What Colour Is the Wind

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A young lad called Paddy sang it in front of the whole school. He had that strength in character which meant kids respected him, rather than sniggered at him. He did a great job, but then I buried the song for a long time. Following the album's success in Ireland, Landsborough appeared on several TV shows in the UK. Since then, he has released ten additional albums, including originals, greatest hits and double CDs of previous releases. Overall, sales of his albums have exceeded 700,000 units. He also has had two number ones singles in the Irish pop chart, and several of his albums have topped the British country charts. In 1996, he converted to Catholicism. [3] The Kirkus review journal said that this book was, “ ‘The blind men and the elephant’ reworked into a Zen koan” and then proceeded to recommend it for 9-11 year-olds and adults. I'm fairly certain I disagree with almost every part of that. Now here’s the funny part. I didn’t read this review before I read the book. I also didn’t read the press release that was sent to me with it. When I read a book I like to be surprised by it in some way. This is usually a good thing, but once in a while I can be a bit dense and miss the bigger picture. As I mentioned before, I completely missed the fact that this book was an answer to a blind child who had asked Anne Herbauts the titular question. I just thought it was cool that the book was so much fun to touch. Embossing, debossing, die-cuts, lamination, and all kinds of surfaces give the book the elements that make it really pop. As I read it in the lunchroom at work, my co-workers would peer over my shoulders to coo at what they saw. All well and good, but would a kid be interested too? Kirkus says they'd have to be at least nine to grasp its subtleties. Despite having performed since he was a teenager, his big break didn't happen until he was in his 50s, when after appearances on Pat Kenny on RTE and The Gerry Anderson Show on the BBC, What Colour Is the Wind reached number one in the Irish charts.

With plans to release a new album later this year, Charlie is certainly not contemplating retirement and he's optimistic that the Landsborough name will carry on in musical circles for generations to come. I've a great band and crew and I couldn't not go on stage without singing What Colour is the Wind and My Forever Friend, together with a few older songs we've resurrected and some covers thrown in. So hopefully people will enjoy it." I also think this is a great book for adolescents and adults in that it reminds them/us that even when we think we've figured out a concept like love and acceptance, there may be more to learn and maybe what we understand now isn't the "true" understanding. What is essential is invisible to the eye,” Antoine de Saint-Exupéry wrote in The Little Prince. Those bereft of vision, therefore, need not be bereft of the essential — they discern it by means other than sight.Far from having had a straightforward pathway into a musical career, Charlie has done his fair share of other jobs including working as a navvy on the railways, in a grocery store, in a flour mill, as a postman, a soldier and a primary school teacher. But all the time his dream of being a professional singer refused to go away.

A blind child asks what color the wind is. He gets different answers from those he asks. The wolf says the wind is “the dark smell of the forest.” The bees say the wind is “the color of sunshine.” The rain says nothing! But the bees say “the color of sunshine.” At the end the child reaches a giant who says that the wind is the color of all of these things. I think this little book is a bit of a wonder. Deeply appealing to children of all ages, to say nothing of the adults out there, with so many uses, and so many applications. It reminds me of the old picture books by Bruno Munari that weren’t afraid to try new things with the picture book format." —Elizabeth Bird, School Library Journal You're an artist who certainly hasn't had the success overnight, that's for sure. A lot of hard work has gone into you, and you've really had to work hard. What advice would you give a new budding writer? I would say to them be inspired by other people but strive to be your own person. Musically, it's great to take sort of influences from here, there, and everywhere; everybody's done it, me included; but then to strive to find something uniquely your own is all I'm used to; I used to admire, say, Dylan and the Beatles and all these wonderful writers, but then you think, Oh, I'm just Charlie . I'm not that, so I would say strive to be your own person. Musically, don't be put off by rejection because everybody's rejected me many times, but even people as great as Elvis Presley and the Beatles were rejected, so don't be disheartened by that, be yourself, don't lose her, and put a bit of faith in the man upstairs. Charlie Thank you so much for joining us. We wish you the very best for the year coming. I might look like that, and one of the lads may join you. Then one of the lads, James, has years of experience as a fine acoustic guitar player and a fine singer in his own right, so I'm thinking of bringing them on board and having them do some harmonies with me. yeah Charlie What makes a good song? I think if you can write something that sort of everybody's experienced but put it in a new way so that whenever anybody hears it they think I know what he's talking about yeah and I think simplicity is the most difficult thing to achieve I mean you listen to wonderful songs like say smile for example hardly any lyrics there but it's everything that needs to be said is said in that short space and the accompany that with a wonderful melody and I think that's it now live on forever so my aspiration is to write something that good that people will want to sing you know under do each time a song yeah but it's very difficult to to categorize exactly what's going to work and what's nothing oh yeah so did The illustrations are enchanting, worth touching, too, for their textured surfaces. Readers will like the surprise ending where the little boy feels the wind and learns its color." — The Vermont Country SamplerHe left school early and worked intermittently as an apprentice telephone engineer, on the railways, and in the flour mills before joining the army. He left after four years, in the early 1960s, and joined a group, The Chicago Sect, in Dortmund, Germany. Returning to England, he married, played in local bands, and worked in a variety of jobs before becoming a teacher [1] at Portland Primary School on Laird street, Birkenhead. A newly married Charlie eventually decided it was time to settle down and he went on to qualify as a teacher in 1978, spending his spare time songwriting. He often wrote songs for the children to sing at assembly, including one of his biggest hits My Forever Friend. I was a grocery store manager railways flour mills you name it and lastly I was a teacher for 14 years but the dream was always a musical long really you ready teach you for 14 years I was is this in Birkenhead yeah in the same area where I lived and it was funny that must have been fun well if part of it was and part of it I mean I was so glad to leave people had this misconception that you were having a wonderful time and it must have been a real you know strain to pull away from it yeah I was so delighted when the Irish people rescued me it was it was so stressful but at the same time it had wonderful aspects to it and I used to get requests in the playground they said me mom said will you play crazy for a tonight in the pub so everybody knew what it would wear me how it really lay but I haven't said that I met wonderful kids and wonderful staff who were still friends now that's brilliant are you still in you're still based in Birkenhead value I am yet although even Peter Lindbergh and a

Obviously my 5-year-old daughter likes the book but she’s just one kid. She is not a representative for her species (so to speak). That said, this book just drills home the advantage that physical books have over their electronic counterparts: the sensation of touch. Play with a screen all day if you like, but you will never be able to move your fingers over these raised dots of rain or the rough bark of a tree’s trunk. As children become more immersed in the electronic, they become more enamored of tactile books. The sensation of paper on skin has yet to be replicated by our smooth as silk screens. And this will prove true with kids on the younger end of the scale. I'll agree with Kirkus about the adult designation, though. When I worked for New York Public Library there was a group of special needs adults that would come in that were in need of tactile picture books. We would be asked if we had any on hand that we could hand over to them in some way. There were a few, but our holdings were pretty limited (though I do remember a particularly keen tactile version of The Very Hungry Caterpillar that proved to be a big hit). Those kids would have loved this book, but children of all ages, and all abilities, would feel the same way about it. Kids are never too old for tactile picture books. As such, you could use this book with Kindergartners as well as fifth graders. Little kids will like the fun pictures. Older kids may be inspired by the words as well.This book is the perfect example of an interactive picture book. Where the text--poetic and anaphoric--is beautiful in its own right, it is the illustrations where we gather further, more in-depth meaning. This book does not mention once that the little giant is blind, but the text asks us to ponder a question that those of us with sight think is an easy question to answer: what color is the wind? We know that the wind does not have a color, not really--but to someone who has a different way of navigating his world, this is not straightforward. We must rely on other senses. When the bees say the wind is the color of sunshine, we can assume that it's artistic in that sunshine also doesn't really have a color, but it also evokes a sense of warmth, the reminder of summer, the ability to relax. Here, look at it, even for 30 seconds and see some of it and see what I mean (and even read a full review from Popova:

We were doing a school assembly on the theme of friendship, so I thought I'd write a song for it. My sister Joyce, who is one of those soppy individuals who tells you she loves you when it's not even your birthday, once sent me a card signed 'To Charlie, my forever friend'. I thought that was a great title and used the song to express my own faith. For 22 years I just played in the pubs and clubs and never said a word. Just to lighten it up I started to tell little stories between the songs. I wasn't really aware of how important that was until a fellow from Derbyshire came to me afterwards and said, 'You were grand tonight lad, but I'm a bit disappointed because you hardly told any stories and that's all I came for'. So it's become an important part of the show. I think it gives people an insight into your character."While this thought-provoking story might go over the heads of some little ones, the offbeat questions, beautiful artwork, and unique multi-sensory approach will be simply enchanting for creative-minded children." — Booklist With that, because I'd never been a child in real life, he said, No, dad, you're number two. I was number one the following week and all of Ireland went out and bought that song so I'm eternally grateful to the artist people because if it wasn't for them I wouldn't be here what's for the future Charlie well I never looked too far ahead you know you've just celebrated your birthday I have do you dare want to tell us well I'll tell you I'm 69 years of age and I still feel like 69 years you know you look good freshness Velma well, she's delighted because for years while I was playing in the pub, she was shattered in the house mind and the kids in the dog and everything, and as this success arrived late, all the kids had grown, so now we'd yet set round the world, you know, doing My oldest grandson, Charlie, is 17. He was surfing in Cornwall all last week and has a surfing type hairstyle. I'm delighted he's taken up the guitar again as he's very talented so hopefully the musical thread will carry on." One song in particular was to transform his life. What Colour is the Wind tells the story of a young blind child’s attempts to envision the world. The richness of that otherness is what Belgian artist and author Anne Herbauts came to see in a surprising and profound question from a blind child. During a bookmaking workshop she was leading, a little boy asked her whether she, as an artist, could tell him what color the wind was — a notion of the same trans-sensory, synesthetic quality as Helen Keller’s electrifying account of “hearing” Beethoven.