Weekly Review 1/20 - 1/24

This week in music, the first graders started studying Sergei Prokofiev's "Peter and the Wolf." It is a story and musical piece by the Russian composer.  We read the book first, then started a listening map in the second class.  As the students listened to the story and orchestral music (narrated by Patrick Stewart), they completed the activities in each box.  Each part of the map included a fun activity, such as drawing the different characters and identifying different instruments. We will be finishing this activity next week. Here is a list of all the character in the fairytale. Each character in the story represents an instrument and has a musical theme:

• Bird: Flute
• Duck: Oboe
• Cat: Clarinet
• Grandfather: Bassoon
• Wolf: French Horns
• Hunters: woodwind theme, with gunshots on timpani and bass drum
• Peter: String Instruments

The second grade students continued their instrument family unit. This week they learned about the brass and woodwind families. 

Common Brass Instruments:

• Trumpet
• Trumbone
• French Horn
• Tuba

Common Woodwind Instruments:

• Piccolo
• Flute
• Clarinet
• Oboe
• Saxophone
• Bassoon

The third graders visited the amazing Cary Hall to see the Lexington Symphony perform! The student saw a few familiar faces in the orchestra - from when the symphony's quartet visited Memorial.

They were taken on a musical journey through time, starting in the year 900.  Music was primarily vocal (sung by voice) until the Renaissance, when recorders and drums were popular.  Little by little, instruments were added, such as violin, viola, cello and bass (very common in the Baroque period).

In the late Baroque and Classical periods, concertos were performed! Unfortunately, the young musician who was going to perform was sick and unable to attend. We hope he feels better soon!

In addition, more wind, brass, and percussion instruments were added to the ensemble!

Pretty soon, everyone was on stage, and the students were introduced to some lesser-known (but still important!) instruments such as as the contrabassoon, bass clarinet, and English horn.

By the end of the concert, there was a full modern symphony orchestra on stage!  As a finale, they played a medley of Star Wars, composed by John Williams.  This was certainly a favorite!

 Big thanks to the parents who volunteered to chaperone- we hope you had fun too!

The fourth and fifth graders are learning how to play ukuleles! If your child has their own ukulele, they are more than welcome to bring it to their first music class of the week (Monday, Tuesday, or Wednesday). This week, they learned the parts of the ukulele and how to play a C-chord. Changing chords is very important so we practiced changing from an open strum to a C-chord. 

The fifth graders remembered some of the chords from last year, so they were also able to review A minor and F major. Then they did a ukulele play along on YouTube! 

We hope you have a fantastic weekend!

Weekly Review 1/13-1/17

Our first grade students learned a fun little song with movements called, "A Sailor Went to Sea, Sea, Sea," Each time we sang the song, we replaced the word "sea" with hands, chop, knee, toe, and Oo- was- she was." We came up with movements to reflect those words. We also began our  "Peter and the Wolf" unit which is a story and musical piece by the Russian composer.  We read the book and learned about the different characters and the instruments they represented. Next week, we will begin a listening map.

Here is list of all the character in the fairytale. Each character in the story represents an instrument and has a musical theme:

• Bird: flute
• Duck: oboe
• Cat: clarinet
• Grandfather: bassoon
• Wolf: French horns
• Hunters: woodwind theme, with gunshots on timpani and bass drum
• Peter: string instrument

The second graders learned two new instrument families this week:  the percussion family and the  string family.

Common Percussion Family Instruments:

Snare Drum
Bass Drum
Tambourine
Maracas
Timpani/Kettle Drums

Common String Family Instruments:
Violin
Viola
Cello
Double Bass
Guitar

Next Thursday, Jan. 23rd, our third grade students will take a field trip to Carey Hall to watch the Lexington Symphony perform. We will leave at 9:00am and will be back by 11:30am. Dressing up is highly encouraged! 

Our fourth graders practiced playing chordal accompaniments to, "Auld Lang Syne" while the fifth grade students practiced playing chordal accompaniments to the famous 80's hit, "Take On Me." 

We also began chorus this week! Our theme is still the Biome with songs about the desert, ocean, savannah and the rain forest. We will be singing a song from a famous cartoon and also a Disney song. Can you guess what they may be?

Have a wonderful long weekend!

Weekly Review 1/6 - 1/10

Wow, our first full week of school in 2020!

This week, the first graders learned a silly movement chant called "Hands, Hands." We warmed up our cold bodies by moving just one body part at a time. We also sang a winter song called "I Have a Little Snowman."  It explores movement and pitch in a scale.  As the song continues, the pitch of the song rises, and when the snowman melts the pitch returns back to the starting note (do).  After we reviewed our solfege tones, we learned a fun song and game called "Doggie, Doggie." One student played the part of the dog who was sleeping in the middle of the room while another student distributed the bone to one person in the room as the class sang the song. Whoever had the bone on the phrase, "Who stole the bone?" got to sing the solo part of "I stole the bone!" It was so fun to see students guessing who they thought had the bone.

The second graders reviewed a musical term from last year: tempo. Tempo is the speed of a piece of music. We practiced listening and moving to various tempos with a song called "Freight Train." Students also had a chance to compose a "tempo story." The class chose a topic, then as each part of the story was added, students determined its tempo: adagio, andante, or allegro (slow, medium, or fast). Next week. they will "perform" the story on percussion instruments, following the changing tempos.

To prepare for their upcoming field trip, the third grade students had an exciting visit on Tuesday from four members of the Lexington Symphony Orchestra. Students got up close and personal with the violin, viola, clarinet, and tuba (or "TUUUUBAAAAA!"). The performers played beautiful music and taught us about their instruments.   We discussed the four instrument families (string, brass, woodwind, and percussion), and learned a little bit about concert etiquette.

The fourth and fifth grade students started a new unit - chords!  A chord (unlike a pitch or interval) is a group of three or more pitches played at the same time.  There are MANY different chords in the music world, but we focused on chords with three or four notes.  We explored the different tonalities that the chords can possess and a process for building a chord that will sound good every time!  Once everyone knew how to build a chord, we used the classroom floor staff to learn how to notate and label them.

The fourth graders also learned a song for the New Year, "Auld Lang Syne" (a Scottish tune that is typically heard right after the ball drops in Times Square!).  Next week, we will be adding a chordal accompaniment to the song using the tone chimes. 

The fifth grade students plaed chords along with a fun song from the 80s by a Norwegian band called A-ha...Take on Me!