Line Riders

Für Elise


Bagatelle No. 25 in A minor for solo piano, commonly known as "Für Elise" (English: "For Elise"), is one of Ludwig van Beethoven's most popular compositions. It was not published during his lifetime, only being discovered (by Ludwig Nohl) forty years after his death.

Beethoven composed Für Elise on 27th April 1810 and it was published in 1867

Lugwig van Beethoven 

Born      Bonn, Electorate of Cologne
Baptised 17 December 1770
Died     26 March 1827 (aged 56)
            Vienna

The Entertainer

Scott Joplin (November 24, 1868 – April 1, 1917) was an American composer and pianist. Joplin achieved fame for his ragtime compositions and was dubbed the King of Ragtime

"The Entertainer" is a 1902 classic piano rag written by Scott Joplin. It was sold first as sheet music, and in the 1910s as piano rolls that would play on player pianos. The first recording was by blues and ragtime musicians, the Blue Boys in 1928, played on mandolin and guitar.

As one of the classics of ragtime, it returned to international prominence in the 1970s, when it was used as the theme music for the 1973 Oscar-winning film The Sting. 

Ride of the Valkyries

Wilhelm Richard Wagner ( 22 May 1813 – 13 February 1883) was a German composer, theatre director, polemicist (meaning 'warlike, hostile') and conductor who is chiefly known for his operas (or, as some of his later works were later known, "music dramas"). 

"Ride of the Valkyries" is one of Wagner's best-known pieces.

His compositions, particularly those of his later period, are notable for their complex textures, rich harmonies and orchestration, and the elaborate use of leitmotifs ("short, constantly recurring musical phrase").

boom snap clap snap

Try this rhythm game
Boom snap clap

2019 Term 1: Seniors

The World's Greatest Dances and Dancers: 

Here's something from the 1943 movie called Stormy Weather, most famous for this amazing dance routine by the Nicholas Brothers,  and Cab Calloway  singing and leading the band.  The Nicholas brothers grew up in a musical family but never had a formal dance lesson when they were growing up - they learned to dance by watching others and practising.  This  dance was unrehearsed and filmed on its first take, prompting  famous dancer Fred Astaire to say that it was the best dancing he had ever seen on film.  Watch how they do the spilits - and get up from that position - how hard do you think that would be? (Don't try it yourself!) 

And because it was Saint Patrick's Day this week, let's look at some very well known Irish dancers  - Riverdance  - Lord of the Dance. Like the Russian dancers, these, too,  have to be in perfect synchronised time - and must be very fit.  What do you notice about the way the Irish dancers use their arms?  Notice  how they, to, finish so suddenly  - and keep still without puffing and panting.  Do you think they are fitter than athletes and sports players? 

Have a look at this video of Russian  dancers.  Notice how they are so precise and perfectly synchronised.  This is a sailors' dance. How fit do you think they need to be to be able to dance for so long and yet be able to stand still  and not puff, but smile at the end of their performance?   

BODY PERCUSSION 

Some new routines for body percussion: 
Parts C and D may be little bit easier than parts A and B, but you can do these in any order. Once you know them off by heart, you can also link them together, or do  each of them at the same time with others. You will need to practise each one for a bit to become confident and accurate. 
Body Percussion Routine Part A
Body Percussion Routine Part B
Body Percussion Routine Part C 
Body Percussion Routine Part D


Watch this school group performance of a basic body percussion where different rhythms are added in sequence to make a very clever sounding  rhythm. Can you copy each different group's rhythm? 

Pop Corn 
Follow the instructions on this Pop Corn video to make a range of body percussion sounds.   Check the settings if you want to slow it down a bit.  And you might enjoy the Swedish Chef's version of Pop Corn also. 

Alpha Four  - Body Percussion   This is a bit tricky to start with, as you try to copy and follow instructions and keep up. Try it a few times and you will get better at it. 

The Truthful Step - a body percussion lesson from Tribal Groove - involves clap, stamp, slap. 

Here's a collection of body percussion routines to try. You will need to pause the video and practise each one a few times, then make your own combinations. 

Here's another set of body percussion routines. You may want to pause to practise each one as per the other ones above. Skip to 30 seconds into the video to start. 

Clap the cymbal part from Carmen Toreador Song by Bizet. Watch the video and follow the instructions.  You may want to pause it and practise it a bit to work out the pattern. 

SONGS: 

 - The wreck of the Diddley  by Fatcat and Fish Face 
 - Liver Lover by fleaBITE   - Hard to keep up with, but join in the chorus. Find the lyrics on this blog post 
 - Don't Sit Under the Poo Tree by fleaBITE  - another fast-moving song that's hard to keep up with to start with. Find the lyrics on this blog post. 

- No Toast  by fleaBITE 
- Favourite Undies by Fatcat and Fishface
- Birdbrain by Fatcat and Fish Face - Can you keep up with the lyrics? Excellent for enunciation practice.   You can find the lyrics here. 
 - I knew You Were Treble  - to help you learn the names of the notes on the treble clef  music staff 
 - Ode to Treble Clef  - to help you learn the names of the notes on the treble clef. 

The Story of Music, Part 1: 

Music is a collection of sounds arranged into patterns. These sounds can be produced by human voices or humans making sounds using their body, or by playing instruments - or even by nature.  

From Newmusicbox

1. Think of some different patterns you can make with your voice.  Have a go at making different voice patterns? 
2. Think of some different sound patterns you can make using your body . . . 
3. How could you use as an instrument to make some sound patterns? 

Music can affect our emotions - the way we feel. For example, music can sound happy or sad, exciting,  scary, peaceful or uneasy. 

Happy by Pharell Williams  - Obvious enough

Kyrie from The Armed Man by Karl Jenkins.  You may like to try listening to this first without watching the video, and then compare your feelings after watching it while you listen. 

This is a piece of music is conducted by the actual composer, Karl Jenkins. It's called "Kyrie Eleison". The words Kyrie Eleison come from the Greek Language and mean "Lord have mercy". They were used in some forms of pagan worship and were later incorporated into Christian worship. 

This piece of music evokes a range of emotions and is certainly guided by the accompanying video.  This modern work, was composed by Welsh composer Karl Jenkins  and first performed in 2000. It is about the horrors of war and is subtitled "A Mass for Peace". 

At 1:50 there is a special part sung by a boy soprano, which means a young boy who can sing very high notes. After that, the whole choir joins in. Can you hear 4 different singing parts: soprano (high female voices),alto (lowest female voices), tenor (high male voices), bass (lowest male voices). (Stop at 4:40,  but you may like to find it and watch the entire piece at home.)

1. How does the music make you feel? What words can you use to describe your feelings? 

2. How does the video change or support the way you felt listening to the music?

3. What was it about the music that made you feel the way you did? 

Do you agree with this statement? Can you give examples

Music can be a solitary experience, when you sing or play an instrument for your own purposes, or music can be a shared experience, when you are part of a large group performing an item or an audience experiencing a performance. 

2019 Term 1 Juniors

Follow this link to find a list of dances (J) means particularly suitable for juniors. 

FAVOURITE DANCES FOR JUNIORS:
Baby Shark   Can You Point Your Finger and do the Twist?  
Follow the Leader
The Freeze Game
Get Ready to Wiggle 
Get the Sillies Out 
Hold Still 
Hot Potato 
I Like to Move it. Move it 
Gummy Bear 
I'm Gonna Catch You 
I've been working on the Railroad 
Jump Up 
Mah Nah Mah Nah 
Skip to My Lou 
The Wheels on the Bus 
YMCA

NEW: 
Monsters of Jazz   follow a monster's dance movements to a jazz band's music. 
Boogiesaurus - follow a dinosaur - of sorts - to dance to rock 'n' roll music. 
Happy Farm -  A dancing chicken to follow. 

GRAND MARCH /MARCHING MUSIC  
The Ants go marching - Just dance version 
Radetsky March by Johann Strauss Senior 
March of the Toy Soldiers by Tchaikovsky 
British Grenadiers (Fife and drums) 
Colonel Bogey 
Liberty Bell (aka Monty Python theme) by John Philip Sousa

Here's some of our favourite songs: 
Hello, Nice Day 
Alice the Camel 
Five Little Ducks 
Taniwha Song 
Favourite Undies


Music for relaxation and creative dance. 
These are some beautiful lullabies  by NZ singer and songwriter Claudia Robin Gunn. 
Goodnight Moon 
Ship that Sails 
Lullaby  Time 

Nursery Rhymes:

Little Miss Muffett
The nursery rhyme Little Miss Muffet first appeared in print in 1805. It's origins and meanings are not known for sure.  

Vocabulary: 

tuffet - a low seat or footstool, completely covered in cloth so legs are not visible. 

curd  - (curdle) when milk starts to form solids

whey - the liquid left over after the milk has formed curds

arachnophobia - fear of spiders 

arachnid - spider

A tuffett

Curds and whey

A Bullwinkle cartoon about Little Miss Muffet 

Kermit the Frog Interviews Little Miss Muffet

Hey Diddle Diddle 

 Hey Diddle Diddle and cat and the fiddle.
Here's Kermit the Frog reporting for Sesame Street News about the cow jumping over the moon.

Here's the Teddy Rock version of Hey Diddle Diddle - time for air guitar!
And a jazz version 

Do check out this very old (1935) Terry Toons cartoon based on nursery rhymes. It shows nursery rhyme characters heading off to school for a quite different kind of education. See what happens when the parents turn up. Can you imagine your teachers doing what this teacher does?

Three Blind Mice 

Three Blind Mice   Sing along video 


Here's a Walt Disney cartoon called the Three Blind Mousketeers, from 1936. Listen and watch for how the animals' movements and actions become part of the music and rhythm patterns. 

And a Muppets version of Four Blind Mice - done as a round.
Something really different - a jazz version of Three Blind Mice from 1962 by Art Blakey and the Jazz Messengers. What instruments can you identify? Listen to all the different drumming sounds and patterns. Can you identify the basic tune? 

And a Teddy Rock version of Three Blind Mice so you can practise you air guitar and air drumming skills.

Jack Be Nimble
The earliest known time that it appeared in writing was in 1815. Jumping candlesticks was a type of fortune telling and also a sport. If you jumped over the burning candle without the flame going out, it was believed you would have good luck. (It was obviously good luck because you didn't get burned!)

Here's a Sesame Street video clip about Jack be Nimble 

 Hickory Dickory Dock 


- One version of the song (Love to Sing) 
- Dance  
- Kermit the Frog interview  
- 

BODY PERCUSSION: 

Try this body percussion routine. You will need to practise it a few times to get it right, and then you might find yourself doing it all the time. 

2018, Term 4, Week 7: Christmas Music

2018: A New Beginning

Click to read this book, made with Book Creator

https://read.bookcreator.com

 Santa's solar sleigh  

Crazy Christmas  Dance -  Reindeer and Santa  (Jingle Bells)

Line Rider - Dance of the Sugar Plum Fairy from the Nutcracker by Tchaikovsky

Simon's Cat discovers the Christmas tree. 
                      

Not exactly Christmas  - but it certainly fits our Blue Suede Shoes song. 

A joke for Christmas by Ayesha:

What does the gorilla sing for Christmas?

Jungle Bells!

2018, Term 4, Week 6: More Classical Cartoons and Christmas Songs

Corny Concerto 1943 

Part 1 is to the Johann Strauss waltz music called Tales of Vienna Woods.  Look and listen for how the animators made the characters move in time to the music and how they made the story fit the "feel" of the music.  Note that the music is in 3/4 time - Can you  hear the beat go 1,2,3; 1,2,3.   The characters are Elmer Fudd (And as we hear the whythmic stwains of the haunting wefwain, wisten to the wippwing whythm of the woodwinds, as it wolls awound and awound, and it comes out here..." Porky Pig and Bugs Bunny. 

In Part 2, the music is the Blue Danube - Probably Strauss's most famous waltz - and possibly the most famous waltz music of all time.  A mother swan is gliding across the water with her cygnets - and a duck . . .  See if you can follow the story. 

Ukulele / recorder / glock play along Christmas songs: 

 Look for the Christmas tab above for more of our favourite Christmas songs.

All I want for Christmas is You   Some tricky chord progressions, but once you've got the pattern it should be easier.  Don't worry if you can't change all the chords in time. 

Feliz Navidad 

Rockin' Around the Christmas Tree   More tricky chord changes - just do what you can. 

Last Christmas  

Jingle Bells - simplified (C,F,G) but quite fast backing track - you do the singing. 

Santa Claus Rock  - Follow the 12 bar blues format in D, G, A7 to play along with this 

Junior songs

Scroll down to Term 4, Week 1, for more junior songs. 

Here's some new ones: 

Pop, Bang, Crack go the Christmas Crackers 

Ring, Ring Ring the bells  (Christmas Round) 

Dum Dee Diddle 

2018, Term 4, Week 3: While we are in Hungary . . .

This week we are learning about Brahms Hungarian Dance Number 2. 

Following on from listening to and viewing List over the past two weeks,  we will continue our Hungarian music theme with Brahms Hungarian Dance Number 5. 

Johannes Brahms was born in Germany in 1833 and died in Vienna in 1897.

His father was a musician and played the double bass. Johannes learned the piano when he was young, and he was a talented musician and composer. When he was growing up in  Germany there were many Hungarian musicians in his home town of Hamburg. Brahms liked their folk music and it influenced a lot of his own compositions.

Brahms was close friends with many other famous musicians of the time: Franz Liszt , Robert Schumann and his wife Clara, and Johann Strauss II. (Brahms said that he wished that he had written The Blue Danube which was composed by Strauss.) He eventually moved to Vienna and lived there until he died from cancer in 1897. Wagner, another famous German musician, also met Brahms in Vienna and did not like him, saying he was a bad conductor. Wagner was afraid that Brahms might compose better operas than his, but Brahms didn't write operas, anyway. It was true that Brahms was not a very good conductor, so he got someone else to conduct the music he composed.

Here's some easy-to-read information about Brahms and a listening map for Hungarian Dance #2. 

Here's Charlie Chaplin    -  one of the first movie stars  in a scene in a barber's  shop. Watch how he makes all his movements fit the music. 

Here's a Looney Tunes cartoon of the Three Little Pigs, using Brahms Hungarian Dances #5, #7, #6  and #17 in that order.  What changes do you think were made to make the music fit the story and soundtrack?

And how about having a go at dancing to it?  (Skip to 38 seconds into the video). 

If you enjoy playing the drums  - ore electric guitar - listen and look at this version .

Here's a listening map to help you follow the structure and form of the music. How would you imagine a listening map to look? 

Here's an orchestra performing Hungarian Dance #5. How does the conductor show fast and slow, soft and loud? Look at the different ways she communicates with the musicians. 

Probably the most well known of Brahms music is his lullaby. 

2018, Term 4, Week 1 - Classical Cartoons and Countdown to Christmas

It might be a bit early to start thinking about Christmas, but some classes  only have a half-term block of music, so we will need to cover our Christmas music in the first half term for them. This term we will cover music from several festivals including Christmas, Diwali, Halloween and All Souls' Day  and Day of the Dead, and Pacific Islands music. 

Let's get started with some of the dances for the term: 

Halloween: 
Banana Boat Song by Harry Belafonte 
Day-O (The Banana Boat Song)" was usually classified as an example of calypso music from Jamaica.   It's a work song   about the dock workers working the night shift loading bananas onto ships. Daylight has come, the shift is over, and they want their work to be counted up so that they can go home  The song has nothing to do with Halloween and the dance routine is probably a reference to the movie Beetlejuice, but the skeletons just gave it a bit of a Halloween context. 

Calling All Monsters - Just Dance Disney 

Ghost in the Keys  (Choose your character) 

I will Survive 

The Monster Mash 

The Monster Shuffle - especially for the juniors 

This is Halloween from the Nightmare Before Christmas 

Christmas: 

Oh Christmas Tree (Bollywood Version) 

Crazy Christmas Dance (medley) 

Jingle Bells  (Juniors) Technically not a Christmas song (notice the absence of the word "Christmas"  anywhere in the song) but rather a song written for the American Thanksgiving Celebrations. 
Jingle Bells (Seniors) A mash up of several other dance videos (you'll recognise "Limbo").
All I want for Christmas is You   A Zumba workout. 
It's Christmas Time   Follow along with these girls as they sing and dance a new Christmas song with easy-to-follow dance moves. 
Jingle Bell Rock (Juniors) A NZ video with semi-animated dancers. You may want to adapt the part where they run around the tree and then fall on the ground . . . 

Christmas Songs for Juniors: 
I'm a little Star   from Love to Sing (Note the New Zealand accents!) 
He has a Red Red Coat from Love to Sing 
When Santa got Stuck up the Chimney  from Love to Sing 
Five Mince pies  from Love to Sing 


fleaBITE has a new song out. It's called Probably Papakura.  Listen for the local place names in the song.  

This term we are also learning about some of the most famous classical music which has been used in cartoons. 

Cat Concerto - Tom and Jerry 
This cartoon is considered one of the best Tom and Jerry cartoons ever. It won the 1946 Academy Award for Best Short Subject: Cartoons. In 1994 it was voted #42 of the 50 Greatest Cartoons of all time by members of the animation field.

In this cartoon, Tom, the cat, is a famous concert pianist playing Hungarian Rhapsody Number 2 in C# Minor by Franz Liszt.  Watch what happens when Jerry, the mouse, gets involved. 

Vocabulary: 
rhapsody - a one-movement piece of instrumental piece of music with several contrasts of tempo and mood
movement - one section of a longer piece of classical music. Longer pieces of classical music are often broken up into different sections - called movements. Often there is a different tempo and mood to each movement. Audiences are not supposed to applaud between movements, but wait until the very end when the conductor puts down his baton and bows.
tempo - the speed a piece of music is played. There can be many changes of tempo in a single piece of music.
applaud - to clap. Applause means clapping.
concerto - from the Italian language meaning 'agreeing' or 'playing together'. A concerto is a piece of music played by a solo instrument with an orchestra. (A piano is the solo instrument in the Tom and Jerry cartoon. We don't get to see the orchestra but we hear them.)

Look 

- at what a grand piano looks like on the inside and outside 

- at where the high notes and low notes are played.

- at how the pianist arrives on stage and prepares for the performance

- at how a performer finishes a performance 

Listen: 

- for the orchestra warming up and practising before the concert starts

- for the conductor to tap his baton to let the orchestra know it's time to begin

- to changes in tempo (speed)

- for high notes and low notes 

- for soft /quiet sounds (piano / pianissimo) and loud /strong sounds (forte / fortissimo) 

                                           

Here's what Franz Liszt wrote and what the piano player had to read and follow. 
 Although it looks (and is!) very difficult, there will be some things that you can recognise about the music.   What notes and symbols can you recognise and name?
 
Watch this sixteen-year-old girl play Liszt's Hungarian Rhapsody Number two along with the cartoon  and exactly as it is played in the cartoon.   

Have a look at this version of the original with a visual guide to show you the patterns  of the music as it is played.  You ill notice that it's a bit different from the Tom and Jerry version which was adapted to help tell the story.