2018 Term 3, Week 1: Mostly Mozart and Musical Maths

Mrs Lee and Mrs Vincent are singing in this concert. Afternoon tea is included in the ticket price.

Welcome back to Term 3 music.  

Dances

Juniors: 

- Goodnight Moon 

- Can you point your finger and do the Twist 

- Can't stop the Feeling 

- Gummy Bear 

Seniors: 

 - All you Gotta Do is just Dance   (with some interesting new dance moves) 

- Bailar 

- Blue 

Songs: 

Wreck of the Diddley   By Fatcat and Fishface 

The Fox  (See lyrics on this blog post. Scroll down the page.) 

Sarasponda

  

MOZART: 

This term we are learning a bit about one of our favourite composers - Mozart.  Watch this  video of Dies Irae from Mozart's Requiem.   A requiem is a special mass (church service) asking for peace for the soul of a person who has died. It is Latin for rest or repose (sleep).  The lyrics (words) of Dies Irae  are in Latin, and they mean Day of Wrath (anger). 

 And here's a version Mozart could never have imagined - a heavy metal accompaniment! 

Mozart didn't compose Twinkle Twinkle Little Star - but he is well known for making an arrangement  (version) of that music.  Here's a Sesame Street version of the alphabet as if Mozart had done it. Note that in New Zealand we say zed instead of zee  - but, of course, it doesn't rhyme with "me"

And now - watch how a conductor leads the orchestra (with Sesame Street Connections). Murray Monster and Ovejita (Little Lamb in Spanish) travel to join the New York Philharmonic Music Director Alan Gilbert to find out just what a conductor really does. Ovejita plays timpani while Gilbert conducts Mozart's Eine Kleine Nachtmusik (A Little Night Music) with Juilliard student musicians. 

And on a similar note  . . . see what happens to Gonzo while he tries to play Mozart's Eine Kleine Nachtmusik on the bagpipes while sitting on a pole. 

And for those who think that playing the recorder is only for children, here's Mozart on a range of different recorders. 

Here's a young 7-year-old-boy conducting Mozart's Eine Kleine Nachtmusik. (Skip to 1:00 minute in.) Note that he conducts without reading the music. 

Here's an easy-to-understand short video about the life of Mozart. 

                                      

Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (1756-1791) was an Austrian composer and musician. He was born in what is now Salzburg, Austria. His father Leopold Mozart was a choir master, a composer and a teacher.

Mozart's sister Nannerl began keyboard lessons  at  age 7,   and younger brother Wolfgang began lessons at age 4. By age 5 he was composing short pieces. In the following year Wolfgang and Nannerl began traveling through Europe with their father, giving concerts in the courts of Europe. Mozart learned to play the violin and the organ. At the age of 8 Wolfgang published his first two sonatas for the harpsichord. By the age of 13 he had composed his first opera at the request of an emperor. 
                                           
By the time Mozart was in his mid-twenties he had established himself as one of the most accomplished keyboard players in Vienna, and was recognized as an talented composer. 

On December 5, 1791, Mozart died at 35 years of age. He had no money and was buried in a paupers' grave. He left behind a collection of more than 600 compositions. Some of these pieces are considered to be the finest works in the Classical style.

                                     

Vocabulary: 

- requiem - special church service for the dead 

- wrath - anger 

- lyrics - words of a song 

- conductor - person who leads the orchestra 

- baton - a stick the conductor holds so musicians can see his or her movements 

- tempo - speed of the music 

- symphony - a longer piece of music made up of several parts

- opera - music that tells a story in song and acting

- pauper - a person who is so poor they have no money or home and very few possessions. 

Musical Maths: 

How many ways do you think music is mathematical?  How many ways do you think we could teach maths through music, or use music to help understand maths? 

Some vocabulary you might need: 

- whole note -  also known as a semibreve. It has 4 beats. 

- half note - also known as a minim. It has two beats. 

- quarter note - also known as a crotchet. It has one beat.

- equivalent - having the same value; e.g., $1.00 is equivalent to two 50c coins. A minum is equivalent to two crotchets. 

- pizza - a useful item to help explain fractions.  

Let's start with notation and fractions. 

Imagine the whole note  (or semibreve) is a pizza. It is four beats long. (Hold the note and count to four.) 

Now, imagine that half a pizza is like a half note  - half the value of a whole note, unsurprisingly. A half note has two beats long and is called a minim. Hold the note and count to two. 

                                                         

Then, a quarter of a pizza is like a quarter note (or crotchet)  - quarter of the value of a whole note, and half the value of a half note. Hold the note and count to  . . . one. 

Confused?  It will make more sense after we've done a few activities. 

We arrange our notes in groups - called a bar (or measure) so we can read them easily and keep in time.  For our purposes  this week, every bar will be equivalent to a whole note. 

Which of the following bars are equivalent to a whole note (four beats in a bar). 

Now, where would you put bar lines to make each bar equivalent to a whole note (4 beats). 

Here's a bit of a test. Play Level 1 of this video and see if you can keep in time with the rhythm.  You will need to know know what a quarter note (crotchet) rest looks like - but that's easy enough to pick up.