Assembly celebrates diversity in song

Band pushes anti-bullying message

By: Bill Greenwood
   The gymnasium at Monmouth Junction School was filled to the brim with rambunctious youngsters Tuesday.
   Excited to be out their classrooms, they chatted loudly, played patty-cake and inquisitively eyed the set-up before them. Drums of all shapes, sizes and colors littered the front of the room, with one resembling oversized bongos and another consisting of what looked like three bass drums stacked on top of each other.
   The teachers in attendance all held up a peace sign with their fingers, and the audience settled down for a quick speech from Principal Maribeth Edmunds. However, the energy in the room would soon reach a fever pitch, as Chet Doboe, of the percussion ensemble Hip Pickles, burst out from the back of the room pounding away at a mid-sized hand drum suspended from a strap wrapped around his shoulders. As he made his way to the front of the room, he was joined by fellow Pickle Jeremy Fischer, who complemented his beat.
   The Pickles’ performance, however, wasn’t all fun and games. The event was part of the bullying section of Violence Prevention Week, which began Monday and will end Friday, according to Kim Schreiber, who coordinated the event and is vice president of programs for the PTA. To get the anti-bullying message across, the group used the diversity of their instruments as a metaphor for the diversity of the student body.
   "I loved the analogy," student assistance counselor Lynne Weinstein said. "I happen to be a huge music lover, and I think music definitely soothes the savage beast. So, I thought that was a really good method of teaching a lesson to kids."
   "You need to treat others the way you want to be treated," Ms. Schreiber said. "Even though the instruments look different, sound different, when it comes together, it makes a beautiful thing, and that’s the ultimate goal. Everyone looks different, sounds different, dresses differently, but when you come together, you can work together."
   Hip Pickles, which is based in Uniondale, N.Y., and is now in its 20th year, brought drums from Africa, Cuba, Puerto Rico, America, Portugal, Poland, Europe and the Middle East as part of its show. Throughout the event, the group encouraged the audience to sing along and organized 13 teachers as well as Ms. Edmunds into an impromptu percussion band, which brought all the students to their feet as they clapped and danced along to their teachers’ musical number.
   "You’ve got to be a fool not to appreciate the magic of it because the kids love their teachers, and it’s all about connectivity," Mr. Doboe said. "We want to connect with the kids, and we hope they connect with us. And then the teachers, that’s probably the biggest connectivity of the whole act."
   "It looked like the kids had a great time," Ms. Schreiber said. "They were dancing, they were up and singing, they were laughing. I thought it was great."
   The group put on two performances for the school, the first for students in grades three through five, and the second for students in kindergarten through second grade. The latter performance was slightly more subdued but much more interactive, as the Pickles invited 15 to 20 children to come up and play the drums themselves, Ms. Schreiber said.
   "What’s great about drums is you can put percussion instruments in anyone’s hands and they can get it down and almost immediately make some kind of music," Mr. Doboe said.
   The assembly is not the only thing the school has been doing for Violence Prevention week, according to Ms. Weinstein. She said the school has been hosting read-aloud lessons focusing on the topics of bullying, anger and feelings for kindergarten through second-grade students. In addition, the school has designed a school showcase filled with books on bullying and conflict resolution that stands by the main entranceway and has asked a South Brunswick police officer to address third- and sixth-grade students on gun-violence awareness, bullying and school safety.
   As the Pickles brought its first performance to a close, the students began to file out, chatting loudly about everything they had just seen. Mr. Doboe and Mr. Fischer, both sweating from their enthusiastic performance, remained at the front of the gymnasium, setting up their various drums for a second go-round.
   "This school has a great energy, aura, vibe, whatever you want to call it," Mr. Doboe said. "It’s a cool school, and it’s really cool to be here. It makes work fun."