"I'm a child of God, yes, I am!" Now you can play that song on your recorder. See the score below. Notice the chorus and bridge are all built around 5 tones: low E, G, A, B, and C. You can do this!
And here's a video of me playing the song:
Monday, March 30, 2020
Friday, March 27, 2020
SEEKING FUTURE
COMPOSERS and ARRANGERS!
For all students who may wish to experiment with writing their own music,
or writing out something to play or sing,
NOTEFLIGHT is a free (for the basic version) notation software
that can create a very professional looking music score.
You can edit and arrange it to look like 'real' music,
and then save, print, or share your music.
Sound interesting?
Maybe part of your passion project?
Check it out:
Wednesday, March 25, 2020
Explore Music With Your Family!
Several families have asked about ways to explore classical music, the orchestra and it's instruments with their family during this quarantine time. Most major symphony organizations have websites which offer a lot of resources. Students, you can explore on your own as well!
Here are a couple of my favorites: (Make sure you have some good audio for these!)
San Francisco Symphony:
http://www.sfskids.org/classic/templates/instorchframe.asp?pageid=3
Dalla Symphony
https://www.mydso.com/dso-kids/
Friday, March 20, 2020
Mini-Lessons for 5th Band Students
I plan to post a whole series of mini-lessons for the 5th grade band students based on the exercises in our red Standard of Excellence book. I will begin on page 26, even though many of you are further along in your method book than that. Feel free to skip to the posts that are about the songs that interest you. Also, don't be afraid to contact me with questions that arise.
I plan to post a whole series of mini-lessons for the 5th grade band students based on the exercises in our red Standard of Excellence book. I will begin on page 26, even though many of you are further along in your method book than that. Feel free to skip to the posts that are about the songs that interest you. Also, don't be afraid to contact me with questions that arise.
Educational website for clarinet players:
Here's a resource specifically for clarinet players, full of good info and free sheet music you can download to play:
The Clarinet website
Thursday, March 19, 2020
2nd Grade Music Listening Project
Every year in second grade we listen and respond to a fun piece of music entitled "The Carnival of the Animals" by Camille Saint Saens. It's a musical picture of what it may be like to visit a zoo and stroll from one animal exhibit to the next. But watch closely--there are some very unusual animals here!
Understanding Camile Saint Saens' "Carnival of the Animals"
It might be fun for you to see this older recording because it includes live images of the orchestra players, the animals, and poems from Ogden Nash.
A Zoo Concert! with "Carnival of the Animals"
Students, you may like to explore and find some LISTENING GLYPHS like the ones from this website. They are color by number pages that are fun and help you to listen carefully to the music as it is playing. You respond by choosing colors for your drawing! I hope you enjoy the zoo!
Carnival Coloring; Listening Glyphs
Wednesday, March 18, 2020
Fourth Grade Music Listening Project
"Peter and The Wolf" by Sergei Prokofiev
Students, here is some information and some links to fun activities with one of my favorite pieces of orchestral music, "Peter and The Wolf". Besides being a good story with very descriptive music, it's a very good way for us to review together what the various instruments of the symphony orchestra look and sound like. The first part of this post is information you can read, but don't forget to scroll all the way to the bottom, where you will find some fun online games about the piece. And don't miss the link to one of my favorite recordings of the piece done by the Vancouver Symphony Orchestra with their conductor doing the narrating. And if course, there are tons of other acitivites and recordings you can search out online. Enjoy the music!
"Peter and The Wolf" by Sergei Prokofiev
Students, here is some information and some links to fun activities with one of my favorite pieces of orchestral music, "Peter and The Wolf". Besides being a good story with very descriptive music, it's a very good way for us to review together what the various instruments of the symphony orchestra look and sound like. The first part of this post is information you can read, but don't forget to scroll all the way to the bottom, where you will find some fun online games about the piece. And don't miss the link to one of my favorite recordings of the piece done by the Vancouver Symphony Orchestra with their conductor doing the narrating. And if course, there are tons of other acitivites and recordings you can search out online. Enjoy the music!
About Peter and the Wolf
Sergei Prokofiev’s Peter and the Wolf is a composition written for symphonic and spoken word performance. Created in 1936 for his own son, Prokofiev has given us a most charming tale of a young boy’s adventures in the meadow behind his grandfather’s house that both tells a story and cleverly teaches children about recognizing musical themes.
Story Summary
Peter is a young boy who lives with his grandfather in the Russian countryside. He is a bit rambunctious and certainly doesn’t listen to his grandfather’s advice – to lock the gate and stay inside! Well, that’s no fun! So one day, while playing in the meadow, he leaves the gate open to let a duck loose for a swim in the pond. While Peter chats and argues with a little bird, his cat sneaks out and is on the prowl. Luckily, Peter sees this, warns the bird and both the duck and the bird are safe.
Grandfather is not happy about this. What if a wolf were to find them? Peter is told to go inside and to lock the gate. As if on cue, a wolf does appear! The agile cat escapes into a tree, but the duck isn’t so lucky. The wolf swallows him whole!
Peter is not going to give up so easily and let this wolf feast on his animal friends. He concocts a plan to string the wolf up on the tree with the help of the daring bird. Together, they capture the wolf and hang him up by his tail. Some hunters, who have also had their eyes on the wolf, come by and prepare for their own attack. Peter won’t hear of it though. He announces that they will take him to the zoo, much to the hunters’ and his grandfather’s chagrin. All Grandfather can mutter to himself is, “What if Peter hadn’t caught the wolf? What then?”
On the way there, guess what they heard?! A quack, quack, quacking coming from the belly of that big, bad wolf!
The Composer
Sergei Prokofiev
Sergei Prokofiev (1891-1953) was born in the village of Sontsovka in the Donets region of the Ukraine. He was a child prodigy on the order of Mozart, composing for piano at age five and writing an opera at nine. His first teacher was his mother, a talented pianist. He attended the St. Petersburg Conservatory from 1904 to 1914, winning the Anton Rubinstein prize for best student pianist when he graduated. He traveled widely, spending many years in London and Paris, and toured the United States five times.
In 1936, Prokofiev returned to settle permanently in the Soviet Union. One of his first compositions after his return was Peter and the Wolf, written in just two weeks in April of 1936 for a children’s theater in Moscow. Prokofiev invented the story and wrote the narration himself, drawing on memories of his own childhood. He constructed the music as a child’s introduction to the orchestra, with each character in the story represented by a different instrument or group of instruments: Peter by the strings, the bird by the flute, the duck by the oboe, the cat by the clarinet, the wolf by the horn section, and so on.
Peter and the Wolf was an immediate success and has been loved by children all over the world. The music is sophisticated enough to be enjoyed by adults, even through repeated hearings. And its moral — you can’t be a hero if you don’t take risks — delights children as much as it must have cheered the composer.
Sergei Prokofiev’s Peter and the Wolf is a composition written for symphonic and spoken word performance. Created in 1936 for his own son, Prokofiev has given us a most charming tale of a young boy’s adventures in the meadow behind his grandfather’s house that both tells a story and cleverly teaches children about recognizing musical themes.
Story Summary
Peter is a young boy who lives with his grandfather in the Russian countryside. He is a bit rambunctious and certainly doesn’t listen to his grandfather’s advice – to lock the gate and stay inside! Well, that’s no fun! So one day, while playing in the meadow, he leaves the gate open to let a duck loose for a swim in the pond. While Peter chats and argues with a little bird, his cat sneaks out and is on the prowl. Luckily, Peter sees this, warns the bird and both the duck and the bird are safe.
Grandfather is not happy about this. What if a wolf were to find them? Peter is told to go inside and to lock the gate. As if on cue, a wolf does appear! The agile cat escapes into a tree, but the duck isn’t so lucky. The wolf swallows him whole!
Peter is not going to give up so easily and let this wolf feast on his animal friends. He concocts a plan to string the wolf up on the tree with the help of the daring bird. Together, they capture the wolf and hang him up by his tail. Some hunters, who have also had their eyes on the wolf, come by and prepare for their own attack. Peter won’t hear of it though. He announces that they will take him to the zoo, much to the hunters’ and his grandfather’s chagrin. All Grandfather can mutter to himself is, “What if Peter hadn’t caught the wolf? What then?”
On the way there, guess what they heard?! A quack, quack, quacking coming from the belly of that big, bad wolf!
The Composer
Sergei Prokofiev
Sergei Prokofiev (1891-1953) was born in the village of Sontsovka in the Donets region of the Ukraine. He was a child prodigy on the order of Mozart, composing for piano at age five and writing an opera at nine. His first teacher was his mother, a talented pianist. He attended the St. Petersburg Conservatory from 1904 to 1914, winning the Anton Rubinstein prize for best student pianist when he graduated. He traveled widely, spending many years in London and Paris, and toured the United States five times.
In 1936, Prokofiev returned to settle permanently in the Soviet Union. One of his first compositions after his return was Peter and the Wolf, written in just two weeks in April of 1936 for a children’s theater in Moscow. Prokofiev invented the story and wrote the narration himself, drawing on memories of his own childhood. He constructed the music as a child’s introduction to the orchestra, with each character in the story represented by a different instrument or group of instruments: Peter by the strings, the bird by the flute, the duck by the oboe, the cat by the clarinet, the wolf by the horn section, and so on.
Peter and the Wolf was an immediate success and has been loved by children all over the world. The music is sophisticated enough to be enjoyed by adults, even through repeated hearings. And its moral — you can’t be a hero if you don’t take risks — delights children as much as it must have cheered the composer.
The Featured Instruments
The string family are instruments that create sounds in two major ways: Rubbing the strings with an object
called a bow, made of wood and stretched horsehair; and plucking the strings with one’s finger (called
pizzicato). The strings family represents Peter. (violin cello viola bass)
The flute is a metal instrument (but originally made from wood and therefore classified as a woodwind) that works by blowing over a hollow tube to make the air vibrate inside. In Peter and the Wolf, the flute represents the Bird.
The clarinet is a single-reed instrument. The reed is a thin flexible piece of wood that is attached to the mouthpiece of the clarinet. As the player blows through the mouthpiece, the reed vibrates to create a pitch. The cat is represented by this instrument in the story.
The oboe and bassoon are double-reed instruments. Double reeds are two slightly curved single reeds attached together. As the reeds vibrate against each other they create a somewhat raspy sound that is similar to pinching one’s nose while talking. The bassoon is longer than the oboe, so it has a lower range of pitches. The oboe represents the duck and the bassoon represents Grandfather.
oboe bassoon
The flute is a metal instrument (but originally made from wood and therefore classified as a woodwind) that works by blowing over a hollow tube to make the air vibrate inside. In Peter and the Wolf, the flute represents the Bird.
The clarinet is a single-reed instrument. The reed is a thin flexible piece of wood that is attached to the mouthpiece of the clarinet. As the player blows through the mouthpiece, the reed vibrates to create a pitch. The cat is represented by this instrument in the story.
The oboe and bassoon are double-reed instruments. Double reeds are two slightly curved single reeds attached together. As the reeds vibrate against each other they create a somewhat raspy sound that is similar to pinching one’s nose while talking. The bassoon is longer than the oboe, so it has a lower range of pitches. The oboe represents the duck and the bassoon represents Grandfather.
oboe bassoon
The French horn is a brass instrument that is made of about 12 feet of circularly wrapped metal that ends in a
big funnel called a ‘bell’. Lip ‘buzzing’ on a mouthpiece produces sound. The wolf is represented by the French
horn.
Timpani and bass drum represent the Hunters. Percussion instruments make sound when you shake, rattle, or hit them with your hand or a stick.
Timpani and bass drum represent the Hunters. Percussion instruments make sound when you shake, rattle, or hit them with your hand or a stick.
(Spanish Worksheet)
Learn the following vocabulary words en Español and then see if you can answer the questions below!
Pedrito [ped-RI-to] — Peter, en Español El pájaro [el PAH-ha-ro] — the bird
El gato [el gah-to] — the cat
El pato [el pah-to] — the duck
El lobo [el low-bo] — the wolf
El abuelo [el ah-bway-lo] — the grandfather
Los cazadores [los ca-sa-door-ays] — the hunters Cuidado [quee-da-do] — Watch out!
Pequeño [pay-kayn-yo] — little
Grande [grahn-day] — big
El zoológico [el zo-LOW-hee-co] — the zoo
Write your answers in Spanish:
1. What animal says, “meow”?
2. What is the opposite of little?
3. Where can you find elephants, giraffes, monkeys and tigers in America? 4. Name two animals from the list above that have wings.
5. If la abuela means grandmother, how do you say “grandfather”?
Now see if you can answer these questions:
1. Which animal is más (more) grande – el lobo o el pato?
2. From the list above, which things could live in el zoológico?
3. Who is más viejo (older) – Pedro o el abuelo?
4. In the story, who else wants to catch el lobo?
5. What would you yell to your friend if she walked out in the street without looking? Pedrito y el Lobo — Peter and the Wolf
Learn the following vocabulary words en Español and then see if you can answer the questions below!
Pedrito [ped-RI-to] — Peter, en Español El pájaro [el PAH-ha-ro] — the bird
El gato [el gah-to] — the cat
El pato [el pah-to] — the duck
El lobo [el low-bo] — the wolf
El abuelo [el ah-bway-lo] — the grandfather
Los cazadores [los ca-sa-door-ays] — the hunters Cuidado [quee-da-do] — Watch out!
Pequeño [pay-kayn-yo] — little
Grande [grahn-day] — big
El zoológico [el zo-LOW-hee-co] — the zoo
Write your answers in Spanish:
1. What animal says, “meow”?
2. What is the opposite of little?
3. Where can you find elephants, giraffes, monkeys and tigers in America? 4. Name two animals from the list above that have wings.
5. If la abuela means grandmother, how do you say “grandfather”?
Now see if you can answer these questions:
1. Which animal is más (more) grande – el lobo o el pato?
2. From the list above, which things could live in el zoológico?
3. Who is más viejo (older) – Pedro o el abuelo?
4. In the story, who else wants to catch el lobo?
5. What would you yell to your friend if she walked out in the street without looking? Pedrito y el Lobo — Peter and the Wolf
Peter and The Wolf memory Game
Peter and The Wolf Jeopardy
PETER and The WOLF by the Vancouver Symphony
Tuesday, March 17, 2020
3rd Music Music Activity:
One of the ways students can explore the Britten piece is through an interactive online game created by the folks at the educational arm of the Carnegie Hall Foundation. I'm hoping this link will connect you to the opening page of the game. From there you can create a free account and explore to your heart's content! (Alternatively simply search 'listening adventures Carnegie Hall')
The YPGO Interactive Game Site
One of the ways students can explore the Britten piece is through an interactive online game created by the folks at the educational arm of the Carnegie Hall Foundation. I'm hoping this link will connect you to the opening page of the game. From there you can create a free account and explore to your heart's content! (Alternatively simply search 'listening adventures Carnegie Hall')
The YPGO Interactive Game Site
3rd Grade Music Listening Activity
Our listening project in third grade music this spring is 'The Young Person's Guide To The Orchestra" by British composer Benjamin Britten. Before our unscheduled vacation, we were in the process of investigating the structure of the piece before listening to the entire piece. Here is a copy of what the students' listening map would have looked like after we had completed it in class:
Our listening project in third grade music this spring is 'The Young Person's Guide To The Orchestra" by British composer Benjamin Britten. Before our unscheduled vacation, we were in the process of investigating the structure of the piece before listening to the entire piece. Here is a copy of what the students' listening map would have looked like after we had completed it in class:
Section 1 Section 2 Section 3 Section 4
Main Theme
|
Theme Again!
|
Solo Variations
|
A Fugue!
|
Played by the entire orchestra
|
Played by each family: woodwinds, brass, strings, percussion
|
Each instrument has its' own ‘special time’ while the other instruments play in the background.
|
A musical ‘dog pile’ as one by one the instruments begin playing very actively over top of each other.
|
Lasts less than a minute
|
Ends with one more statement by full orchestra
|
The longest section of the piece—it takes a while to hear every one!
|
They come back in the same order you first heard them!
|
Listen for a final statement of the main theme ‘overtop’ of the wild orchestra fugue just before the closing chords! A very clever and majestic ending!
And here is a link to a wonderful 2011 recording of the piece being performed in Sydney, Australia as part of a You Tube sponsored 'world orchestra' project:
Monday, March 16, 2020
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