Thousands of students ready to rock out with Chris Hadfield
Spaceman stays grounded for Music Monday in Canada
Astronaut Chris Hadfield didn’t let being in outer space stop him from celebrating Music Monday last year.
The event to highlight the importance of music education saw Hadfield, the Barenaked Ladies and the Wexford Gleeks sing the Hadfield/ Ed Robertson song “Is Somebody Singing” (ISS).
More than 700,000 students across Canada joined in.
Music Monday celebrates its 10th anniversary Monday with a recre- ation, on Earth of the simultaneous participation of students, teachers, musicians and parents across Canada that was so successful last year.
Hadfield (who cheekily chose the title ISS to be the same initials as the International Space Station) will be in Edmonton this year for the event, which will be live nationwide.
“The beauty of it is using technology to join voices together,” says Hadfield, who studied trombone in school but is known more for his guitar skills. He played in the school stage band and played with fellow astronauts both in Houston and Russia.
He calls music “a human necessity” and said he wrote the words and Robertson the music for a song designed “to raise kids’ voices together.” Afan of the Barenaked Ladies, Hadfield invited them to the space centre in Houston years ago when they were on tour. “I’ve stayed in touch with them ever since,” he says. Music Monday is the signature program of the Coalition for Music Education and involves students in every part of the country. The live webcast links events in St. John’s N.L., Halifax, N.S., Charlottetown, P.E.I., Edmonton, Alta., Whitehorse, Yukon, Ottawa, Ont., Montreal, Que. and Vancouver, B.C. It runs from 12-1 p.m. and is broadcast on MusicMonday.ca At Toronto’s Science Centre, members of Chris Hadfield Public School will join singer-songwriter Justin Hines and the Supertonic Barber Shop Quartet for the midday singalong. In Mississauga, 2,500 students will sing “Is Somebody Singing” in the Music Monday program and launch the City’s Rebel14 youth campaign happening until May 7. The video conferencing and webcast technology are provided by the Centre for Distance Learning and Innovation (Newfoundland and Labrador Department of Education) and Memorial University’s Distance Education, Learning and Teaching Support (delts.mun.ca)