We're halfway through the semester - - - can you believe it?! Everyone did such a great job of identifying the lines and spaces of the staff and it was a blast performing the puppet show with the parachute. It's been so fun to see their brains work and start to understand these foundational musical concepts! 

I'll see your kids next week for Lesson #8!  

Scotland's Burning

We practiced our solfeg hand signs and audiation today in class. Audiation is the ability to accurately hear musical sounds in your head when they are not being sounded aloud. This is a foundational skill for students to be able to harmonize. Creating harmony, or notes that sound good together, is difficult and begins by knowing what the music should sound like in your head and then singing something that is different and complimentary.

Hickety Pickety

To play this song the way we did in class, ending with a sol-sol-do, click here to see the skills video.

Ooooo Halloween

Singing like a ghost is a great vocal channeling exercise. We are practicing a pure, natural head tone while extending the child’s vocal range and helping them to experiment with the sounds their voice can make. This is a great voice lesson for a child and adults too! Read more about playful ways to make spooky sounds on our blog: "Spooky Music Fun: Playful Ways to Learn Through Sound".

Boom, Boom

The autoharp is an age appropriate instrument used to create harmony with our singing. Sing and practice strumming your book autoharp or the autoharp in the Let's Play Music App. You can play the autoharp through the Let's Play Music App by clicking on the two notes in the bottom left corner. Select the Autoharp feature then push a red, blue, or yellow triangle and strum the strings slowly from the bottom to the top. Playing on a tablet or iPad is preferred to mimic the strumming motion best.

Distinguishing High and Low Sounds

The staff determines pitch - the top of the staff is high sounds, the bottom is lower sounds. The placement of notes (or balloons!) determines if the sound moves up, down or stays the same.

Perfect Pitch and Relative Pitch

When we sing "DO is Home" we are developing perfect pitch. This is the ability to sing a note out of thin air, no hints or external cues at all. Just think it and sing it. Then we perfect this skill by distinguishing sounds that are "too high" or "too low", or right on. Once we know where Do, or Middle C, is we can then relate other pitches to Middle C. This skill is intended to train the ear and will lead the students to develop relative pitch. This is the ability to relate other pitches to a given one (Middle C).

Puppet Show - The Magic Lamp

Identifying the melodic classical themes is one purpose of our Magical Lamp puppet show. It aids us in hearing and identify different themes in classical music, which makes the music come alive! 

Because nearly every music system in the world uses the same five notes—known as the pentatonic scale—many people say these notes are “hardwired” into our brains. Howard Goodall, Emmy-winning composer and author of The Story of Music, says these notes are so fundamental that it seems that they were pre-installed in us when we were born. He goes as far as to call these notes a “human genetic inheritance.” In this video, always-entertaining Bobby McFerrin uses the pentatonic scale to “play” an audience, and in the process provides a fascinating demonstration of how our brains are musically wired.

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Thank you!