? (Edgar Interview, 2019)

For Rick Snow (2019), the MBV represents a meeting place for creatives, and for a relatively low financial investment, the impact on community is huge:

The impact is huge because, you know, it creates this just playful space for kids, adults, but also musicians, you know, every, every city has got a collection of, you know, amazing musicians that would love to have a chance to walk into a place like this and just enjoy themselves, enjoy each other, you know, have their families in a space that appreciates music as a playful, you know, kind of an art form and let's face it, you know, a lot of music being made today is like bedroom producers all by themselves. And that kind of moves away from the model of, it was always a band getting together and, and kind of being social as they created their music. And I think, you know, this brings back the idea of people being in the same place together and being creative. (Snow Interview, 2019)

Founding sound artist Taylor Lee Shepherd (2019), originally from Detroit, saw how the concept was embraced by other cities in Summer 2018 while touring with Porch Life:

Like I was saying before, I'm from Detroit and people are like, Kinda, yeah. Kinda like stand like the people don't, people don't wanna just like people don't dance around on the rooftops in Detroit. You don't, you don't think it would fly the way we would, but we did. We did. We took porch life to Detroit. Yeah. Yeah. It was great. It was super fun (Shephard Interview, 2019). 190

Chapter Summary

In summary, the MBV helps build community with each project that it develops. MBV is a space that fosters new relationships and ideas, much like an actual village does (Martin

Interview, 2019). Three sub-themes were revealed through my analysis related to this construct: community music, assets, and an exemplar model for sharing the knowledge.

My research findings revealed that as a proponent of community music, the MBV provides access to its surrounding neighbourhoods, and underserviced groups. Through the analysis of interview transcriptions and other audio-visual data provided by the organization, I was able to distinguish several assets within the categories above, some which were expected, and others revealed through the research. Some of these assets include community-mindedness, a connector, self-resilience, intergenerational and intercultural, commemoration, and a social disruptor. MBV plays a continual role in allowing access, removing social barriers, and giving access to space in a thoughtful way. Although New Orleans Airlift follows the rules of the city

(Perkins Interview, 2019), they also aim to challenge its prevalent social inequities.

What I witnessed during the case study, was that MBV creates space for important, and sometimes difficult dialogues to occur safely. Notably through the Bridge Panel Series, a series of four lectures on education, non-for-profit models, arts and culture, and Black spirituality.

This musical playground connects unobvious communities, and shows the benefit of social harmony through using odd sounds and experimental music. They have a strong ability to encourage unforeseen collaborations, crossing disciplines, creating new artforms and communities in the process. In the next chapter, I will discuss the emergent theme of radical collaboration, as it relates to MBV. 191

Chapter 8: Their Brand of Radical Collaboration

You could apply radical collaboration to other elements of how we worked. We routinely brought two artists together who were from different backgrounds and who moreover had never met until the day they showed up to work on the project. For example, Callie (Swoon) and the 60-year-old New Orleans blacksmith. The makers of the fan house Chateau Poulet, one from Nola and one from Germany, who had never met but are now the greatest of friends. Martin email, 2020

Introduction

Early in my research of Music Box Village (MBV) the recurring meta-theme of radical collaboration emerged. As Tesch (1987) asserts,

Meta-themes are the more abstracted entities. At the same time, they are larger than the individual themes. They cannot be compressed into a short phrase…Concrete illustrations, taken from the data, are often added to make a meta-theme come alive for the reader (p. 234).

In the case of MBV and my research, this meta-theme of radical collaboration certainly fit this description.

This chapter begins with an unpacking of my conception of radical collaboration, and then applies it to the MBV. Since this summative construct emerged through the research, I did not include it in the literature review, but will begin this chapter with a background on radical collaboration, leading to key indicators that I then apply to the MBV and my related sub- questions.

Background on Radical and Collaboration

Although the word radical has political and extremist connotations, this derives from

Charles James Fox (1797) who called for “radical reform,” reform that made changes to the very root of the system, with the Latin word “radix” actually meaning “root” (Merriam-Webster,

2020). In the 1820’s a group known as the “philosophical radicals” emerged (Halevy, 1961). 192

Along with being politically radical, the group favoured a laissez-faire approach (Halevy, 1961) to government. Although often associated with extremist political movements, the term radical can also be applied to other fields, as demonstrated by the MBV in New Orleans.

The anonymous publication “Radical Philosophy” acts as a collective, much like MBV, where the work is ever-evolving, from the input of many contributors:

From its original DIY ethic to proprietary publishing software that required not simply costly licences [sic] and machines for its operation but also an outsourcing of labour and a paywall system to finance itself. To shake this and the greater problem of centralizing the collective’s power around those with the relevant skills and licences, we reconceived our means of production around Free and Open Source Software that inherently accommodates a distribution of labour, and created a new in-house engineering collective to work alongside our editors to develop the journal’s tools and distribution channels (“Radical Philosophy”, 2018).

As Kautzer (2015) asserts, any radical philosophy stems from “the angry realization, and the attempted righting, of this basic (radical, root) wrong. All of the articulable wrongs of radical philosophy – ableism, sexism, racism, colonialism, heteronormativity and so on – fall out from this wrong” (p. 145). This spirit of wanting to right some of the social wrongs in New Orleans is reflected in their motivating principles, and helps New Orleans Airlift develop their projects accordingly. Later in the chapter, in the vignettes, this concept is unpacked further, as it relates to MBV’s brand of radical collaboration.

Rubin (2009) defines collaboration as “a purposeful relationship in which all parties strategically choose to participate in order to achieve shared or overlapping objectives” (p. 2).

Design thinking also ties into this definition, as a group moves together in a unified direction, without a seeming leader or conductor. Design thinking, as defined by Van Mechelena et al.

(2019) “aims to transfer designerly methods, tools and processes to other areas or people, in this 193 case children, who are not trained as designers” (p. 181). This collaborative approach leads to unique and unforeseen outcomes.

In his concept of collective creativity, Rubin (2009) highlights the distinct importance of risk taking: "collective creativity - when a group is working on any creative project that is too large or complex for one person alone – only works in a collaborative context that encourages risk rather than minimizing it" (p. 13). Sawyer (2006) links this notion of risk-taking to the importance of mistake-making in the collaborative, improvisatory setting of jazz music, and that an individual would not arrive at the same outcome as a group.

Some collaborative models in music making include Maia Giesbrecht (2013) and her findings that composing music together helps build identity, notably with the more junior composer. Some examples of collaborative composing include John Zorn (1984) where the band replaces the conductor in driving the direction of a piece of collectively improvised music, in

Cobra (1984). This approach is also brought to life in the work of Butch Morris (1996), whose term ‘conduction’ includes leading improvising ensembles using a series of hand gestures and signs. Also, the Orpheus Chamber Orchestra from New York City employ a collaborative leadership model, where the musicians interpret the score, not the figurehead conductor.

In the traditional classroom and bandstand tradition, the teacher, the composer and the conductor are typically placed in the leadership role, where ego is worshiped. In a collaborative, group creativity model (Sawyer, 2012) the ego is shed in favour of achieving a state of group flow, relating it to Csikszentmihalyi's (1990) flow theory, “but with a critical difference.

Csikszentmihalyi intended flow to represent a state of consciousness within the individual performer, whereas group flow is a property of the entire group as a collective unit” (pp. 12-13). 194

Planche (2013) links collaborative inquiry to the classroom, where co-learning is a pillar, and similarly to the Orpheus Chamber Orchestra model, the decision-making becomes more shared among the group: “Our classrooms need to provide a safe haven for a community of diverse co-learners. An inquiry mindset paves the way for collaborative learning for adult and student learners. Collaboration processes have deepened and will continue to do so” (Planche, p.

5). Kruse and Louis (2009) outline the importance of trust in the culture of an organization, which often gets overlooked. The Ontario Government’s Leadership Strategy (2014) also asserts that trust is a key factor to the successful learning environment, “required for the development of effective collaborative learning cultures, and a factor that must be considered” (p. 5).

Sawyer (2006) asserts that music is a collaborative group activity, often taught in an anti- social environment:

My focus on group creativity and collaborative improvisation treats music as a communicative activity. Music is a collaborative practice, and improvised group music results in an emergent, unpredictable performance. But many educators teach music as a solitary activity – practicing fingering and scales for hours, at home alone; studying to learn how to read notated music effortlessly; memorizing a solo piece for recital performance. But if music is a collaborative practice and if communication is central to musical creativity, then our educational methods should emphasize group interaction. There are some exciting new projects designed to teach children by drawing on the power of group creativity and communication. For example, the Toy Symphony Project was developed by the Hyperinstruments research group at the MIT Media Lab in Cambridge, MA, USA. Its goal is to introduce children to the creative music-making process by using specially designed 'music toys' that enable children to engage in sophisticated performing and composing (p. 15). 195

These suggested new musical instruments and approach to music education models also apply to educational spaces. Sawyer (2006) points to community building in the work of music educators and the spaces they create for collaboration to:

support a kind of musical education that is fundamentally collaborative and emergent. It taps into children's natural ability to improvise in social groups (Sawyer, 1997). Sociocultural approaches suggest that the goal of musical educators should be to create musical communities of practice, rather than to transmit musical knowledge. In this way, children are socialized into collective musical practices. When teachers create these musical communities, they should keep in mind that learners need more structure than experts. These structures have been called scaffolds and the educational practice is known as guided participation (p. 15).

Although the above section unpacks radical and different forms of related collaboration, this next section focusses on radical collaboration, as demonstrated by the MBV. MBV bring the radical piece to their brand of collaboration across each of the three established sub-themes of creative expression, music education and community development. Indicators of radical collaboration include confidence in their unobvious artistic connections, trust and removal of ego, risk-taking, and an anything-goes approach.

The Collaborative Model of MBV

MBV incorporates several elements of the above models into theirs in order to foster successful collaborations, no matter what the age group of its participants. Their pattern, reflected in several of their musical houses, includes one or more local contributors, and another contributor from outside of the city with a unique perspective to add into the ecosystem.

Delaney Martin (2020) began using the term “radical collaboration” to describe the projects inside MBV as follows: 196

We first started using the words radical collaboration after we made the first music box. We had already been bringing collabs together and had made it the premise of Airlift’s work. Pairing Big Freedia with a NY producer. Working with a British Curator and British artists to create a long-distance realization of a public art project in New Orleans around tableau vivant. But after the miraculous experience of joyous creation that was the Music Box, I started to think something really special was going on. Not just collaboration - but radical collaboration because we were creating something so artistically iterative, involving so many voices, that in some ways nothing any one artist created would ever be left alone. It would always be messed with, sometimes to the point of no return to anything even resembling an artist’s original vision. And that was ok - with everybody (Martin email, 2020).

Unobvious artistic connections. As an organization, the New Orleans Airlift work immediately at helping foster the relationship between these two or more parties. New Orleans

Airlift, with their roots in international arts curation, work on developing the sense of trust and comfort for both parties, what Louis (2006) establishes as the foundation for any successful collaboration. I witnessed this firsthand in my first visit to the MBV, barely having put my luggage down in a corner, and the main team members were already engaging me in meaningful conversation, followed by dinner, and setting up complimentary accommodations.

Part of their successful model links to the art in making strong connections, that would not otherwise have been made. As Andrew Schrock (2019) outlines in his collaboration meeting the German musician Klass Hubner, this is one of the major strengths the New Orleans Airlift has as a collective:

There's many people involved and they all have like a wide reaching group and, and whenever people are just like sitting around the table, like spit balling ideas or like whatever they think would be like a next step in a project like that, there's a lot of people 197

who know somebody who would fit exactly like how Klaas and I got connected. Like, yeah, somebody knew Klaas and somebody knew me and they're like, ‘hey, these two probably would work well together’, somehow they knew. I don't know. It was perfect! So, I think that's like being able to fit artists together I think is a real strong point from like what Airlift is capable of (Schrock Interview, 2019).

Quintron (2019) on the importance of bringing in improvising musicians from around the world:

They [Music Box Village] are the first organization that started actively seeking and offering money to local and out of town free improvisors, jazz musicians that do not play trad and experimental tinkerers, builders and, and very serious like lifelong devoted artists but that are working in a field that is not generally a big money-maker outside of a couple gigs in new Europe and festivals, weird festivals here and there. But if New Orleans never had that scene and they are the heartbeat of it now (Quintron Interview, 2019).

Leah Hennessy and several other stakeholders outlined their goal to develop MBV’s reputation, so that audiences were not showing up for the artists, but for their trust of the curatorial sensibilities of the New Orleans Airlift (Hennessy Interview, 2019). From attracting such artists as The Residents, to Sun Ra Arkestra, through to Wilco and Solange, down to their Open Hours every weekend, the space clearly demonstrates that it is a hub for creative music making.

Throughout my research, from the reading materials provided, to older video footage shown, there is a through line of this model, pairing unobvious musicians that the New Orleans

Airlift feel will bring forward a fruitful collaborative product. 198

Trust and removal of ego. Martin (2020) attests two other important factors that help define MBV’s model for radical collaboration, one is trust from all participants, and the second being a complete shedding of artist ego from the process. She expands on the kernel of inspiration for this model:

Whether we were making an addition to someone’s musical house (sonically or visually), taking something away that didn’t work, literally cutting up people’s houses into pieces at time, or using their creation in a way that creator had not intended during a performance, we were iterating from a place of trust. And I will actually credit myself for successfully setting up a project that asked for this unusual artistic ego sacrifice from the get go, even if at times I had to fight for it with artists, in honor of a greater whole. It was a modernist project in a post-modern world. It had no irony, only harmony. (In terms of this way of working, I was inspired by an early work of Polish artist I saw in England. She took a lot of other people’s art and built it into her own installation. I did this a couple years earlier with an installation when I first got back to NOLA. It would be a starting point for me. The Music Box would go a lot further than this notion (Martin email, 2020).

Risk-taking. Schrock (2019) continues to expand on the MBV model for radical collaboration, pointing out that where most organizations would not support such experimentalism, the MBV embrace it, placing required trust in the artists they are connecting.

The MBV, after all, are the connecting body between artists who may have never met before, therefore their role in the relationship is to foster this trust, knowing the track records of the stakeholders:

Because there's like these really odd connections from people from totally different worlds that were not totally different worlds, but people may have never met, given at least the space to experiment together. Yeah. And I think Music Box is really open to experimentation and things going in totally different direction than originally anticipated. There, it seemed like pretty open-minded fields. And so allowing for a collaboration to exist in a space like that and then given support for something to continue in the direction 199

and giving a lot of trust to the artists, which I've noticed is like those are the things that seem to really work where they're like, ‘yeah, I've seen what you do, I trust that you're capable of doing something great. Maybe this isn't exactly what we expected but go for it.’ And I mean that's totally the way Klaas [Hubner] and I started, if you would see the drawings, maybe I can share with you on email? Like it was just ridiculous scribbles, like, and like, and you're just like, if somebody else would've seen them, they're like, ‘what? That's going to be nothing like I don't wanna like throw a penny at that.’ But the Music Box talks about the trust. Yeah. Trust that you're actually – I've seen other things that you do or for whatever reason they trusted us then, Yeah. Okay. I believe it, and that's good! (Schrock Interview, 2019)

Co-founder Delaney Martin (2019) asserts:

One of the things that makes the Music Box function has been the broadness of our collaborators and who we invite into it. You know, I remember the very first one we had an artist and then his sisters, his wife's brother showed up and he's a car mechanic and he saw what we were doing and he was like, ‘I want to make somethin' (Martin Interview, 2019). I was impressed by how risky the New Orleans Airlift ran their organization, just risky enough for me to see the benefit in the rewards and meaning from their work. My journal entry from

May 2019, shortly after interviewing Taylor Shepherd: “I love the sense of rebellion and anarchist music and vibe the MBV embodies, from the pirate radio station Taylor was running from the shop, through to the crazy sounds they spawn with every project” (Marsella journal,

May 22, 2019)

An anything-goes approach. The community that MBV and New Orleans Airlift expands through creative collaborations, is in line with the Reggio Emilia community arts movement of Northern Italy (Edwards, Gandini, and Forman, 2019). That model prioritizes community inclusion, from obvious to obscure, in helping realize its arts projects. The MBV naturally embraces the ideas of Pestalozzi, Froebel, Dewey, Montessori, Vygotsky and Bateson – 200 all seen as influences on the Reggio approach (Hanna, 2014). Their learning environment reflects that which Sawyer (2006) asserts builds community in a natural setting:

Learning in musical communities of practice corresponds to the way that children naturally learn in family and peer settings. Children learn music through family musical practices, through informal playground games and rhymes. Jacques Dalcroze first had the insight that learning music should be like learning your native language, an idea also advocated by Suzuki. These educators shared the insight that musical learning works best when educators create musical communities of practice that allow children to learn by participating (p. 16).

As Martin (2020) outlines, the MBV form of radical collaboration has matured into an egoless community, an actual village, where concepts develop over time, and everybody, including the audience were a part of the evolution:

But it was not just this arrangement between artists that expressed the full radicalness of the collaboration. It extended to audiences. I will never forget having to give up my control of the opening night. I had all these ushers in place to keep audiences off the houses as they entered. God forbid they break something right before the performance. We had bleachers. But the amount of people trying to get in was just insane and I relented and said ok - let them go anywhere we can fit them - on the stoops, in the little alleyways between houses, even inside the houses. And I realized right then and there that I was wrong - bleachers were the extra seating. This was the way that the project was meant to be experienced and no “artist” figured this out - In this case the audience were the radical collaborators we needed. And then of course there are the open hours days where people use the houses in unexpected ways, but also show that this project is not complete until it is played by strangers. So, I guess the term radical collaboration was a way of me expressing this sense that nothing was out of bounds here, that everyone is a creator, that no piece of work is ever completed, and that the project should be defined by these qualities (Martin email, 2020). 201

According to Jay Pennington (Pennington Interview, 2018), the MBV has attracted over 1,000 different artists to the space, either as guest performers, or in unique collaborations to build new musical houses.

Vignettes and Reflections

During my research visit in May 2019, I witnessed a couple of these radical collaborations firsthand, both in the building of a new musical house, with Elevator Pitch by

Christine SunKim (w/ Rick Snow) and also as a performer in Teddy’s Twilight Serenade, a project led by local New Orleans musician Tif Lamson, with five guest artists collaborating on a musical concert, using the houses, to interpret our original music using the houses. Both of these collaborations ended with presentations that packed the space with audiences hungry for new music, and ideas. The following two vignettes outline my personal observations of radical collaboration while researching the MBV space, followed by reflections of Delaney Martin on her two preferred examples of radical collaboration from the organization, Space Rites followed by New Water Music.

Vignette One: Elevator Pitch. On May 16th, 2019, the New Orleans Airlift launched a new house, as created by deaf artist Christine SunKim, alongside local sound artist and Tulane

University professor, Rick Snow. This unique pairing brought a unique outcome, in the Elevator

Pitch, an actual physical elevator in the park, that patrons can enter, press buttons, and hear recorded samples of 14 deaf Louisianans, reverberating over the sheet metal inside the elevator

(Figure 27, the video clip, below). 202

Figure 27. Elevator Pitch.

Seeing this new musical house come to life really demonstrated how projects are brought to life in the MBV, highlighting the “tempo of the city” (Martin Interview, 2019), as well as the one-of-a-kind nature of the project, pairing this profound deaf sound artist, Christine SunKim, with local musician and professor Rick Snow.

The MBV also worked in collaboration with the Smithsonian Institute to realize this project, so it was a local and international collaboration at many levels. The outcome was what

Christine SunKim desired – something that would inform the hearing community of New

Orleans, while empowering the Deaf community and giving them a voice (SunKim score, 2019).

According to Rick Snow (2019) who collaborated with SunKim on this project, her ability to connect these two communities, the deaf and hearing communities of Louisiana, was a bold and deliberate decision to build community through this artistic collaboration:

To work with an artist as forceful as Christine was a real privilege and to kind of feel the power that she can bring to a project from this perspective of, you know, this community and wanting to engage that community very specifically bring that community to the attention of the hearing community in a special way. I think it challenged all of us, and we all wanted to rise to the occasion. So yeah, building the elevator was a wild project (Snow Interview, 2019). 203

Eliza MacDermott (2019) outlines how important it is for MBV to stand for the culture it is seeking to preserve:

…having traveled and lived a lot around the United States, you see how more and more the art and music worlds, even the ones that are already sort of on the periphery of the mainstream are, hey, everything's becoming so standardized. It seems like culture is just fading. And so, I see this place, this city and this project within it as well as a vestige of like still trying to hold on to really doing like authentic, original but bound to the history of the culture of a space and place projects (MacDermott Interview, 2019).

As Rick Snow mentioned in his interview, Christine SunKim asks “is art really doing what we think art is doing anymore?” (Snow Interview, 2019) In this project, SunKim certainly brought that sentiment to life, making it count with Elevator Pitch. It was nice to also meet

Adriel Luis from the Smithsonian Institute, while being in the space for the days leading up to its public launch. Seeing how this world class institution was also breaking its own mold by installing something permanent in the MBV, because they were also equally taken by the space, and those who animate it.

According to Snow (Interview, 2019), the New Orleans Airlift, in its early days, introduced him to the concept of folk art as high art. This overall Popeye Village aesthetic that the permanent MBV employs, from what Repaal outlines (see chapter 4), feels very much in the folk art aesthetic. However, this blurred vision, as Snow (2019) puts it “This is a place where you know, someone with who's never heard of John Cage can basically be an experimental musician just by walking in” (Snow Interview, 2019) makes it more accessible to new music and contemporary art. When fun and play are in the mix, the experience feels natural, unforced. The learning happens seemingly by accident.

Christine SunKim’s score from May 21, 2019 consisted of directions for how to present the samples of the 14 deaf Louisianans to an audience. Copies of the score were distributed to 204 the audience so they could follow along, as it was conducted by Leah Hennessey and brought to life by performers, including myself. SunKim’s (2019) artist note at the end of the score reads:

“This performance is created to ritualize deaf kids’ instinctive response to contained spaces that return sensory feedback” (score, 2019). This piece, meant to celebrate the voices of deaf

Louisianans had those very deaf artists weeping in the house on the night of the premiere performance.

Leah Hennessy also pulled off a memorable performance at the Elevator Pitch premiere event on May 21st, with little time to execute it, she took the one-page score instructions from

Christine SunKim and translated them to function within the MBV. Hennessy used performers to improvise on each of the musical houses, as well as on the main focus, Elevator Pitch, the new house and collaborative creation of Christine SunKim and Rick Snow. Integrating Elevator

Pitch with the other more established houses in the Music Box Village was done elegantly by the experienced conductor, and Airlift member, Leah Hennessy (2019). In her words:

Airlift is an artist driven non-profit organization and our work is like very steeped and focused on collaborative work. Between people of New Orleans and people with a national or international presence. And we collaborate to create experimental public artwork (Hennessy Interview, 2019).

The Elevator Pitch project did just that, and left an impact in the space that will resonate for years.

Vignette Two: Teddy’s Twilight Serenade. The MBV is a place where the weird is made normal, where supportive audiences come to cheer on the underdogs of music. As Sharp

(2019) asserts “it's not that they want to run away from New Orleans, it's that they want to transform. They want to broaden the notion of what New Orleans is. And so, they're very 205 committed to projecting a weird New Orleans or like you know, the experimental New Orleans”

(Sharp Interview, 2019).

During my final three days in New Orleans, May 24th to 26th, I rehearsed a full program of music, from different creators, in the MBV. Part of a monthly series, presented by musical director, Tif Lamsen, I was able to witness how musical collaboration functions in the space firsthand. I was taken by how convention seemed to wrestle with invention, and how traditional musical instruments, and harmonic structures seemed to creep their way into a space that almost stands against this method of music making. Throughout many of my interviews, this notion came up, as the space functions as a not-so-traditional music venue, where touring musicians sometimes want to only present their music as they know how, versus the experimentation that the MBV encourages. Delaney Martin (2019), co-founder of New Orleans Airlift:

I hated when the one guy played the saxophone out the window of the house. But beyond that he brought out a musicality that maybe Quintron hadn't and I had to concede that having like an instrument or two that's conventional was not going to kill the experiment. But when the scales get tipped too much in the direction of that, I honestly like sometimes I have to like leave… (Martin Interview, 2019).

Martin (2019) continues to etch out her vision for what the MBV should be:

People start calling the Music Box a venue because people were standing in front of houses, playing conventional instruments…I don't see it as a venue. I see it as an evolving experimental art project that wants to grow around a central framework. I'm pretty stubborn around the framework, you know, people have been like ‘I have an idea for a musical loom’ I'm like, musical looms sound great. Go build it elsewhere. Like we did musical architecture and that's where I get kind of like strict about it because I feel like I don't want to turn it into a junkyard of sounding things (Martin Interview, 2019).

206

Still, in the end, it was magical making music with a spirited group of local New Orleanian musicians, on such unique instruments, the musical houses, alongside our more comfortable conventional instruments. There were keyboards, guitars, cellos, and banjos in the mix. The audience were as warm as the musicians I performed alongside, which included Ben Polcer, Julie

Odell, Tif Lamsen, Leyla McCalla, and Brian Arsenault. I was amazed by how warm the New

Orleans Airlift, fellow performers and audience were towards my work – something foreign to a

Toronto-based experimentalist, except for when I take my music elsewhere (i.e., Europe,

Quebec).

The MBV acts as a vehicle for sharing ideas and diverse output in the form of composition and improvisation. Tif’s Teddy’s Twilight Serenade demonstrated this dance between composition and improvisation quite well, and in each piece we performed. Rick Snow

(2019), Professor of Practice; Music Science and Technology at Tulane University asserts

This is a place where you've got the ability to see both extremes and then also see the massive continuum between those two things. The totally unorganized versus, the totally organized and where you can kind of find interesting little neighborhoods in those shades of grey (Snow Interview, 2019).

Snow (2019) continues on the importance of the unstructured music that the MBV evokes:

…then you look at the Music Box, and you see how you come into that space as a young kid already kind of in a city that surrounds you with music. And then this is a place where you get to experiment with making sounds on, you know, 15 plus unique instruments in a totally nonjudgmental space. You know, where you're allowed to be playful, you're allowed to test things out, play, bang on things, laugh, run around, chase each other...So that's one aspect that I think is really kind of special (Snow Interview, 2019).

In my experience performing in MBV with other seasoned New Orleanian musicians, I witnessed firsthand how this form of radical collaboration plays out. Certainly, the themes 207 outlined above, in unobvious connections between me and the other artists listed; trust and removal of ego; risk-taking, and an anything-goes approach. In this case, I was the outsider musician working with local internationally known artists on a project in their unique space. We worked quickly to build trust, from the first email, to the first rehearsal, to the last note, the experience was genuine and had a baseline of respect among us. We took risks with every tune performed, using the space and movement between each house as much as possible. I had the unique opportunity of playing almost every house in the span of the program. Finally, an anything-goes approach was taken, not only with the original song of mine that we performed, but every piece, where key signatures and chord structures were certainly prevalent, but almost equal to the dissonant elements that MBV naturally emits.

Tif Lamson (2019) on the beauty of what MBV fosters in her musical development:

I think my relationship to myself has changed more. I think now I'm a little more lenient

with myself because if you're used to playing the same instruments and you, you kind of

become not like a know it all, but you, you're comfortable and so, and that comfortability

you start to lose vulnerability because I think you're just like, ‘oh, I know what to do in

this situation’ every time. (Lamson Interview, 2019)

Lamson (2019) talks about how this monthly show Teddy’s Twilight Serenade evolved, which speaks to how New Orleans Airlift seeks to play that role of artist developer:

Well actually the music box came to me. I had directed Peaches' show whenever she came here and did her Music Box show. That was a whole as a whole other discussion. But they, after doing that and directing another show called "From These Roots" and it was about I think 10 or so women. It was female-led songwriters in the community. Almost like a song share through each of like everyone had their own tune kind of in the way we did. We do this a bit. Yeah. but yeah, there they came to me with the idea we want to do a separate club after public hours it'll be really nonchalant, not a big deal. 208

You'll just have a few artists and maybe have one rehearsal and just like, yeah, improvise. And then...(Lamson Interview, 2019).

The next two sections are reflections by Delaney Martin which highlight two memorable events, as they related to the meta-theme of radical collaboration.

Reflection One: Space Rites. Delaney Martin (2020) highlights two of her most memorable radical collaborations via the New Orleans Airlift. The first is a project called Space

Rites, which was cross cultural, and helped build community shortly after Hurricane Katrina with a very unexpected intersection of arts and religion.

My favorite radical collaboration was in the project Taylor led called Space Rites. He made this installation of TV’s that he re-wired to be oscilloscopes. They were installed in the altar space of a decommissioned church and reacted to any sound in the building. We created all these awesome performances that brought really unusual people together. Probably the weirdest was members of the Louisiana Philharmonic with the Vietnamese Lion dancers and drummers. And the performances were amazing, centered around this altar of visualized sound. But the coolest part of this whole 3-month run was that every Sunday the altar supported Reverend Duplessis and real live church service. The reverend was a friend we’d made in the Lower 9th ward working on a different project. His church was not rebuilt since Katrina and he held services in his living room. When we got access to this church for 3 months, I asked him if he’d like to move his services there. I didn’t insist that the TV altar be on, but I told him it could be and he was game. In fact, in the first service, he made his sermon in part about the piece, calling it ‘resurrection technology’ as his deep baritone activated all the oscilloscope TVs. I think his congregation got a kick out of it all, but even if they thought it was weird and unnecessary, it brought our people and the reverend’s people together in this radically weird way. It deepened our relationship with the reverend and his wife and now we will always be friends (Martin email, 2020). 209

Reflection Two: New Water Music. Another one of Delaney Martin’s (2020) favourite radical collaborations is a project called New Water Music, which really highlights how socially aware the organization is, and how activism plays into their collaborative model:

Then there are aspects of size/diversity that also make things feel radical. We had 300 people participate in the New Water Music - our project about Louisiana’s coastal crisis. They included Yotam Haber, a contemporary Rome-prize winning composer, the Louisiana philharmonic, a drum line, fisherman, scientists, Indigenous activists, coastal organizations, the coast guard and weirdo artists. This project elicited my favorite complement. Someone told me that the shrimp boat ballet literally made them cry, but what they couldn’t believe is that we got all these people, with radically-opposed points of view on some very contentious issues, in the same space, working together. That this fact alone gave them hope for the coast. So, at this point I think of our form of radical collaboration as a collaborative eco- system that feeds the work, but also feeds the human soul (Martin email, 2020).

Chapter Summary

The MBV acts as a safe space for collaborative projects to unfold, in that it helps foster relationships between world class international creatives and local ones in a trusted environment.

As I see it, radical collaboration is when an unobvious grouping works together in a trusting space which allows for risk-taking and open experimentation, to produce something truly innovative, where every participating voice is maximized.

So many examples of this came up in my interviews, from Peaches working with Tif

Lamsen (Pennington, 2019), to Andrew Schrock working with German Klaas Hubner on

Chateau Poulet, to Rick Snow working with Christine SunKim on Elevator Pitch, this collaborative model helps foster creativity and maximize the artists’ voice in every scenario.

Part of what makes their collaborations radical is the level of innovation, one of the few places in the world to be producing musical houses, the MBV forges collaborative paths that would not 210 otherwise occur. Crossing renowned Mardi Gras Indians like Big Chief Darryl Montana of the

Yellow Pocahontas with New York kinetic sound artist Gamelatron (aka Aaron Taylor Kuffner),

Jeff Poree Plastering and Studio Inferno Glass is just another example of community-building through their radical collaboration model. This inside out concept of trying to ensure somebody local gets paired with somebody from outside the city, helps import and export creative concepts and fosters new paths and future artistic collaborations.

The MBV brings unique thinkers together in a safe, exciting collaborative space that helps breed new relationships, new projects, new unforeseen paths of inspiration. With this space acting as the connector, and its supporting organization the New Orleans Airlift collective helping initiate and foster these relationships, they might not otherwise occur. The organization has a touch of care, helping build trust between the collaborators, a necessary ingredient in the model, according to Louis (2013).

Pennington (2019) outlines how the initial performance between avant-garde musician

Peaches and local artist Tif Lamson happened at MBV in 2016. This led to Tif becoming the

Musical Director of Peaches’ 2019 European tour, actually bringing an entire dance troupe and

Tif Lamson from New Orleans to influence her live show. Another example, among many, where new collaborations grow from the original spark project started by MBV and the New

Orleans Airlift. When I interviewed Andrew Schrock in Detroit (2019), he disclosed that he remains in touch with Klaas Hubner, how they collectively built Chateau Poulet, one of the signature houses in MBV, “he's trying to actually get a project set up right now in Berlin. Yeah.

Send me out there. Totally different than the Music Box. But…” (Schrock Interview, 2019)

Where most organizations or funding bodies might not be in a position to support such experimentalism, this is an area where the MBV thrives in creating new artistic communities, 211 built on calculated risk and trust. The entire MBV team embrace the sharing of the village, not hinged on the ego of one. Their anything-goes mantra helps it expand as an actual healthy community or village would.

As Martin (2020) states “collaboration, when really done right, when prefaced on the idea of leaving ego at the door and being open to adaptation, can be a tool for artistic expression, but also community building” (Martin email, 2020). 212

Chapter 9: Conclusion

I will provide an overview of the major insights of the research in this final chapter and offer recommendations based on them. I will also suggest areas for future research that emerged as a result of this study.

This study was focused on discovering answers to the following research question: how does the Music Box Village (MBV) musical playground function within its community?

Through gaining multiple perspectives on the MBV, from documents, interviews, observing over

50 local New Orleanian grade four students playing in the space for three consecutive days, conducting surveys, and experiencing multiple events in the space in May 2019, I began to understand how the space affected its surrounding community. Run by an organization of well- informed transplants who now call New Orleans home, the New Orleans Airlift takes a wholistic approach when it comes to connection and building community through the arts.

As outlined in the next section, MBV is often personified, as the composer in the context of creative expression, as the teacher in the context of education, as the conduit in the context of community development, and as the canvas for radical collaboration, where the larger community all pitch their ideas in to the village.

Learning how the MBV came to fruition, seeing the way it operates, behind the scenes as an organization, and as a front-facing tourist attraction to the public, it begs the question, what are the general makings of such a space that could be replicated elsewhere? General themes that emerged from my research are reviewed below, as they relate to each of my sub-questions.

However, in general, I saw a willingness at every level, from each docent in the space, through to

New Orleans City Hall, in wanting MBV to succeed. I saw numerous hours spent in the hot, swampy Louisiana heat, to get the job done, so that children of all ages could enjoy the space, 213 and relish in the odd sounds it produces. I saw a willingness to make new friends through music, something all the folks at New Orleans Airlift embrace as a fundamental tenet of the organization (Martin interview, 2019), and also an ability to function within the parameters of

New Orleans municipal bylaws, for the most part.

During my stay, I witnessed hundreds of smiles and evident imagination expansions, saw the odd finger get cut, but for the most part, no tears, just joy emanating from the space. The odd guitar string would break, periodic Louisiana rainstorms would flood the space, but as resilient as the city itself, the strings would get replaced each day before MBV reopened.

At a time when most arts and cultural institutions find themselves at a crossroads, challenging their own possible systems of oppression and systemic racism, music education is not void of such scrutiny. At the root of Western classical music is a hegemony of white male supremacy (Maysaud, 2009). Bartel (2004) outlines the power structures still prevalent in music education, where the conductor leads, and the design of our teaching institutions perpetuate oppression. There is a reckoning in music education, where repertoire and educational models need to be closely examined.

In line with Lundquist (1982), Howard (2020) asserts “despite this growth of interest in diversifying the content of and even decolonizing pedagogical practices in music education” (p.

3) very little research has been done in schools and community. From a general music curriculum obsessed with structured, polished, performance-based Western classical music, and teaching structures that support it, music education needs a rethink. For example, the typical disciplinary tactics used to discipline a student with behavioural challenges could perpetuate the power imbalances, and race inequities of our overall society (Ladson-Billings, 2020). Therefore, we must look to other models, and spaces to consider new directions for the field. 214

The Sub-Questions

Q1. How does The Music Box Village function as a safe space for creative expression? Sub-question one explores the context of creative expression and how the MBV fosters unique artistic voices. “Creative expression” in the context of the multiple examples I witnessed, where the MBV provided opportunity for decision-making, and functioned as a creative hub in New Orleans, a venue for experimental musical performance.

As part of the creative process, Kratus (1990), claims that pupils engage in the following types of creative activity: exploration, improvisation, composition and creative performance.

The MBV engages these different types of creative activities through their modular design, where the playground by day can also function as a music venue or lecture hall. On multiple occasions, I witnessed the space function as co-composer, where the design and layout of the unique musical instruments influenced the musical output.

The MBV encourages a space for creative expression and new ideas, through presenting progressive social concepts using sound art as the medium. Through diverse cultural events, their own unique brand of rebellion in music, and community-building, the MBV inspires creative works, inspiring audiences of all ages to participate in the adventures they help foster.

From the research, particular themes were evident which pointed to the MBV as a space that fosters creative expression. These themes include their post-modern approach to repurposing old Creole cottages into new musical houses; the battle in the village between experimentalism, traditionalism and the microcosm the MBV is for experimental music within a city that is steeped in traditional jazz history; celebration and commemoration within the space; honouring New Orleans and finally, the organization itself, as a collective that propagates creative expression. 215

Q2. How does The Music Box Village function as an educational space? With sub- question two, the MBV functions as an alternative educational space, from its multiple purposes as a music venue, presentation space, playground, it presents a unique opportunity to develop new curriculum to help maximize its potential for affecting social change, within the City of

New Orleans and beyond as a tourist attraction. Created by experts in the field of sound art and experimental music, delivered by the collective New Orleans Airlift, the space itself, in this instance, becomes the teacher, through its well-thought design.

The MBV functions as a space that naturally teaches sound art to students of all ages, and through this exploration, reflects many of the different forms of intelligence, as per Howard

Gardner (1999). This musical adventure playground inspires invention, it sparks the imagination, much like a children’s museum model might, and it teaches sustainability, and other important STEM-related pillars, such as collaboration, physics, and math.

Some of the themes that were derived from my research in this area include how informed the entire team were in delivering this unique form of sound art to children of all ages; the recurring theme of structured versus unstructured forms and how this plays out in music education; free play and the importance of risk in play (Almon, 2013), where the space itself acts as the third teacher; and finally the impact left of the participating children, who were inspired to invent their own musical instruments in the end.

Q3. How does the Music Box Village function as a vehicle for community development? The third construct I analyzed is community development. The MBV helps build community through every project it launches or supports. MBV is a space that helps foster new relationships and ideas, similar to an actual village (Martin Interview, 2019). They have a strong ability to encourage unforeseen collaborations, crossing disciplines, creating new artforms 216 and communities in the process. Themes derived from the research include community music; assets as they relate to the MBV within the City of New Orleans including the space as connector, community-mindedness, intergenerational and intercultural, commemoration, and disruption; finally, the theme of knowledge-sharing and how the MBV becomes an exemplar for other cities to adopt.

What I observed during the case study, from lectures on the history of Black spirituality, to how the entire space was born from the disaster of Hurricane Katrina, I learned how important the arts are as a community healer. This musical playground connects unobvious communities, fostering social harmony (Spiro, 1965) through using odd sounds and experimental music. Acts of protest, commemoration, and placemaking are also highlighted throughout the playground.

Recommendations for future stakeholders to try and replicate such a model as MBV are as follows. In my participant interview list, I spoke with founding members, related sound artists, a City of New Orleans official, a board member, academics, parents, park visitors consisting mostly of student participants, makers and musicians who perform in the space. In each interview, I found a willingness and belief in the project and its merits that help the project shine. Everybody I interviewed treated MBV just as that, a genuine care for the village aspect of it. Everybody adds their special voice and ways of supporting the project, whether it be fundraising through a board member, or approving a permit from the city’s Historic Landmark

Commission. None of this would thrive without the leadership and vision of its founders,

Delaney Martin, Jay Pennington, Taylor Lee Shepherd and Swoon. MBV simply would not exist were it not for their persistence, their diverse paths to knowledge, and their refined sense of collaboration. 217

Lennard and Lennard (1992) call for a community model that is embraced by MBV in

New Orleans, where parents, unknown adults and children of all ages mix and learn together in an inspiring public play space. Their approach also links to Vygotsky (1933), who ties play to child learning, as it includes language in play as an important tool for social development.

Meta-Theme: Radical Collaboration

The MBV brings unique thinkers together in a safe collaborative space that helps breed new relationships, projects, and unforeseen paths of inspiration. Without this space acting as the conduit, and its supporting organization the New Orleans Airlift, helping mobilize these relationships, they might not otherwise occur. The organization has a touch of care, helping build trust in the collaborators, a necessary ingredient in the model, according to Louis (2013).

Pennington (2019) outlines how the initial performance between avant-garde musician

Peaches and local New Orleans artist Tif Lamson led to further collaborations between the two artists, with tours and musical direction and more. A deeper relationship forged from this initial spark in the village. Another example, among many, where new collaborations grow from the original spark project started by MBV and the New Orleans Airlift. When I interviewed Andrew

Schrock in Detroit (2019), he mentioned that he and Klaas Hubner are still in touch about new collaborations in Europe, continuing on their initial project, which all began at MBV with

Chateau Poulet.

What makes their collaborations radical is the level of innovation, one of the only places in the world to be producing these unique musical houses, the MBV forges collaborative paths that would not otherwise occur. Crossing renowned Mardi Gras Indians like Big Chief Darryl

Montana of the Yellow Pocahontas with New York kinetic sound artist Gamelatron (aka Aaron

Taylor Kuffner), Jeff Poree Plastering and Studio Inferno Glass is just another example of 218 community-building through their radical collaboration model. This inside out concept of trying to ensure somebody local gets paired with somebody from outside the city, helps import and export creative concepts and fosters new paths and future artistic collaborations. When I reflect on the impact made on the Louisiana Deaf community, through the project Elevator Pitch, it is evident that their work begins with the notion of community and providing access. MBV and

New Orleans Airlift use space to act as the seeming conduit of community connection, as it is the backdrop to unlocking new directions between the new creative teams they orchestrate.

Where most organizations or funding bodies would not support such experimentalism, this is an area where the MBV thrives in creating new artistic communities, built on risk and trust. The entire MBV team embrace the sharing of the village, checking their egos upon entry.

Their anything-goes mantra helps it expand as an actual healthy village would.

As Martin (2020) asserts “collaboration, when really done right, when prefaced on the idea of leaving ego at the door and being open to adaptation, can be a tool for artistic expression, but also community building” (Martin email, 2020).

Implications for Future Research and Curriculum Development

As this study was conducted at one site in New Orleans, Louisiana, findings cannot be generalized beyond the one institution in the New Orleans Airlift. However, future research on similar spaces, even linked to the same organization or other sound art installations could be pursued. Other business models that differ from the New Orleans Airlift are of interest, for example, the for-profit model of Meow Wolf in Santa Fe was cited numerous times by the Airlift staff in interviews. What could be learned from these alternate business models? 219

In chapter 5, I touch on the fact that I had intended to observe children with behavioral challenges and disabilities, as they might benefit significantly from accessing a musical playground. There is a need for more in-depth study in this area.

In my interview of Daniel Sharp at Tulane University, I quickly learned of the book he was writing on Music Box Village, and the musicological study he was doing on the site, from a popular music perspective. This quickly made me realize the vast number of studies that could be done on a musical playground, specifically the MBV, looking at it from multiple perspectives.

Perhaps looking at their outpost sites, the organization in greater details, their collaborative artistic model, how the trauma of the COVID-19 pandemic might inform their organization, as they were born out of post-Katrina New Orleans, so their new take on public space, public health, and community music would be of interest.

New research could continue to focus on the participating children’s experience, and their future musical inventions. It could observe the collaboration in touring musicians, coming from a more conventional background, as they prepare to perform concerts in the space, and how they approach the unique challenges the space presents.

It could also trace scaffolding techniques and design different play assignments for students in the playground. Additionally, future research could relate to the socio-economic structure of affected communities as it relates to access and engagement of such a space.

There is a need for future study of the impact of alternative music education spaces, such as the City Museum in St. Louis, the hydraulophone (Mann, 2007) at the Ontario Science Centre, and other international musical installation sites outlined in Chapter 2. 220

Finally, I discussed a need for complimentary curriculum development for alternative music learning sites such as these, to help educators guide and foster creative ideas from the unique play and projects that can spawn from such a place.

Imagine a world where musical playgrounds became as ubiquitous as actual playgrounds.

This study charts a path for municipalities to consider taking such a step, to help them continue developing in unique and creative ways. The MBV in New Orleans provides such an example, acting as a healing agent for the city. As an organization, it takes on a leadership role in the community, in hosting important dialogues around race, religion, culture and more. The space pushes the boundaries of music, and celebrates the rich musical traditions of its city. It is the perfect reflection of what New Orleans can be, as it honours its past, while helping the city look forward, to what it can become. Imagine an Airlift, or MBV in every city, where the uniqueness of each city could help shape the playground and programming within. This study has aimed to highlight this great potential. The next step gives distilled suggestions for parents (elements to consider when setting a play date), musicians (new methods and ways to make music together, from the communal playground, to musical installations and other forms of creative expression, referencing Elevator Pitch and the deeper purpose of why we create), educators (showing children a new way to make music, in a completely different space, multidisciplinary model), and city councils (showing them there is a better way to create together and grow closer neighbourhoods because of spaces like this one), to strive for more inclusive, collaborative modern cities.

One Final (Ugly) Note

The Italian proverb, “tutto il mondo è paese” or “all the world is a village” comes to mind, as throughout this research experience, an experimentalist such as me got to feel a lot 221 closer to my community by bonding with the fine folk at New Orleans Airlift. I hope that the rich model presented by the Music Box Village can be drawn from and help improve cities and neighbourhoods around the world, one ugly note at a time.

222

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248

Appendix A: The Interview Participants

Here is a list of the interview participants, and my personal reflections on each of their interviews and their contributions to the project. This section is different from next chapter, when I outline the professional background of each interview participant, and how their unique voices connect to the MBV. With their consent, I used their real names, as detailed in Appendix

B, the Stakeholder Consent Letter:

Jay Pennington, Co-Founder New Orleans Airlift

The first interview I conducted, May 14th 2019, was fittingly at the Piety Street home of

Jay Pennington, one of the founding members of New Orleans Airlift, in the yard where the pilot version of Music Box Village began.

Pennington explained why he felt it was significant to conduct the interview there, as he showed me the remnants of the original Creole cottage, in his side yard, what was the original site of the Music Box Village. In seeing it firsthand, I certainly absorbed the element of how community-based the project was. Pennington shared the origin story, highlighting Hurricane

Katrina, and how impacted the city was by this 2005 disaster, and how important a space like

Music Box Village, even in its smaller scale Piety Street rendition, was for coalescing the

Bywater neighbourhood.

Pennington sees the Music Box Village as “essentially tricking people into coming to an experimental music concert.” He touched on the importance of it being a politically-neutral space, where punk anarchists can mix with conservatives, and music can act as the connector.

Post-Katrina, it was important for the New Orleans Airlift to not take space away from other organizations in the Lower 9th Ward, so they did the more socially responsible thing, and waited, to install in the Upper 9th Ward. Through their work, they quickly discovered the term place- 249 making coined by such notable authors as Jane Jacobs (1961) who believed in the importance of lively neighborhoods and inviting public spaces. Jacobs advocated for the human touch and voice to be included in city design and planning, the eyes and ears on the ground.

Pennington’s subversive approach of “sneaking in” (Marsella, 2019) the experimental side of music is one of the motivating drivers of the New Orleans Airlift, looking to connect with children of all ages. He was quick to outline how the Music Box Village acts as a neutralizer, where punks and Trump voters can bond over the common ground of music.

Delaney Martin, Co-Founder New Orleans Airlift

By design, Delaney was my last interview, and she surprised me on so many levels. The main one, was how much effort she puts into preserving the weird, experimental ethos of the

Music Box Village. She spoke about how often she needs to step away from conversations, if she sees the experimental side losing the fight, or the site moving in a direction that she disagrees with. This to me, is a clear indicator of how dear the space and the organization are to Martin.

At times, it felt like Martin was referring to it as an actual village, with rules and aesthetic factors that need to be considered, like Orwell’s Animal Farm and keeping order in the village.

Both Jay Pennington and Delaney Martin spoke about the organization’s outpost model, and what it was like installing smaller versions of the project, from Connecticut to Kiev. The tenets of my research questions around creative expression, education, and community-building were also prevalent in their outpost models. Martin, like Pennington, stands in defense of noise and experimental music, this concept of “sneaking in the weird” (Marsella, 2019) was prevalent, and inspiring. In her interview, Martin also cited Russolo and the Italian Futurists as a big influence of primary collective members such as Taylor Lee Shepherd, along with The

Residents. Delaney Martin also spoke about the importance of doing such a unique project like 250

Music Box Village in New Orleans, versus say New York City or London, where she had worked beforehand. Martin spoke about the slower tempo of the city, and the way things get done in New Orleans versus New York, and that it seems like a natural fit in New Orleans, in that the weird, and off-the-beaten path concepts are normalized in context.

Elliot Perkins, Executive Director, New Orleans Historic District Land Corporation

During my preliminary visit to New Orleans in September 2018, Delaney Martin recommended that I speak with Elliot Perkins, from the City of New Orleans, who was instrumental in supporting the project from a municipal government standpoint. The only formal city representative that I interviewed was Elliot Perkins, the Director of the Historic Landmark

District Corporation. According to Perkins, in New Orleans “districts evolve organically over time,” which ties in with Pennington’s discussion about communities, and how they evolve over time.

Thankfully, Elliot Perkins is a man who saw the importance of not getting “lost in the rules” (Perkins, 2019). This is necessary in order to green light something as unique as the

Music Box Village, which could easily get sanctioned by regulation. Perkins (2019) had a great definition of community: “I think community is people talking to each other, involved in each other's lives, doing, working on the same things, you know, or at least reacting to the same things” (Perkins Interview, 2019).

Perkins (2019) highlighted how important it was for the New Orleans Airlift to realize the project in collaboration with the City of New Orleans, and not as an off the grid initiative: “And that’s the difference is transitioning this thing from taking the anarchy out of it just to the extent of, you know, making it legitimate” (Perkins Interview, 2019). The Music Box Village is just anarchist enough! Compared to other examples like the Elephant Collective who were just too 251 offside to approve, according to Mr. Perkins (2019).

Leah Hennessy, Artistic Director, New Orleans Airlift

Similar to Delaney Martin, Leah Hennessy (2019) claims the Music Box Village is very tied to the way that art gets made in New Orleans, through personal relationships, and the

“benefits from being a slower road” also referring to the tempo of a city.

Leah Hennessy’s sense of community, and the responsibility that New Orleans Airlift embraces when it comes to hosting panel discussions, employment equity, land acknowledgments and indigenous rights, and more, she programs with a lens of social awareness and wants to be a part of positive change in New Orleans.

Hennessy (2019) spoke at length about the creativity of touring artists coming through

Music Box Village, and how some will use the houses more than others. Hennessy (2019) cited avant-garde legends, The Residents, and their concert as one that taught them a lot, with relatively no use of the houses in their performance. It takes time for that creativity and comfort level to unravel in some artists. Like her programming partner Jay Pennington (and Delaney

Martin), Leah Hennessy also aspired for audiences to come to the space on a monthly basis, without knowing who the performing artist was; to develop a trusting culture where the audience is drawn by the place itself and by its reputation.

My interview with Leah Hennessy also touched on other universal themes of the Music

Box Village, for example, their unique model of having local artists mix and collaborate with higher level international artists to create something new, either an ephemeral performance project, or the permanent installation of new houses in the park.

The Hennessy (2019) take on imagination is in line with Elliot Perkins and Jay

Pennington, on creativity, and all-ages attractiveness: “I think the Music Box Village is a place 252 that inspires…limitless thinking…and is a place that engenders, a sense of play, for all aged people to just like go and experiment with something. And I think that those places are somewhat rare, it's that place where it meets for, for adults and for children” (Hennessy

Interview, 2019). Very few spaces cater equally to children of all ages, perhaps children’s museums, and even then, there is a slant towards children being the focus.

From interviewing Leah Hennessy, I noticed that her music education included Anthony

Braxton and other outside-the-box musical thinkers, that she has worked hard to defend her brand of weird music, and the Music Box Village embodies this, with experimentalism in the foreground.

Alita Edgar, Director of Strategy and Special Projects, New Orleans Airlift

Alita Edgar joined the New Orleans Airlift team in 2011, and has since performed many roles for the organization. From strategic planning and financial oversight, to creative collaboration, artistic, and visual input, Alita Edgar evidently makes every project stronger.

I recall Alita Edgar buffing the sheet metal pieces hours before the launch party of the

Elevator Pitch house installation, alongside Delaney Martin, one of her co-conspirators in the project, ensuring everything was just right for public presentation. Alita Edgar (2019) refers to the New Orleans Airlift organization as “a collective,” the way they all contribute to the greater good and success of the organization – this concept was illuminated during the launch event for the Elevator Pitch house installation.

Alita Edgar (2019), like several of her peers, sees the Music Box Village as a great way to connect people of differing political opinions or lifestyles:

we try to create a neutral space because situated where we are, right? We're in a blue city

in a red state in the south and the deep south and also a very Caribbean city with a very 253

wild history and like it's just extremely diverse in its way and all those things. And that's

all been part of the Airlift ethos as well as like, we're about connecting people and we're

talking about really different people and we work with a lot of non-artists, you know, and

we're like, okay, we want these classic car guys to be comfortable with, you know, a

bunch of freaks and we want the lake fishermen to be comfortable with the, you know,

gay flag corps, like whatever... (Edgar Interview, 2019)

Alita Edgar (2019) spoke about the importance of speaking several languages, when addressing different stakeholders, from funders, to politicians, to artists. Edgar (2019) spoke about the sustainability factor, and working within the system in order to bring this rebellious vision to life:

“…you need the support and the buy-in of people who have resources and power. And we're very lucky that we touch them in a way that they are excited about us and, and to support what we're doing” (Edgar Interview, 2019).

Teachers “Ms. French” & “Mr. English,” Participating Community School, New Orleans,

Louisiana

I interviewed both of the grade four teachers who participated in the study, “Ms. French” and “Mr. English,” teachers at a participating community school in New Orleans, Louisiana.

Both teachers had never been to Music Box Village prior to these three visits. According to

“Ms. French” (Interview, 2019), the Music Box Village fosters creativity, and she is excited to see if the kids build their own instruments or get into creating their own sounds from this enlightening experience. “Mr. English” (2019) asserted “they’ll remember this forever” (“Mr.

English Interview, 2019). According to Ms. French (2019), “it helped ground and focus kids who I know had behavioral challenges” (Ms. French Interview, 2019). Both teachers remarked 254 on how surprised by how well the structured and unstructured play exercises melded together so nicely on the final 3rd day of their visit to the village.

“Ms. French” noticed how the Music Box Village grounded her students:

I got a positive response from the structured and unstructured play, because they have a chance to channel that energy and whether it was on the drums or just in like the, the separate little houses to kind of figure out the different sounds, the hyper-activity that some of them had, it kind of channeled it a little bit differently. I think they were able to focus more and listen. (“Ms. French” Interview, 2019) Quintron, contributing musician

One thing led to another with my interviewing of stakeholders to the Music Box

Village. While interviewing Jay Pennington, he texted the artist Quintron, a New Orleans staple, to see if he would have some time to speak with me about his important contributions to the vision of the space, and how it might function musically. I was unfamiliar with Quintron’s work beforehand, but fast became an admirer of his musical inventions. I learned that he has been running alternative venues in New Orleans for decades, and hours after interviewing Jay

Pennington, found myself in Quintron’s studio, “I’ll give you a half hour interview, as I’m going on tour tomorrow” (Quintron Interview, 2019). I felt very fortunate to cross his path and gain

Quintron’s (Interview, 2019) insight on the Music Box Village.

They are the first organization that started actively seeking and offering money to local and out of town free improvisors jazz, jazz musicians that do not play ‘trad’ and experimental tinkerers, builders and, and very serious like lifelong devoted artists but that are working in a field that is not generally a big money-maker outside of a couple gigs in Europe and festivals, weird festivals here and there. But if New Orleans never had that scene and they are the heartbeat of it now. (Quintron Interview, 2019) 255

When the space began, Quintron introduced the idea of how to play it, conducting it, leading musical experiments, like composer and avant-garde jazz saxophonist John Zorn (score, 1984) using conducting paddles.

My subsequent travels and conversations in New Orleans quickly demonstrated the impact that Quintron has had on that community at large. For example, he and his partner Miss

Pussycat are painted on the side of Kermit Ruffins’ BBQ spot, giving him a legendary status in the city creatively, alongside the likes of Doctor John, Alain Toussaint and so many others.

Eliza MacDermott, Director of Public Programs and Community Engagement, New

Orleans Airlift

Eliza MacDermott was instrumental in supporting much of the study I conducted with the participating Community School from New Orleans, Louisiana, and other participants. Eliza

MacDermott’s care and commitment to the organization shone through with every interaction.

MacDermott’s (2019) dream for Music Box Village is to see it thrive equally as an alternative education space, as it does on the arts presentation side. The collaboration that MacDermott helped set up with the participating Community School planted the seeds of collaboration with student-led ideas, that one could envision tying into the New Orleans Airlift model of local and international collaborations. Seeing MacDermott fearlessly lead a group of grade fours, and grade twos through the Music Box Village was also a lesson in curricular development for the space. MacDermott’s deliberate language and experience in directing tours of this surreal space and artistic creations, highlights her commitment to ensuring children of all ages digest and understand and retain its philosophy.

MacDermott brings a great sense of community, social justice and awareness to the team that is a great asset. Like every member of the collective, MacDermott also wears several hats, 256 for example, as Manager of Open Hours, she is constantly introducing new people, many tourists, to the Music Box Village. Her ability to withstand the soundscape of the space for eight-hour blocks, and find ways to cope with it in that regard, was admirable, and also something that might have otherwise gone overlooked. Nothing is beneath Eliza MacDermott, or anybody on the New Orleans Airlift team, this sense of completing the task or project collectively was a big inspiration, and if the trash needed to be taken out, it was not a matter of it getting done, but who would get it done faster. Everybody from its founders to part-time staff took equal pride in keeping the space proper.

Eliza MacDermott is community-oriented and believes that the Music Box Village can act as an even stronger resource for the community, offering welding classes to women, who inherited many of the homes after Katrina, some without the skills to repair them. She wants to pull together different educational voices and organizations, such as Tool School and Electric

Girls, offering marginalized youth access to tools and electronics, to apply themselves in the

Music Box Village, “that's your audience of tomorrow. That's your music of tomorrow. That's your community of tomorrow” (MacDermott Interview, 2019).

Daniel Sharp, Chair of Music, Tulane University

I travelled to Tulane University to speak with the Chair of their music department, Daniel

Sharp, who is currently writing a book about the Music Box Village from a pop music perspective. According to Sharp (2019), “there's always kind of an implicit protest in the insistence of, of doing something other than the prefab, you know, it definitely comes out of a kind of Bohemian or cultural thing” (Sharp Interview, 2019). Sharp (2019) discussed the theme of universality, that “they try to pitch different events to like their different kind of sub constituencies” (Sharp Interview, 2019), connecting different political stripes through music. 257

Sharp (2019) picks up on the social element that the New Orleans Airlift is attempting to bolster:

“they want to broaden the notion of what New Orleans is. And so, they're very committed to projecting a weird New Orleans or the experimental side of New Orleans culture” (Sharp

Interview, 2019).

Rick Snow, Sound Artist & Professor, Tulane University

I met Rick Snow organically, as he was working diligently on the Smithsonian-funded

Elevator Pitch project, collaborating with sound artist Christine SunKim on a new house, to be launched while I was in New Orleans. The Elevator Pitch example is perfect for highlighting

New Orleans Airlift’s pairing local and outside artists, between Rick Snow (local professor and composer) and Christine SunKim (international artist, via Smithsonian). According to Snow

(2019), “they export the idea to other cities, and they pick it up” (Snow Interview, 2019), in other words, ambassadors of weird! “When I worked with them on the City Park project, I did get to see like what a huge team of people can get involved, all kind of contribute their talent to these different kinds of aspects of, you know, what is a pretty remarkable multi-disciplinary sculpture, and music…” (Snow Interview, 2019). This idea of exporting the model of Music Box Village to other cities will be developed in chapter seven, as a vehicle for community development.

Rick Snow (2019) on how the Music Box Village benefits children: “When you look at the Music Box Village, and you see how you come into that space as a young kid already in a city that surrounds you with music. And then this is a place where you get to experiment with making sounds on, you know, 15-plus unique instruments in a totally non-judgmental space, where you're allowed to be playful, you're allowed to test things out, play, bang on things, laugh, run around, chase each other, you know. So that's one aspect that I think is really kind of special” (Snow Interview, 2019) 258

Rick Snow (2019) on how the Music Box Village works as a community-building device with social groups, in this case Louisiana’s deaf community: “this piece (Elevator Pitch) is the only one that has really been conceived as specifically addressing a community that probably has, you know, had the chance to experience this space” (Snow Interview, 2019)

The Music Box Village is a welcoming space that helps normalize foreign sounds.

“This is a place where you know, someone with who's never heard of John Cage can basically be an experimental musician just by walking in” (Snow Interview, 2019).

Taylor Lee Shepherd, Technical Director, New Orleans Airlift

Taylor Lee Shepherd and his partner Delaney Martin really capture the spirit of the Music

Box Village. Undoubtably, Taylor Lee Shepherd is the main sound artist behind the Music Box

Village. I conducted my interview with Shepherd overlooking the Mississippi River, with the

Music Box Village behind us, and the noisy soundscape of his dogs, boats, trains and New

Orleans around us. Taylor Shepherd shared his love of Brian Eno and his philosophy of music for non-musicians, and how early inspiration from a class of tinkerers like Frank Pahl in

Michigan helped him develop into the sound artist that he is today. Shepherd (2019) also spoke about the anarchist punk band, Crash Worship, and his subversive ham radio project, the first time I visited it was broadcasting, the second time, it had been shut down by the federal government. The sense of rebellion in the Music Box Village is certainly illuminated by

Shepherd’s approach to music and society. I later found out, through interviewing his partner

Delaney Martin, that Shepherd was highly influenced by Russolo’s The Art of Noises (1913) and would share a quote from the book with all new hires on the Airlift team. The entire group are highly informed in the area of sound art, architecture and visual arts.

Andrew Schrock, contributing artist 259

Another example, where the Music Box Village connects artists and builds community, is in the pairing of artist Andrew Schrock (who helped actually build the wall and other aspects of the space) with German sound artist Klaas Hubner (local and international model). From my interview with Andrew Schrock (2019) in a Detroit alleyway, “that's so not average, that place I would love for it to be normal.” The vision to expand the model beyond New Orleans and into every city. Schrock talks about how collaborative and integrative the New Orleans Airlift team is when building TRUST in any community they work in, from Kiev, where he travelled with them on an outpost project, through to New Orleans.

From his website biography (2019), Schrock shares the spirit of rebellion and community-building in his work:

Andrew Schrock is a multi-faceted artist, ambitiously delving into all realms of creativity. His endeavors include chopping apart freight trains, tug boats, hacking fire hydrants, exploding sculptures, decon-re-construction, adventures into the metaphysical, and breathing all for the sake of realizing fantasy, experimental thinking, and an understanding of the multi-verse. (Schrock Interview, 2019) Bryan Bailey, Board Member, New Orleans Airlift

Real estate agent and producer, Bryan Bailey began to frequent the Piety Street space, and befriend Pennington, Martin and others on the core team, as he also knew Swoon.

Eventually joining the New Orleans Airlift board of directors and being involved with their business planning for over ten years, Bailey has helped Martin in acquiring their permanent space, and also with several funding pitches.

Originally from Knoxville, Tennessee, Bailey has lived in New Orleans well before

Hurricane Katrina. The juxtaposition between Knoxville and New Orleans has helped shape his world view: 260

So, coming to New Orleans wow. You know, it was a very welcoming experience where there's a city in New Orleans is deacon historically kind of a city of outcasts. It's a transient port city and it's there's this sort of underlying current here. Now you can get into your little pockets of different social groups and, and have the same judgments and bullshit, right? But there's an underlying current here that is, as long as you're not hurting other people, like you are welcome to be here and be whoever you want to be. It's very accepting as a community, which I love. (Bailey Interview, 2019) Tif Lamson, contributing musician

With her successful monthly series in the Music Box Village, Tif “Teddy” Lamson’s relationship in playing the musical houses has not only normalized, similarly to the working team of New Orleans Airlift, but also within her musical colleagues, and she approaches the space much differently, as a creative musician.

Lamson (2019) shares her approach to programming in the Music Box Village, versus more traditional settings: “I think in rock shows, like I'm really privy to, you know, like pop and rock and roll music and stuff that really like bangs pretty hard and makes people dance. Really.

It's like immediate, you know, and in this there's more a theatrical sense of letting, almost like watching a flower grow” (Lamson Interview, 2019).

My last night in New Orleans, I was able to perform in one of Lamson’s Twilight

Serenades and experiences firsthand the space’s ability to uniquely engage an audience. I discuss this in greater detail (see Chapter 8).

Christian Repaal, Shop Manager/Lead Fabricator

My interview with Christian Repaal was relatively short, but my time observing him was substantial. Like with Taylor Lee Shepherd, his compatriot in building things, he is one of the main drivers in keeping the Music Box Village afloat technically. Not a musician, Christian’s 261 background is more in the making of things, hence his title of Lead Fabricator. “I'm barely an artist. I'm a more of a craftsman”

I observed Christian Repaal in the build of the new house, Elevator Pitch, and his collaboration in project managing such a complex installation. From moving in the physical elevator into the space, to helping install the roof, Repaal was there for long hours, daily.

Notably, he was not in the Music Box Village during the launch event, he just seemed more interested in the behind the scenes process, than the public-facing side. Repaal was evidently valued by the entire collective, and although some procedural challenges came up in my interviews, the overall output of the group at large remains stunning.

Marilyn Payne, regular visitor during Open Hours

During both Saturday Open Hours sessions that I observed on May 18th and 25th, I found local Bywater resident Marilyn Payne and her two children Shakayah, eleven, and Brendton, nine, playing in the Music Box Village. In my short interview of Payne (2019) and her two children, it was evident how much fun the two kids were having, unpeeling undiscovered musical elements in each house, relishing in the noise, but also Payne’s mention of “peace of mind” within the noisy environment. In this model, Payne and her agreeing neighbours get to choose and embrace the noise and soundscape of their community. 262

Appendix B: Stakeholder Consent Form

Consent Form to Participate in a Research Study

Researcher: Richard Marsella, 1045 Melvin Street, Oakville, Ontario, L6J2V8, Canada.

Cel. 416.833.7240 email: [email protected]

Study Title: A Case Study of The Music Box Village, New Orleans (The Musical Playground as a Vehicle for Community Development)

May 2019

This consent letter is in support of Richard Marsella (University of Toronto) and his research of the Music Box Village in New Orleans. As a related stakeholder I agree to give an interview to Mr. Marsella and sharing my knowledge related to the Music Box Village. I understand that my name and interview results may be included in Mr. Marsella’s doctoral dissertation and referred to at related conferences. I understand that I may withdraw my participation in this study at any time during the process.

I understand that Mr. Marsella is a doctoral researcher from University of Toronto, documenting the effects of The Music Box Village in the community. I understand the specific purpose of this study is to examine how the Music Box Village in New Orleans functions within the community and as an educational space, and to share the learnings with other communities.

263

If you have questions about your rights as participants you can contact the University of

Toronto, Research Oversight and Compliance Office - Human Research Ethics Program at [email protected] or 416-946-3273. You may also contact my advisor, Dr. Lee Bartel, from the University of Toronto at 416-524-2822.

Conflict of Interest: As a participant in this study, you declare that you are not related to members of the research team, and/or not part of the research team.

I understand that the intent of this research is to describe the function of a musical playground in a community and what impact it has on children.

I give consent to Richard Marsella to share the audio-visual footage recorded during his study of

Music Box Village in May 2019 at academic presentations following the study.

Signed,

______

Print Name Signature Date

264

Appendix C: Organizational Consent Form

Consent Form, New Orleans Airlift

Researcher: Richard Marsella, 1045 Melvin Street, Oakville, Ontario, L6J2V8, Canada.

Cel. 416.833.7240 email: [email protected]

Study Title: A Case Study of The Music Box Village, New Orleans (The Musical Playground as a Vehicle for Community Development)

[date, to be filled out on the day of signing]

This letter is in support of Richard Marsella (University of Toronto) and his upcoming research of the Music Box Village in May 2019. As the parent organization of the Music Box

Village, the New Orleans Airlift is in full support of this research case study: to interview stakeholders related to the Music Box Village and to observe children playing onsite in the

Music Box Village, New Orleans between May 6 and 26 2019.

We will help make the space available and coordinate the children who will participate in the study through our local programming linked to the school system. We will also provide to the researcher video and audio footage from the space, via our security cameras and microphones. We will hold Mr. Marsella responsible to screen and edit with facial obscuring any participants who do not give explicit written consent in any academic or public use of the recordings.

We will facilitate as we are able interviews with key stakeholders who have helped the

Music Box Village thrive since its inception in 2015, including local politicians, member of the 265

New Orleans Airlift, artists linked to the project, and participants. We will expect Mr. Marsella to gain written informed consent from each interviewee.

We understand that Mr. Marsella is a researcher from University of Toronto planning to document the functions of The Music Box Village. In May 2019 we will welcome Mr. Marsella to visit the site to conduct a series of interviews, and observations of free play, which will include children participants.

We understand the purpose of this study is to examine exactly how the Music Box

Village in New Orleans functions as a safe space for creative expression, as an educational space, and as a vehicle for community development. Most specifically, this study will examine how the Music Box Village in New Orleans functions as an educational space, and to use those learnings as an exemplar to share with other communities. We will support the gathering of information collected by observation of free play for the duration of Mr. Marsella’s stay in May

2019, by video, audio and in person. It will then be compiled, coded, and analyzed and shared in a thesis dissertation, and summary report which we are excited to obtain.

Conflict of Interest: As a participant organization in this study, we acknowledge that New

Orleans Airlift is not related to members of the research team, and/or not part of the research team.

Signed,

______

Delaney Martin (Artistic Director, New Orleans Airlift) 266

Appendix D: Participating School Consent Form

Consent Form to Participate in a Research Study

Researcher: Richard Marsella, 1045 Melvin Street, Oakville, Ontario, L6J2V8, Canada.

Cel. 416.833.7240 email: [email protected]

Study Title: A Case Study of The Music Box Village, New Orleans (The Musical Playground as a Vehicle for Community Development)

May 15, 2019

Dear participating school admin board,

I am a researcher from Toronto, Canada planning to document the effects of The Music

Box Village on the community, observing how it functions as a safe space for creative expression, as an educational space, and as a vehicle for community development. Most specifically, this study will examine how the Music Box Village in New Orleans functions as an educational space, and to use those learnings as an exemplar to share with other communities. In

May 2019, I plan to visit the site to conduct a series of interviews, and observations of free play, which could include a participating class at Participating School, New Orleans.

I am requesting your voluntary consent to allow your school to participate in the study.

A suitable class of your students (grade 4) will be asked to play in the Music Box Village for an hour on each of three consecutive days. While this class plays, observations of the play will be conducted in person and via audio and video recordings. On the first and last days, a short pre and post survey will be conducted with the participating students. What I am looking for are 267 things like what children find interesting, on what they spend time, what musical decisions they make, how they interact with other children while they play, what things they appear to learn, and most importantly what they enjoy. What I learn from your school’s play with other children from the school, will be used in my thesis and will help other communities design enjoyable and educational playgrounds.

There are many benefits and very few risks associated with this study. Typical playground activity has some risk, but there will be careful adult supervision at all times. Any risk of a child feeling awkward or embarrassed by musical efforts will be very low because children are not asked to do specific musical tasks but rather will be allowed to “play” the way they want. At any point during the study, participating children can withdraw from the study.

The participants anonymity will be assured in the thesis and in presentation or related publications. Confidentiality will be maintained throughout the research process – you or your students’ identities will not be revealed. Any data collected will be guarded on a secure password-protected laptop and will be destroyed 12 months after collecting.

If you have questions about your rights as participants you can contact the University of

Toronto, Research Oversight and Compliance Office - Human Research Ethics Program at [email protected] or 416-946-3273. You may also contact my advisor, Dr. Lee Bartel, from the University of Toronto at 416-524-2822.

Conflict of Interest: As a participant in this study, you declare that you are not related to members of the research team, and/or not part of the research team.

I give ______(school board) consent to participate in Richard Marsella’s study of the Music Box Village from May 13 to 24 2019. I understand that the intent of this research is 268 to describe the function of a musical playground in a community and what impact it has on children.

Signed,

______

Print Name Signature Date 269

Appendix E: Student/Parent Consent Form

Consent Form to Participate in a Research Study

Researcher: Richard Marsella, 1045 Melvin Street, Oakville, Ontario, L6J2V8, Canada.

Cel. 416.833.7240 email: [email protected]

Study Title: A Case Study of The Music Box Village, New Orleans (The Musical

Playground as a

Vehicle for Community Development)

[date, to be filled in on day of signing]

Dear ______(parent or guardian,

I am a researcher from Toronto, Canada planning to document the effects of The Music

Box Village on the community, observing how it functions as a safe space for creative expression, as an educational space, and as a vehicle for community development. Most specifically, this study will examine how the Music Box Village in New Orleans functions as an educational space, and to use those learnings as an exemplar to share with other communities. In

May 2019, I plan to visit the site to conduct a series of interviews, and observations of free play, which could include your child.

I am requesting your voluntary consent to allow your child to participate in the study.

Your child will be asked to play in the Music Box Village for an hour on each of three 270 consecutive days. While your child plays, observations of the play will be conducted in person and via audio and video recordings. On the first and last days, a short pre and post survey will be conducted with the participating students. What I am looking for are things like what children find interesting, on what they spend time, what musical decisions they make, how they interact with other children while they play, what things they appear to learn, and most importantly what they enjoy. What I learn from your child’s play with other children from the school, will be used in my thesis and will help other communities design enjoyable and educational playgrounds.

There are many benefits and very few risks associated with this study. Typical playground activity has some risk, but there will be careful adult supervision at all times. Any risk of a child feeling awkward or embarrassed by musical efforts will be very low because children are not asked to do specific musical tasks but rather will be allowed to “play” the way they want. At any point during the study, you may choose to withdraw your child’s participation.

Your child’s anonymity will be assured in the thesis and in presentation or related publications.

Confidentiality will be maintained throughout the research process – you or your child’s identities will not be revealed. Any data collected will be guarded on a secure password- protected laptop and will be destroyed 12 months after collecting.

If you have questions about your rights as participants you can contact the University of

Toronto, Research Oversight and Compliance Office - Human Research Ethics Program at [email protected] or 416-946-3273. You may also contact my advisor, Dr. Lee Bartel, from the University of Toronto at 416-524-2822. 271

Conflict of Interest: As a participant in this study, you declare that you are not related to members of the research team, and/or not part of the research team.

I give ______(insert child’s name) consent to participate in Richard Marsella’s study of the Music Box Village from May __ to ___ 2019. I understand that the intent of this research is to describe the function of a musical playground in a community and what impact it has on children.

Print Parent/Guardian’s Name Signature Date

I give consent to Richard Marsella to share the audio-visual footage recorded during his study of

Music Box Village in May 2019 at academic presentations following the study.

Print Parent/Guardian’s Name Signature Date 272

Appendix F: Interview Questions

Proposed Questions for Semi-Structured Interview

Founders / Artists involved:

What are the key factors that you think allow a place like this to exist?

E.g., Follow-up Probing Questions

- how important is the financial side?

- is it a unique social environment that allowed this to develop?

Why is a space like this important?

E.g., Follow-up Probing Questions

- What makes it stand out in the community?

- What do you think the intrinsic value of Music Box Village is to New Orleans?

Who was the artistic influence on this project?

E.g., Follow-up Probing Questions

- What helped shape the vision for Music Box Village

- Who were some of the artists and/or thinkers that you were inspired by?

What philosophies helped shape it?

Does a space like this help coalesce a community?

e.g., Follow-up Probing Questions

- In what ways did you notice the space making connections, foreseen & unforeseen?

What does it do for community health?

E.g., Follow-up Probing Questions

- what would happen if something similar were to exist in other cities?

What do you like the most about this space? 273

What does this space represent to you?

What does a space like this do for musical development? Traditional versus experimental.

E.g., Follow-up Probing Questions

- How does Music Box Village change how we approach music education?

What do you dream beyond a space like this? What are some key next steps?

Political Supporters

What are the key factors that you think allow a place like this to exist?

E.g., Follow-up Probing Questions

- who were the supporters, naysayers, and what political structures helped it thrive?

Why did you support this project? Why was it important to you?

Does a space like this help heal a community? What does it do for community health?

What were some challenges you faced in supporting this project politically?

What do you like the most about this space?

How does The Music Box Village reflect the New Orleans community it serves?

What does this space represent to you?

What are some recommendations you might make to launch a similar project in another city?

What do you dream beyond a space like this? What are some key next steps?

Parents of Past Participants

What did you notice after your child spent some time at MBV? Any changes, transformations, developments?

Why is this space important for your community?

Would you call it music? How did your child make music on site? 274

What was your favourite part about the Music Box Village?

Least favourite part?

Were there any noticeable behavioral changes in your child that you could link back to

Music Box Village?

E.g., Follow-up Probing Questions

- Did you notice your child approaching music, collaboration, or problem

solving differently after spending time at Music Box Village?

Participant Student Surveys

Pre-Interview

Before having played in the Music Box Village, how would you describe it?

Do you have any prior musical experience?

What do you think about this musical space?

What sort of music do you enjoy listening to, or making?

What do you like (or dislike) about your school music classes, if applicable?

What do you like about structured play experiences?

What do you like about free play experiences?

Post-Interview

Now that you have played in the Music Box Village, how would you describe it?

What was different about this experience in making music, versus your classroom music education?

What musical house did you like the most, and why?

What musical house did you like the least, and why?

What did you notice happening around you, when your friends were playing? 275

E.g., Follow-up Probing Questions

- did you hear anything that caught your attention?

What was your fondest memory in playing here over the last few days (lasting impact)

Will you return to this space in the future to play with friends?

How did playing here change your perspective on music?

E.g., Follow-up Probing Questions

- What projects do you dream of now that you’ve experienced this unique space?

Did you feel happy when playing any of the musical houses?

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Appendix G: A Field Guide to Musical Architecture

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Appendix H: Survey Results

School Pre-Interviews

Q1. Before having played in the Music Box Village, how would you describe it?

Q2. Do you have any prior musical experience?

Q3. What do you think about this musical space?

Q4. What sort of music do you enjoy listening to, or making?

Q5. What do you like (or dislike) about your school music classes, if applicable?

Q6. What do you like about structured play experiences?

Q7. What do you like about free play experiences?

Q8. Anything else you’d like to add?

31/50 participants responded

Name Q1 Q2 Q3 Q4 Q5 Q6 Q7 Q8 Student 1 Very fun Yes, I play It’s very nice, I’m a big fan What I I mean I get to It’s really fun to [blank] viola it glows up in of Arianna dislike about play easy and do free play the night Grande it, is it’s way hard music too long Student 2 [blank] Yes! [blank] I like to listen They’re not Probably a lot EVERYTHING! I have a Violin, to Aviva and fun enough better than the mixed taste guitar, bass I like that other when it in music guitar, type of music comes to drums, safe…but safe singing is boring Student 3 It is awesome Yes Pretty good, I I like The drums It will be pretty You can do No! because I like guess listening to cool sometimes anything of how trumpets creative they were Student 4 Unique and Used to Very fun and Taylor Swift I don’t really I like the way I like them No thank fun, because play the educational and country dislike the they are smart because kids you they used violin program, but if the kids need might be bored, recycled I do like that exercise but not if they’re materials we do at a park different things every day Student 5 [blank] I have [blank] I like love I like guitar / I like them I like the swings No thanks never had songs and kid I hate drums because they any musical pop are fun, but I experience like phones before better Student 6 It is beautiful Yes! I think I love making I like it about * Like to play free Nothing and fun education! music! school music music and play else to add my own music Student 7 It looks like I rap, I [blank] I rap, I like I like the Yes, I like I like everything No I do not tv show sing! rap and teachers, but everything Moose making rap they are Village bossy 279

Student 8 A Yes but not [drew a star] Rap mostly, I like the What I like What I like [blank] masterpiece a lot, I’ve but I like round and about about free play is and a true played other music rhythm in structured play everything work of art drums the class is everyone does it the correct way Student 9 It is really lit Yes, I have I don’t know, I enjoy “the I dislike that I like that it is I like that it is [blank] prior haven’t been soviet onion it haven’t easy more fun experience there anthem” and taught me a flamingo full song Student 10 It is pretty Rap and [blank] Rap by nba I dislike the [blank] [blank] [blank] and looks like drum at young boy teacher a home home because they village are boss and talk too much Student 11 I wonder if drums [Blank] Hip hop and I don’t like It is really fun Good exercise I love video the village is rap music class games old b/c it is boring Student 12 A place the Yes I sing [blank] I like to listen I dislike the Everything Everything Anything make music in church to country teacher Student 13 I would I know how [blank] I like to listen The class I like I like to swing [blank] describe it as to sing to Ellsa was boring basketball a real village and it’s brown Student 14 Beautiful Yes Fun Making I like it [blank] I like to play and No music I want Student 15 A real village I know how [blank] Hip hop I like theatre I like I like everything [blank] and it’s to dance or p.e. structured play brown and sing because it’s fun and cool Student 16 It looks Yes [blank] country Nothing I like it I like everything No interesting because it is about it sir/ma’am and looks like fun a camp Student 17 It looks light I draw I [blank] I like to listen I like theatre I like I like everything [blank] full big sang I to young boy everything dance Student 18 No Yes It’s cool rap I like about I don’t know I can make songs No the music classes because of the drums Student 19 Nun Yes Nun Hip hop Nun Nun Yes No Student 20 Fun Yes Fun Old time road Love it Love it Free No Student 21 A place to Yes Good Star wars Nothing I don’t know A lot Noooo play music Student 22 A place with Yes in Don’t know Regular It is just hard I don’t know! It is a thing that I No! music music class music can play any instrument Student 23 Horrible yep Don’t know Don’t know I like that I don’t relly Its free play nope there even is [sic] like it a music class Student 24 It’s cool and Yes Its cool guitar I don’t go I don’t know I can do what I No!!! rusty that word want Student 25 I never went Yes I never went I like Korean I like that we Good I think they are no to Music Box music. I like get gummie good because Village making [sic]bears you can play any music on the music keyboard Student 26 Fun! Music! A little awesome Rock and Nothing, I That its fun There fun and nope Fun! raps love music everything awesome Student 27 No No No no No No No no Student 28 I think it has No I don’t know no No No No No lot of star Student 29 No No No no No No No no 280

Student 30 Amazing Of course IDK Darkness. I’m with the Everything Everything I was not Orchestral. students there! Pop. Student 31 Yes b/c it is No Is like a I listen to a I like the I like the I like to pay all Nope important basement beat noise thing that drumming the music you push it makes noise

SCHOOL POST INTERVIEWS

Q1. Now that you have played in the Music Box Village, how would you describe it?

Q2. What was different about this experience in making music, versus your classroom music

education?

Q3. What musical house did you like the most, and why?

Q4. What musical house did you like the least, and why?

Q5. What did you notice happening around you, when your friends were playing?

A) did you hear anything that caught your attention?

Q6. What was your fondest memory in playing here over the last few days (lasting impact)?

Q7. Will you return to this space in the future to play with friends?

Q8. How did playing here change your perspective on music?

A) What projects do you dream of now that you’ve experienced this unique space?

Q9. Did you feel happy when playing any of the musical houses?

Name Q1 Q2 Q3 Q4 Q5 Q5a Q6 Q7 Q8 Q8a Q9

Student 1 A musical At the I liked the I didn’t I noticed [blank] [blank] ThatI you [ [ and artistic village I drum like any noise and don’t can use [blank] [blank] place was able kitchen b/c the least movement know anything to play my to make what I favourite music want but instrument at school to play is I had to the drums play what I was ordered to Student 2 I like to Fun and I like the I like the I notice lots Yes I It was ItY I I play the loud kitchen kitchen of music hear drummin es changed project I felt drums music drum set playing g b/c I becaus it be doing happy 281

b/c I can b/c it is drummin like to e it is playing is when I make a loud g drum fun loud drumm was good beat music ing playing the kitchen drum set. I had so much fun Student 3 Fun, loud, Music Horn loud Nothing A lot of swing playing MusicY is yEes! playful box is and noise es! loud Everyt loud nothing hing Student 4 I would Is that The DJ b/c None of A lot of horns drums Thatm you VAery describe it you play you make the music aybe can learn drum very as a play instrume your own instrumen what to project happy you love nts music ts were play bad Student 5 It is nice I don’t The house The fans The drum no They ItY didn’t non thing know with the (Chateau set were fun es change Nothin swing Poulet) g Student 6 I can make There is a The junk The [blank] No It was II will YesW music out lot of drum kit. I swing awesome actuall start to When of anything music can make because I to make y don’t make my you with pots, beats with could not music know own can pans, things I make with MBV if I record anything. never used. much anything can the Even music it will be music your with it. the 3rd that body. day you’ve made Student 7 I played the Do what The trash None Nobody did Yes last Ity did Y[ es bucket you want house b/c it not right houses es [blank] drum was fun Student 8 It was fun The I liked the I liked all Nobody Yes the I liked the IY didn’t YesI differenc one that of them tried to start house first day es if know want to e is you was tall a fight with b/c we there there try to can and up and strings on got to are were so build actually talked like the stairs explore more many more do what a chicken [Porch around field vibrating own you want [Chateau Life] had trips sounds music instead of Poulet?] a lot of machin doing sound e orders Student 9 I would The You drum I like the I noticed all The My YouN can YesA describe differenc on cans drum of my string fondest o or make piano MVB as e is that kitchen friends house memory probab anything in a noise there are b/c it were with the is the ly you want room instrume feels like playing fans drum nts made you are in drums caught circle from a band my [Corey] cans attention [Chateau Poulet] Student 10 I would The Music Music Music and No I Nothing [blank]M [blank][ describe it different house one house two sounds didn’t really aybe [blank] as a music part was because because it b\c it’s play house that it it’s fun and doesn’t fun was rusty you can really and old create sound as and it sound. good. was cool Student 11 It’s unique It was The house I liked I noticed a The Swinging IP used to Yes!T and a fun more with the them all little song string on the ossibly think you To experience open- string b/c they being made railing white tent . had to show to learn minded railing were all [Porch rope. It make others music and fun [Porch awesome! Life] changed music this than Life] and I can’t being my with amazin staying in the even played perspecti instrumen g park 282

a Swinging decide if ve on ts, but I classroo Chair any of swings. now m [Dipthimb them are know that olina] b/c it bad. you don’t was the most unique experience to me Student 12 I would Music I liked the I didn’t I noticed The My MyI I It felt describe Box was tent around like the everyone kitchen fondest definit perspecti would terrific! MBV as an more fun, the rope rope was happy was full memory ely ve has like to educational b/c you [Dipthimb house with of was when will changed, make place, but could do olina] b/c it [Chateau everything different everyone b/c it I learned someth also fun. what you went really Poulet] sounds in fourth is fun that ing want and fast b/c it only and it grade was and literally with all when you had four was made playing free anything of the want, but ropes with real can be sounds school is kitchen music combin more supplies ed education al. Student 13 One of the In MBV I liked the I liked the I noticed No not My IY used to I want Yes, I most fun there house with telephone lots of cool really fondest es, I think that to did places I’ve aren’t as the booth the sounds memory will I could create been many swinging least b/c I around me is playing only a band rules as bench and could do all of the make at school bells only one different music in music [Dipthumb thing instrumen with alina] ts expensive because I shiny could do instrumen the most ts, now I things know that I can create them Student 14 It was very You I liked the All the That they Swing I can still ChangedY treehou Yes! fun could white musical were had a remember es by se with play swing houses making thing on the first playing musica different [Dipthumb were my different it that if day we regular l instrume alina] b/c it favourite sounds to you hit it, arrived, instrumen instrum nts than plays make music made and I was ts vs. ents viola or music sound making a when in inside, other while bunch of MBV like musical you’re noise, and cello or instrume swinging gave someth nts (they had myself a ing bells on it) headache! Student 15 It was cool There The wind The bell Lots of no none Byy being All Yes was type of type, b/c musical es all project different musical there’s houses creative s musical house not much making stuff [Chateau] inside music by there and b/c it my friends music makes some kind of alien noise Student 16 That you In my Kitchen n/a That they Yes it [blank] Thaty The Yes I can make classroo and trash almost was the es music kitchen like the one music m, we know how kitchen have all , b/c kitchen only play to play types of almost house 3 drums feelings the instrume same nts drum that you play at home 283

Student 17 The MBV I wanted I like the I like the I noticed yes I play the TheY II feel was fun to make drumming drummin me and my drums es music dream happy swing b/c it g and the friends was fun about b/c I that make makes thing that played the the play the music noises you push drums and drumm drums that it made me ing makes happy sound b/c they make noise