Monday, October 25, 2021
John Bunnell Tribute 10/25/21
Martie Barylick
Mr. Bunnell was my music teacher at Madison High School for 3 years. I flourished in the artistic culture that he created. There was something magic about working with like-minded people for the common good, which might have been a half-time show or a choral concert or singing at a nursing home or building a large tree or arranging a Chopin piano piece for orchestra. He himself had something magic, which was his bedrock confidence that we would all GET BETTER at all the stuff he let us try. He was the embodiment of hope.
For me in particular, well, he actually set up my life for me. In the spring of Junior year he stopped me in the hallway and said “We’re thinking of doing The Music Man next year. Do you want to choreograph it?” I gulped and said, “Um sure.”
That question and the permission it granted changed my life, with the result that I spent that life in high school, giving every student I met permission to create dances. My colleagues and I created a performing arts program whose culture of confidence and hope has served kids and that community for going on fifty years. As a public-school dance teacher, I spent 40 years trying to become John Bunnell—with that vast patience of his, his conviction that having fun was a legitimate way to learn, that finely-honed combination of deep seriousness and deep silliness, and his unmatched musical expertise! Mr. Bunnell was a rarity--a fine musician who was also a master teacher. Inspired by him I strove to be a fine dancer/choreographer who was also a master teacher. Thus, “Mr. Bunnell-ness” was later handed over to hundreds of my graduate students in dance education at Rutgers and NYU. “Mr. B” SO STILL LIVES.
People flourish in their professions because they have loving support systems. To Mr. Bunnell’s wonderful family, I say thank you.
