Piece Comment

Review of Airplane Safety or How to Teach Pre-Schoolers About Death


Strange, beautiful, disturbing, real, eerie - all words that come to mind after listening to this piece. You should listen, just to hear the play with sound and form. You'd probably drive some of your listeners off the road if your station aired it during drive time... but they'd all be thinking, and drive time doesn't often make me really think very often these days.
I am not entirely sure I can describe this piece - I THINK it's all one man's voice - real or fiction I am not sure and it does not much matter. The story is about a pre school class, and a young student teacher. I would give it away and fail to do justice to the narrative if I tell you what happens, but basically the story is about children grappling with death, and their teachers trying to figure out how to manage, lead, deal with discussing death with little kids. The stuff about the kids and how they talk rings true to me, as a mom and as a person who has spent a decent amount of time listening to and recording little kids talk. The piece really held me, confused and happy, until the dream stuff just seemed a little but too pat and tight. And I wasn't crazy about the host's tone at the end, which landed the piece on an overly ironic tone, and irony was not the tone I was hearing or feeling.
Provocative and innovative use of sound, music, spoken word. Again, worth listening to. I want to know what other people think.