On 26 February a partnership between the children of the Focolare Movement (Gen 4) and the Forme Sonore Association brought about a workshop on composing children’s music, with about a hundred participants from various continents. Many reflections were collected from participants, as were the impressions of the teachers, Sabrina Simoni and Siro Merlo. This beautiful collaboration began in the summer of 2021 between Forme Sonore, an association that deals with music production and experimentation to encourage the growth of musical thought, and the Gen 4. It lead to a piece of music recorded by a small choir of children from Burundi. The opportunity to join forces and achieve something beautiful together rose once again on 26 February 26, the day in which the founders of Forme Sonore, teacher Sabrina Simoni (director of the ‘Mariele Ventre’ choir from Antoniano in Bologna, Italy, who plays a lead role in the annual Italian children’s ‘Zecchino d’oro’ event) and maestro Siro Merlo (an expert in writing children’s songs and artistic direction) held a beautiful workshop, organized and promoted by the Gen 4. It was aimed at those who understand music and work with children. It included a training session that was followed online by a hundred people from all continents. It focused on the composition of children’s music, not only from a technical point of view, but as a means to convey values such as sharing, unity, fraternity, care for others and nature. “When Valeria Bodnar, the Gen 4 assistant from Burundi, contacted us last August, we were deeply impressed by her enthusiasm,” Sabrina and Siro said. “We felt the same way on Saturday 26 February. The word that more than any other that describes it is ‘chorality’ – that intense feeling you get when, moved by sincere joy, you perform a song together with others. “The people who participated, in addition to being geographically very distant from each other, belong to remarkably different social and cultural spheres, yet the messages that reached us by the end of the workshop expressed similar views perfectly in harmony.” Filippo from Monopoli, Italy said: “This course has particularly revived my desire to compose something for our Gen 4. I learned that songs for our children must be simple, playful and make them feel free and happy to sing them.” There were many expressions of thanks. Ramia from the Ivory Coast wrote: “I understood that the song must be composed taking into account the psychology of children, the target audience that will interpret it, finding the best way to convey an emotion and the right rhythm to allow the child to sing without worries.” It was a real journey among notes, technique and passion, which revealed to participants how important it is to consider music as a “means and not as an end,” explain maestros Simoni and Merlo, “a vehicle that not only ‘transports’ content of various kinds (didactic, pedagogical, emotional or playful), but does so more quickly, directly and profoundly.” This moment of great sharing became a mutual gift. It left an important mandate for those who work in childcare and music: to grow and shape themselves more and more so they can accompany the children in this path of discovery where, as the teachers conclude, “music has a particularly powerful socializing energy that must be properly guided and channelled by competent teachers, animated by great passion, rich in empathy and sensitivity.”

Maria Grazia Berretta