A Green Horn Blowing

From School Library Journal Grade 2-4?Music is the central theme of this memoir of growing up on a farm during the Great Depression. Music from the horn playing of a poor, black itinerant worker named John Potts brings joy and pleasure to a boy left to help his aunt with the hard work of planting and picking on her berry farm. After finding a trumpet-shaped gourd (John Potts calls it a "trombolia"), the boy learns, with mighty effort, to make sounds and form notes through the hollow stem. "All it takes to play a horn," says Potts, "is a whole lifetime." Eventually the gourd returns to seed, the berry planting is done, and the drifters, like Mr. Potts, move on. The boy finds and follows the "trombolia" vine to the barn where Mr. Potts's trumpet has been left for him to find and keep. Realistic full-page illustrations in soft pastels are balanced by ivory colored pages with clear, well-spaced text framed by a delicate border line. The measured pace of picture and text fits well with the dreamlike memory of a magical childhood moment. The message of the tale is that music can create beauty in any place, even in times of great hardship and is worth the lifelong effort it sometimes requires.?Shirley Wilton, Ocean County College, Toms River, NJCopyright 1997 Reed Business Information, Inc. About the Author David F. Birchman lives in Thousand Oaks, California.Thomas B. Allen is the author of numerous history books, including