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P A N P I P E S Summer 2020 13 A World of Music For further information about the Antonin Dvořák Memorial in Zlonice, visit: http://www.antonin-dvorak.cz/en/zlonice Turkey River I photographed the 1923 monument to him and later climbed the church steps to see the organ (still in use). In his former second-story residence is the small Dvořák museum where I saw one special photo taken in Vysoká u Příbrami. It is an autographed picture of the town's most celebrated summer resident sitting on a bench outside Villa Rusalka with several pigeons close by on the ground. Looking at this gi Otakar had sent, I never dreamed I'd soon have my own connections with him: a photograph of me with two of his grandsons at Vysoká u Příbrami and a copy of his biography with their signatures. Four months aer being with these great-grandsons, I returned to Prague where my granddaughter was studying. e day aer I arrived friends drove me to Zlonice, another Dvořák memorial site where I met my expert guide, Jana Tumova, who is in charge of operations there. She explained that there was no German taught in the school in Nelazoheves, so perhaps12-year-old Antonin was sent about fieen kilometers away to Zlonice to learn the language in order to converse with customers in his father's butcher shop. He lived with his maternal uncle and his wife who took care of "little Dvořák" for eighteen months. e German teacher, Antonin Liehmann, was the school's music teacher and local organist. Recognizing his new student's musical talent on the violin, he began teaching him to play the piano and later the organ. Dvořák and Liehmann's daughter Terinka were about the same age and became sweethearts. It was Liehmann who convinced Dvořák's father to send his son for further musical study in Prague. Located in a former old people's residence, the Dvořák exhibits are in two rooms—one a large room also featuring other prominent local individuals and a smaller room devoted exclusively to the composer. Interesting items there include a large wooden jewelry box (a wedding gi from Czech philanthropist Josef Hlávky), the headboard of Dvořák's deathbed, and a smoking set with buffalo horns — all three gis from Dvořák's son Otakar who visited this memorial only five days before his death in 1961. Although he lost, Dvořák entered his 1865 Symphony No. 1 in C minor (e Bells of Zlonice) in a German competition. For the rest of his life, he thought his manuscript was lost. Actually, Rudolf Dvořák (no relation) had found it in a secondhand bookshop in 1882 but kept this a secret. us sadly Dvořák never heard his first symphony performed! It premiered in Brno, Czech Republic in 1936. ere are also references to Zlonice in Dvořák's opera Jakobin in which two of the characters are Benda, the schoolmaster and choirmaster, and his daughter, Terinka. A bust of Dvořák is outside the adjacent building, Liehmann's flat where the composer spent a lot of time. On a music stand is a polka that Dvořák and Liehmann composed together. Even without original furnishings, I liked being in the music studio. In Prague the next day, I returned for the third time to Villa Amerika to see the special exhibit, e Guilty Pleasures of Antonin Dvořák, which features a collection of items from his personal estate: porcelain pipes, nine pins, Terinka's cookbook, and a deck of darda cards, plus instructions for playing the game. Although he never gambled for money, he sometimes played for matches or buttons, but I didn't see any on display. Jayne I. Hanlin is an initiate of Alpha Omicron and current member of the St. Louis Alumnae chapter. Mrs. Hanlin, the sister of famed pianist Malcolm Frager, is the co-author of Learning Latin Through Mythology (Cambridge University Press, 1991). NEW ZEALAND continued from page 9 When students reach secondary school/college (high school), there are band, orchestra, and choir classes. Many students will then move away from individual lessons, as their school or the Ministry of Education (like the Department of Education in the U.S.) provides paid lessons for them. Some private schools, however, do not have enough teachers who can teach all of the instruments or the schools are not funded in the same way, and that is where I come (back) in. In the last three years of school, students take NCEA classes. You could compare them to AP classes, except every student takes them and if you take the class, you have to take the exam at the end of the year. NCEA music is an elective, but at the end of the year, those who take the class have to take a theory-based exam. A few months before that, you have to perform two songs in a recital. To prepare for these, students take private lessons. At one of the schools I go to, the school pays me to teach two students in that class so they get the one-on-one instruction that their teacher cannot provide during school hours. Another thing that I have found very refreshing here is how enthusiastic school administrators and teachers are to have students take lessons. I pull them out of class during regular school hours for 20 or 30 minutes, and principals encourage it because they understand the benefits of a well-rounded education that includes a love and appreciation for music. One of the principals even plays piano for the students to sing along to during his school assembly every week. Lastly, and probably the most important difference I see between teaching here and there, is the students' attitudes. In New Zealand, everything moves a bit slower and kids are encouraged to try many things to see what they like and what they excel in. More than anything, my students' parents tell me that they want their children to enjoy making music. ey enroll them in lessons because they see the passion that students have for music and want to encourage them to see where that passion leads. Children tell their parents if they are interested and the parents reach out. And when they decide it's not for them, we leave it alone. Kiwis are pretty laid-back people, and I've grown to love that about them. Aside from that, though, teaching music here is very similar to teaching in the U.S. It has its ups and down, but I absolutely love it, and I'm incredibly happy to be doing what I do where I'm doing it. Now if I could just get the hang of driving on the wrong side of the road... Erin Grigson lives in Canterbury, New Zealand where she manages and teaches for the New Zealand Modern School of Music. She was an initiate of the Delta Omega Chapter at the University of Kentucky and later joined the Lexington Alumnae Chapter.

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