Here is what we did for our first week in music in 2016:
Our 1st grade students listened to the "March" from the Nutcracker ballet. We discovered that there are three main themes to this suite and danced to it. The themes were soldiers, puppets, and mice because of how they sound. We had so much fun dancing like and to these themes. The first graders sang a silly movement chant called, "Hands, Hands." We warmed up our cold bodies with moving just one body part at a time. I think we could all agree that one of our most favorite parts to move and sing to was our tongue. 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). To review the pitches of "Sol-La-Mi" we learned a fun song and game called, "Doggie, Doggie Where's Your Bone." Next week we will play the game that goes with this song.
Second grade students learned a new musical term called, "tempo." Tempo is the speed of the music. We practiced listening and moving to various three tempos with a song called, "Freight Train." The tempos in Italian are adagio (slow), andante (walking tempo), and allegro (fast). We also had BRAVO parties so here is a picture of some students playing freezing dance:
Our third grade students reviewed the notes of the staff by singing, "I Don't Know the Names" and playing the game, "On Your Mark, Get Set, Notate!" We were so happy to see how much the students remembered over the break! If you have not already brought in your permission slips for the recorder and for the Lexington Symphony field trip, please do so ASAP! They were due this week! Our field trip is on Friday, Jan 22nd at Carey Hall in Lexington. We would love to hand out all the recorders after that. You are more than welcome to use your older sibling's Yamaha recorder! Just let us know!
The fourth and fifth graders are all working on building 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! We practiced playing tone chimes this week and next week we will use them to accompany songs.
The fourth graders will play an accompaniment to, "Auld Lang Syne." The song is traditionally sung on New Year's Day, at midnight right after the ball drops. The song reminds us to remember our old friends and fond memories as we approach the new year. The song sounded great as we sang it, but it will sound even better with chordal accompaniment.
The fifth graders will play an accompaniment to, "Take On Me," by a Norwegian band called A-ha. This son was very famous in the 1980's.
Here are what tone chimes are:
We hope you have a wonderful weekend!
No comments:
Post a Comment