Through an innovative partnership, the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, Chicago Children’s Theatre, and singer–songwriter Natalie Merchant have produced Cabinet of Wonder, a labor of love several years in the making.
The series features 16 music videos, a cast of 24 child actors, 27 musicians, a magic cabinet, elaborate costumes and sets, and shadow puppetry created by the Chicago-based performance collective Manual Cinema for the enrichment of prekindergarten and kindergarten children, and as a useful resource for their caregivers and teachers.
An introduction to music, poetry, and the dramatic arts for young audiences, Cabinet of Wonder reimagines Mother Goose and her rhymes with modern interpretations of the classic child-centered canon.
In the series, Merchant plays a dual role: a modern-day fun and friendly librarian–teacher figure named Miss Natalie, who has a passion for nursery rhymes; and an eighteenth-century–fashioned Mother Goose, who introduces children, through song and dance, to the characters in her rhymes.
Children visit Miss Natalie and are transported by her stories, rhymes, and big blue cabinet, which houses a secret shadow puppet theater behind its doors. This Cabinet of Wonder serves as a portal through which children both view and become the inhabitants of Rhyming Town in The Land of Make-Believe.
Cabinet of Wonder was inspired and informed by Merchant’s three years as artist-in-residence with a Head Start program in upstate New York, where she volunteered several days a week in the classroom with more than 400 preschool children. Consequently, she uses familiar teaching techniques on screen, such as circle time, show & tell, pantomime, and choral speaking. With creative modeling, the videos feature self-structured play with turn-taking, circle, partner, and line dancing, and graceful bows and curtsies.
Cabinet of Wonder also offers an introduction to orchestral music. All four families of the symphony are represented: strings, woodwinds, brass, and percussion, along with piano, acoustic guitar, and drums. Children tune their ears to the organic sounds of these instruments arranged with deliberate simplicity specifically for them. There are as many different styles of music in the Cabinet of Wonder repertoire as there are songs.
In addition, Cabinet of Wonder provides suggestions for classroom activities for children, teachers, and parents by early childhood education specialists and arts educators. All materials are freely available through a dedicated, interactive website.
A white paper, from The TMW Center for Early Learning + Public Health at The University of Chicago, details the scientific evidence supporting the developmental benefits of Cabinet of Wonder. For more information about the series and accompanying resources, contact Cabinet of Wonder at cabinetofwondermg@gmail.com.