LESSON EIGHT

Objective

Sing like no one can hear you





Example

We have an ancient karaoke machine that sits waiting to eat cassette tapes while you try to sing over the feedback. It served as my inspiration. "We'll have a sing along Friday night!" I announce. Isabel thinks this is great...everyone else thinks this is lame.
It takes me awhile to get the karaoke beast humming and then I hand over the mic to the kids so Liam can entertain us by screeching like a girl and making my eardrums wobble like jello while I scan the internet for free instrumentals. There are hundreds but I would recommend Karaoke Play.
It has a bunch of choices and songs for kids too.

Eventually...like all Americans looking for cheap entertainment, we drift over to youtube and find tons of songs...some recorded by people actually singing karaoke(avoid those). The little kids start off with Disney tunes, but since none of the songs use many of Liam's weekly sight words from kindergarten, and Isabel thinks every written word is either her name or something about Star Wars, the lyrics are completely manufactured by the children.
They sing about pigs, and Barbies, and cowboys, and cheese.
Fallon finds Lion King songs you can sing along with in Hebrew or Chinese. We try this. I suggest you do too. I love the image of a Jewish Zazu following Simba around spouting advice.
The kids get bored and begin to play with the mic...Liam does some really impressive beat boxing and I have to wonder how he is learning this on a midwestern small town playground.
Then I am alone with Fallon. In fifteen years I have never heard her sing out loud. She swears her voice is terrible and I have no way to address this statement since I haven't heard it. She sings air songs...her mouth moving and no sound coming out. I picture her with a piano player and silent words on a black screen. Karaoke is perfect for her. She can pretend to be singing and can see the words like little thought bubbles. I find show tunes and launch into warbly breathy versions of Phantom of the Opera songs. I am sad to realize that my voice like the rest of me has grown older, has grown dusty with disuse.

I think I am going to cry.

This is not very daddish of me.

It is Fallon, the silent singer that rescues me. She downloads "Karma Chameleon" by Boy George and wonder of wonders, sings with me, out loud. We both sound bad... I don't think anyone but Boy George can sing this well. We then plow through Grease and a few more before we have sung and giggled ourselves out.

I am amazed. My daughter and I have created a deeper bond by doing something she hates. She is a wonder to me, enjoying something she thinks she is terrible at, doing something she said she would never do...as a gift to me. She is braver than I am. She is a bigger person than I will ever be. Even an old Dad can learn new tricks.

Homework

Sing like no one can hear you.

Extra Credit

Out loud.