An Elementary Lesson in Classical Music

Montpelier Elementary School fourth-graders Mojisola Ogunbode, from left, Tamira Johnson, Cavalo Milfort and Kayla Brown enjoy a game in the Kennedy Center before seeing the National Symphony Orchestra. Prince George's County has sent all of its fourth-graders to see concerts this week. (By Nikki Kahn -- The Washington Post)
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As the short pieces moved from the baroque sound of Handel's "Royal Fireworks" to the bouncing rhythms of Beethoven's Symphony No. 7 to more modern excerpts from the video game EverQuest II and a piece from a Harry Potter film, the students responded in a variety of ways, most of them somewhat unorthodox in the often solemn world of symphonic music.

Some nodded their heads or even gyrated in time with the beat. One boy used his black-and-gold jacket as a blanket and curled up to sleep. A girl covered her ears when the orchestra started blasting a Wagner opera. A pair of boys imitated de Cou, waving their hands like conductors. Another girl slouched farther and farther into her seat as the concert went on, until she was nearly horizontal. A couple of times, the students applauded before a piece was finished.

For all that, though, most of the students paid rapt attention.

"I thought it was extraordinary," said Janice White, a teacher at Thomas Stone Elementary School. "Our kids don't have the opportunity to do things like this."

Her students were stampeding for the waiting buses, but she called a pair of them back to ask what they thought.

The musical tastes of Oscar Ruiz, 10, ran more toward the rap of 50 Cent, but he thought the concert was "pretty great," especially the section where they showed excerpts from EverQuest II while playing a song from the game.

Alexis Garcia, 10, loved the concert unconditionally.

"It was great when they played the drums and the trumpets," he said. Asked how the music made him feel inside, he paused for a moment before answering: "Happy."