Friday’s (Nov. 6) student assembly at Banff Elementary School was the place to be for a dose of fun and empowerment, as Banff’s own Mandi Kujawa shared with students her debut children’s book Jacqueline The Singing Crow.
The colourful and heartfelt book published by Renegade Arts Entertainment tells the tale of a crow called Jacqueline who lives to sing. After a bruising encounter with opinionated people that crushes her confidence and self-belief, Jacqueline flies south to escape the pain and rediscover her true self.
“It warms my heart, it’s huge to have the love of these kids,” Kujawa said after the reading. “One of the things that I love is I was told I couldn’t sing in tune when I was a kid and I kept singing anyway.
“Now I’m so lucky because I get to do a choir program with these kids and I will never tell a kid to mouth the words or that they can’t sing in tune – it’s just a way to return the love I have for music back to these kids in a gentle and inclusive way.”
The idea for the story formulated with the simple fact crows are ubiquitous within the Bow Valley, and have the natural ability, for better or worse, to let everyone around them know they are present when they wish to thanks to their confident cawing.
“Sometimes they’re reviled, but with another set of eyes they can be seen as just fabulous birds and smart, so I made up a little story that was just going to be one of those stories that I made up at the moment at the Banff Public Library. Then one of the mothers said, ‘I’ll never look at crows the same way again,’ and I said ‘OK that’s important,’ ” Kujawa said.
“I just think in life when we can get perspective change, a paradigm shift, and see things in a different way, that’s good and useful. Then I started reading more about crows and then got this idea for a voice and then I realized that was my story – my story was I was told I couldn’t sing and I just did anyway because I loved it.”
Kujawa worked with The Banff Centre’s Richard Armstrong to help strengthen her voice, and to continue her journey towards a true passion and love for singing.
“He’s a magician at helping wounded people with wounded voices recover their voice, so then it was this magical thing of humans looking at crows in a different way and of this crow learning to look at herself in a different way and that she’s amazing,” Kujawa said.
“The final message is take another look, you’re amazing, all we need are the right eyes and we can see that the person in front of us is amazing.
Visit, www.renegadeartsentertainment.com/jacqueline, where you can watch and listen to Kujawa perform Jacqueline’s song.
Jacqueline The Crow is available at Banff Elementary School, The Fairmont Banff Springs Hotel Gallery, Indigo Books, and Whyte Museum and Café Books and Bow Valley Basics in Canmore. The book retails for $14.99 hard copy, or $4.99 for a digital copy available at Renegade’s website.
