Product Details

• Actors: Roberta Guaspari, Arnold Steinhardt, Isaac Stern, Itzhak Perlman, Deborah Meyer
• Directors: Allan Miller
• Producers: Allan Miller, Susan Kaplan, Walter Scheuer
• Format: Closed-captioned, Color, NTSC
• Language: English
• Rating: G (General Audience)
• Number of tapes: 1
• Studio: Walt Disney Video
• VHS Release Date: August 25, 1998
• Run Time: 77 minutes
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
• ASIN: 6304383800
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #148 in Video (See Bestsellers in Video)

  Popular in these categories: (What's this?)

  #1 in	Video > Documentary > History > American History & Culture
  #2 in	Video > Special Interests > History
  #12 in	Video > Kids & Family > Disney Home Video > By Age > 7-11 Years

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com
Arguably superior to the 1999 Miramax drama Music of the Heart starring Meryl Streep as violin teacher Roberta Guaspari, this Oscar-nominated documentary by Allan Miller has a focus and spirit the former lacks. Miller introduced audiences to Guaspari (who actually goes by Guaspari-Tzavaras) in 1995, drawing attention to the inspiring story of her youth music program in East Harlem. A divorced mother and dedicated instructor, Guaspari-Tzavaras offered instruction on the violin to the community's public schools before her position was eliminated from the budget in 1990. She responded by creating a nonprofit learning project so popular that kids of all ages could only get in via a lottery system. Small Wonders captures Guaspari-Tzavaras's extraordinary commitment to the program as she drags piles of violins from school to school, offers private lessons, gets tough with indifferent parents, and conducts class after class of children who could make your ears bleed with their squawking fiddles. The results of her efforts have long been noted for boosting students' self-esteem and a sense of the possible, all the more so when Guaspari-Tzavaras brings her violin army to play the national anthem at a Knicks game and, even more improbably, organizes a benefit in which her charges jam with Isaac Stern and Itzhak Perlman. Miller captures the joys and agonies of learning, from the tyke who weeps at the thought of hard work to the adolescent who finds practicing the violin has helped her organize her life. All in all, this is a remarkable story and Guaspari-Tzavaras is an exciting subject. --Tom Keogh

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars If You Are An Educator, You Must See This Video!, October 7, 2000

By	Pepita Viola (Bedford, NH USA) - See all my reviews

Any educator with the hope and zest for teaching the impossible to any group of less-than-perfect students, PLEASE SEE THIS MOVIE! I first saw this movie as part of a graduate course in the process of getting my MS.Ed. in Education with a group of 40 other teachers. We all wept, applauded, and then brought this same determination to our classrooms in the form of a never-give-up attitude. This video makes it quite clear that with determination, students and adults alike, can accomplish anything they put their minds to: regardless of race, creed, or socio-economic origin. The ability to discipline oneself comes from within and from good role models, such as this music teacher. Please see this movie! It nourishes the inner soul with a sense of achievement for the impossible. Putting one's mind, one's heart, and one's soul into whatever it is that one pusues is all that it takes. This movie transcends all socio-economic barriers, all language barriers, all cultural barriers. The bottom line is this: with determination, you can do anything, be anything. A MUST-SEE!~ Pepita Viola, Spanish TEacher, Manchester Central High School, an inner-city school, representing 64 different countries.

5 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars From Grade School Band to Carnagy Hall, MUST SEE!, August 3, 1999

By	[e-mail] (Boston MA) - See all my reviews

This movie is about a group of children (ages 6-8) growing up in New York that start to take lesson from a violinist. These children start out at a school band and then move to a Knicks Game and finally end up in Carnagaiy hall. A definte must see for all musicians