Dick Mason

The Observer

Nine years ago Chris Gragg, a Portland high school teacher, could not contain his enthusiasm.

Unfortunately his students could contain theirs.

Gragg was starting his career as a teacher of English and writing at Reynolds High School. He was doing what he loved.

"Everything was almost perfect. I was being paid to write and teach writing, something I would be doing anyway,” said Gragg, who spoke at EOU Saturday at a student writing workshop. "Every once in a while, though, I thought I was just a bit more excited than my students were. I was getting the feeling that my students were just a little bit bored by it all.”

Gragg wanted the writing bug to hit his students but it seemed like most were vaccinated against it

Then he introduced something that removed all immunity music.

More specifically the study of the poetry of song lyrics.

"I urged them to pay closer attention to words when they were listening to music outside of class. What they began to notice was that many of the popular songs they were hearing through the mainstream media lacked the level of depth and meaning the students craved,” Gragg said.

He suggested that his students might be able to write better lyrics than some of the songs they heard on the radio.

Some wondered what sense there would be in writing lyrics if there is no music for them, so Gragg’s students answered their own question by making a CD. The students become producers, recruiting musicians and an engineer to help them make a recording.

An annual CD production, part of the Reynolds High School Deep Roots Project, has become a chart-topping hit at the high school. It has also infected students with the writing bug for life.

For openers there is Ken, who was a Reynolds student in the late 1990s and once greeted Gragg with an unflinching demand. "He said, ‘I like to read but don’t ever ask me to write anything.’ ”

Gragg did not comply with his request. "I made him write.” And in the process changed the student’s life.

The corner was turned the day Gragg told Ken that a set of lyrics he had written had been chosen for the Deep Roots Project CD. The message was received with more than a smile.

"He was walking on air,” Gragg said.

Today Ken continues to write skillfully and passionately. Gragg read a letter he received from Ken who was in Afghanistan as a member of the Marine Corps. He talked of his ship journey to Afghanistan, writing of "black velvet waves” and "Poseidon’s breath.”

Gragg teamed with professional Portland writer John Henry Bourke to give the keynote address for Saturday’s Oregon Writing Project at the Eastern Student Writer’s Workshop. More than 150 young people in grades 3 to 12 from throughout Northeast Oregon attended the workshop.

Bourke urged students to do what he has and follow their passion. Bourke said he grew up in a family in which his father and all three of his brothers became accountants or entered finance. Writing for a living was frowned upon so Bourke did not pursue this career path initially. Instead he began working in sales.

"It was a good job but I was miserable. I didn’t like selling something I didn’t care about to someone who didn’t want it,” Bourke said.

He listened to his heart and became a professional writer and musician, and today has 10 CDs to his credit and a movie screenplay.

Bourke encouraged those in his audience to write about those things they feel passionate about. Doing so reveals the common threads people share.

"If you speak from the heart maybe we can see not only differences, but what keeps us together,” Bourke said.

Do not let yourself get discouraged if you don’t meet your expectations initially, Bourke said. Writers are crafted, not born.

"There was a time when Beethoven couldn’t play the piano, when Kobe Bryant could not make a lay up and Einstein couldn’t add 2 plus 2,” Bourke said.

He also encouraged the young writers to refrain from being discouraged even if people are not receptive to their message at first.

"Keep writing and you will find an audience,” Bourke said. "People will not always agree with you but they will respect you for saying what you have to say.”

He added that everyone has a message worth sharing.

"Most everyone has something important to say. Don’t let anyone tell you that you don’t. The world would be different without your voices. It wouldn’t be as interesting.” Bourke said. "You all have something to say. The world is waiting for you.”

The Oregon Writing Project workshop received support from EOU, the Wildhorse Foundation and from Pendleton Grain Growers.