The World as the Composer Sees It

The World as the Composer Sees It

Reading Symphony Orchestra Youth Concert

2013

Educational Materials

Developed and compiled for the RSO

by Valerie Trollinger

[email protected]

The World as the Composer Sees It, RSO 2013 1

TABLE OF CONTENTS TOPIC PAGE

Table of Contents 1 BACKGROUND

Introduction 2

Objectives 3

The RSO 4

Background of the Music (For Teachers) 4

Welcome to our Concert! 11 (For Students)

LESSON MATERIALS

Lesson 1:

Lesson 2:

Lesson 3:

Constructing views of the 13 world. Create a sound cinquain Portraits

Lesson 4: Is it real?

USEFUL LINKS AND 20 RESOURCES

The World as the Composer Sees It, RSO 2013 2 INTRODUCTION

Dear Teacher: We are so very pleased that you and your students will be joining us for a performance of “The World as the Composer Sees It.” We know you will find it entertaining, enjoyable, and educational. The following materials were created to help you prepare your students. We have kept these musically-based (which means no puzzles, word searches, or coloring projects) so they would fit in to your general music curriculum. What makes these different from most supplementary materials is that we have included mostly co-curricular lessons, and when possible, Kodály- and Orff-based lessons, if you are familiar with and use those methods. We also offer listening lessons that are also more geared toward music class, although a general classroom teacher may be able to use them. Above all, feel free to manipulate, modify, or tweak any of the lesson materials to meet your and your students’ needs. You should need to spend no more than three 30-minute music classes (or the equivalent) preparing your students for this concert, however, there are plenty of materials in here that can be used both before and after the concert. These materials are designed to work with PA Arts Education Standards and also the National Standards in Music Education, and will allow the students to be actively engaged in the music preparation rather than passively sitting and listening without any guidance. At the end of this packet is a resource page with links to other sites that can further your understanding of “The World as the Composer Sees It”. If you are interested in finding non-music activities and more information on composers for this concert, please check this link for the Dallas Symphony Orchestra (http://www.dsokids.com/2001/rooms/musicroom.asp), as they have some excellent interactive materials that are of a more general nature. Because there is so much available on composers and their lives online, we won’t include that information here, although other websites are listed in the Useful Links and Resources at the end of this pack.

Have fun preparing your students, and we look forward to seeing you at our concert very soon!


OBJECTIVES

Purpose of these materials are to: • Provide music teachers relevant musical materials to help them prepare students

to see and hear the concert. • Provide materials that work within the structure of the general music class. • Familiarize students with the backgrounds and characteristics of the music. • Familiarize students with personal musical interpretations of music. • Promote creative engagement with the music. • Provide materials consistent with the National Standards for Music Education and

the Pennsylvania Standard for Arts and Humanities. • Encourage the use of integrated arts in the music classroom. Before attending the performance, students should be able to:

• Aurally recognize the main melodic and rhythmic themes. • Perform the rhythmic themes and motives by clapping, patting, or on classroom • musical instruments. • Have had experiences with various representations of the world (artistic, literary, • musically, etc). • Be familiar with musical ways to create imagery. • Be familiar with concert behavior and etiquette.


The RSO—a brief history

It's easy to think of the Reading Symphony Orchestra as a perennial favorite, but there was a time when the organization was downright subversive! In 1913, a group of music-loving citizens, headed by Harry Fahrbach, banded together in a symphony organization. While that may not seem particularly subversive, the concert time was: Sunday afternoons. It was an era of rigid enforcement of Blue Laws - statutes preventing business or entertainments on the traditional Sabbath day. The early Reading Symphony organizers were brought before the Mayor, where they were chastised for their irreverent symphonic activities. It was only after the early members of the Reading Symphony invited the Mayor to a patriotic concert - and provided a generous collection of free passes for his entourage - that the group could proceed unencumbered by statute.

Fahrbach was the Reading Symphony Orchestra's first music director, leading the group for ten years. He was succeeded by a number of eminent musicians, including Saul Caston, Alexander Hilsberg, and Hans Kindler, all alumni of the legendary Philadelphia Orchestra during Leopold Stokowski's reign. Louis Vyner followed preceding the remarkable thirty year tenure of Sidney Rothstein. A national search of nearly three hundred conductors brought the RSO Andrew Constantine now in his second year following an opening season that brought critical and box office acclaim.

Today the Reading Symphony Orchestra looks toward its ninety-sixth season as one of the longest continuously-operating symphonies in the United States. For a complete overview of the orchestra's performance history, visit the orchestra's archives at www.readingsymphony.org/archives.asp. (This information is from Reading Symphony Orchestra website: http://www.readingsymphony.org).

Background about the music (For Teachers) The music for this concert was selected by our conductor, Andrew Constantine, to illustrate the very different ways the world can be viewed through composer’s eyes, as peaceful, beautiful, imaginative, lively and even scary. As music educators and musicians, it offers us an opportunity to delve into the multiple arts understanding, which meet the National Standards in Music Education and also the Pennsylvania Standards for Arts and Humanities. This concert also gives us the opportunity to further investigate imagery in music and other disciplines, and to compare and contrast them musically. The music for this concert involves some full pieces and some excerpts of program music. The music included is:

� “Spring” from the Four Seasons by Antonio Vivaldi � “Winter” from the Four Seasons by Antonio Vivaldi


� “The Swan” from the Carnival of the Animals by Camille Saint-Saens � Excerpts from Beethoven’s Pastoral Symphony #6 � “Moths and Butterflies” from the Wand of Youth Suite #2 by Edward Elgar. � Excerpts from La Mer by Claude Debussy.

Suggestions for Lessons start on Page 13. The Four Seasons (Spring and Winter) by Antonio Vivaldi

These 4 violin concerti were originally written by the Italian Composer Antonio Vivaldi and published in 1723. They are perhaps the best known works of the Baroque era, and also an early example of program music. For purposes of this concert, they are best introduced as the musical interpretation of 4 sonnets (purportedly written by Vivaldi). The RSO concert will highlight two of them: The First Movement of the “Spring” concerto, and the Second Movement of the “Winter” concerto. The matching sonnets are below:

First Movement of “Spring”

Springtime is upon us.

The birds celebrate her return with festive song, and murmuring streams are softly caressed by the breezes.

Thunderstorms, those heralds of Spring, roar, casting their dark mantle over heaven, Then they die away to silence, and the birds take up their charming songs once more.

Second Movement of “Winter” Before the fire to pass peaceful, Contented days while the rain outside pours down.

The Swan, from “Carnival of the Animals” by Camille Saint-Saens The Carnival of the Animals was composed in 1886 by the French composer Camille Saint-Saens while he was on holiday in a small Austrian village. Originally scored for a small ensemble, it was later adopted for a full-size symphony orchestra. The version you hear in this concert will be for solo cello and piano. Saint-Saens work is full of beautiful imagery but also of biting satire. For this reason, he was hesitant to let any other parts of it , other than the Swan, be played. He made a provision that the entire set could be played after his death, and it has become a popular set of pieces to use in music classrooms.

The World as the Composer Sees It, RSO 2013 6 Several interpretations of the story behind the music exist, with probably the most common being that of the Swan elegantly gliding (you hear the feet paddling through the water in the rolled chordal accompaniment). However, there are also connections made to a final, legendary “Swan song” that consist of the final last words of a swan before dying. The minor key further emphasizes the seriousness and perhaps sadness of the Swan’s life.


Beethoven, Symphony #6 “Pastoral”

The Pastoral Symphony by Beethoven was written alongside the famous 5th Symphony, and they were both premiered at the same concert in 1808. Beethoven was a nature lover, and spent much time escaping urban life to enjoy the peace of the more rural world. The term “pastoral” refers to scenes of shepherds, sheep, and grazing, and Beethoven certainly wasn’t the first to use this metaphor in his music or in art. The symphony has 5 movements (as does the Symphonie Fantastique) instead of the traditional 4, in the following order: 1. Awakening of cheerful feelings upon arrival in the country 2. Scene at the brook 3. Happy gathering of country folk 4. Thunderstorm 5. Shepherds' song; cheerful and thankful feelings after the storm) Mr. Constantine has selected parts of each movement for this concert, and will talk from the stage about the music.

The World as the Composer Sees It, RSO 2013 8 “Moths and Butterflies” from The Wand of Youth Suite #2 by Sir Edward Elgar. The Wand of Youth Suite #2 was (along with the first suite) based on music Sir Edward Elgar had written while a 12 –year old boy. The purpose of the music was to accompany a family performance of a play he wrote also called “ The Wand of Youth” that was performed by family members. About forty years later he went back to the music he wrote while young and refashioned it to the current version, the view of childhood, we are now more familiar with. Moths and Butterflies is composed as a dance, and moves in a fast but courtly style. “La Mer” (The Sea)—Dialogue of the Wind and Sea, by Claude Debussy La Mer is a program piece in three movements, with the Dialogue of the Wind and Sea as the final movement. An impressionistic piece of music, Debussy paints an aural portrait of the sea and the wind, and how they interact in both calm and violent forms. For an excellent and accessible discussion on this piece, please see: http://www.classicalnotes.net/classics/lamer.html

Best Approaches for preparing your students: Because nearly all this music is through-‐-‐-‐composed and/or programmatic, it is difficult extracting the elements of each to put them into Kodaly or Orff based lessons. However, the comparison table on the next page can help you use a compare and contrast activity. The materials for the lessons presented here reflect an integrated arts approach. Most of these materials are primarily derived from Flohr J. W. & Trollinger, V.L. (2010) Music in Elementary Education, Upper Saddle River NJ: Pearson-‐-‐-‐Prentice Hall.

The World as the Composer Sees It, RSO 2013-- 10

Quick-Look at the pieces: La Mer Moths and

Butterflies Beethove Symph 6: mvt 1

Beethoven Symph 6, mvt 2




Spring Winter The Swan

Genre

Orchestra Orchestra Orchestr a

Orchestra Orchestra Orchestra Orchestra Concerto Concerto Piano &Cello

Program

Sea and wind

Dance of moths and butterflies

Daybrea k in the country

Along the Stream

Country folk gathering

Storm Clearing after storm, sunset

Awakeni ng of birds

Cold winter, icy rain, snow

Swan, elegance, swansong.

Meter (simplified into 2’s or 3’s by how they feel)

Mostly in 2, but can vary

In 2 In 2 In 2’s (12/8)

In 3 In 2 In 2 (6/8) In 2 In 2’s In 3

Tempo:

varies moderate moderate Flowing, moderate

fast fast Moderate, flowing

fast slow Moderately slow

Period of Music History

20th

Century 20th Century Classical Classical Classical Classical Classical Baroque Baroque Romantic

Cross connect with:

Beeth. 6th, 3rd Mvt.

Spring, Swan

Spring, Bach— sheep may safely graze

La Mer Moths and Butterflies

La Mer Beethoven 6th Mvt 1

Beethove n 6th, mvt 1

La Mer Moths and Butterflies

Co-curricular connections

Visual art, nature sounds

Entomology, things that fly, butterflies, line or court dance

Visual art, poetry, shepherd s

Visual arts, Water and kinds of water bodies

Visual art, Celebrations

Visual art, weather

Visual arts, sunset, the SUN

Visual arts, poetry

Visual Arts, poetry

Poetry, Literature (The Silver Swan), Ugly Duckling


Welcome to our Concert!

The members of the Reading Symphony and our conductor, Mr. Andrew Constantine, look forward to your visit with us this year. Before you come to see us, we want to let you know more about the music you are going to hear, what you will see on the stage, and how to show us your best listening manners. Many of us who play in this orchestra once sat where you are going to sit for the concert, and for us, it helped us learn how much we love music. We hope that you will learn to love the music, too.

The music that Mr. Constantine selected for you to hear is all based how composers saw the world. These composers lived at different times, and they all viewed the world differently. You will see many different views of the world through your ears!

When you see the orchestra, you can look for some special things.

You will that we wear black clothes. We don’t do this because all our other clothes are dirty and in the wash. We wear black because, like folk songs, it goes back hundreds of years and is our tradition in all orchestras. We don’t want you looking at our clothes. We want you to listen to the music. That is why we all wear black.

You can also see where all the instrument families sit in the orchestra. The stringed instruments sit in the front, and the woodwinds, brass and drum family all sit in the back. You will also see us playing when you come into the theater. We do this to warm up our muscles. Playing a musical instrument is just like being in gym class. We need to stretch our finger, arm and breathing muscles just like you do when you will run around or play. If you watch and listen carefully, you will be able to see and hear who is playing.

When we are ready to start the concert, then it’s time for you to make sure you are very quiet. We need to have quiet when we play, because if you talk, we can hear you on the stage because we have very good hearing. Besides, we have very important musical stories to tell you, but if you are talking you may miss them!


Two people are the last ones to come on to the stage. One is our concert master, who sits right at the front of the violin section. When he comes out on the stage, he will bow, and then you will see him turn around and quietly ask the oboe player to play a note, which we will tune our instruments to. After we are done tuning, the concert master will sit down.

Finally, Mr. Constantine will come on the stage, and he will conduct

us as we play the music. If you watch him carefully, you will see how he moves his arms. He doesn’t do this to be funny. He is talking to us with his hands (like you, he cannot talk when we are playing), and that helps us all play together to tell our musical stories. He uses special patterns to lead us. If you watch him carefully, you will able to see what they are. Your teacher may even show you these before the concert!

After we finish a song, we like to hear you clap. That tells us that you liked the music. So please clap a lot for us!

The World as the Composer Sees It, RSO 2013 13 Lesson Suggestions

These lesson suggestions may be adjusted or changed as needed for you and your students’ needs. Some of these can also extend past the student concerts. These are written fairly loosely here so they can be modified in any way you see fit. Or, they can serve as a jumping off point for any lessons you develop.

Lesson 1: Constructing Views of the World Lesson 2: Create a sound cinquain Lesson 3: Portraits Lesson 4: Is that real?

Lesson 1: Constructing Views of the World Concept: People view nature in many ways, through sound, taste, touch, seeing, and smelling. Objectives: Students will create (either singularly or in groups) a multidimensional representation of their view of several different natural phenomena. They can be compared and contrasted with the excerpts from the concert music. Materials:

� Concert music downloaded from iTunes (http://www.iTunes.com).

� Posterboard ( one poster board per group of 5 children)

� Safety scissors � Magazines to cut up and/or � Onine pictures � Things that smell (perfume inserts, dirt, whatever you can find, there is no

definitive list. Children with respiratory allergies may wish to select their own scents)

� Bertie Botts Jelly Bean selection list: http://www.mugglenet.com/info/other/beans.shtml

� Different types of materials for touching (rocks, silk, corduroy, etc—whatever you can find. There is no definitive list)

� colored magic markers � any other art supplies you want to use � glue.

The World as the Composer Sees It, RSO 2013 14 Procedure: This is an exercise to help students define between what are real, known memories and communicating those memories in a non-verbal way. For the real memories, the students will come up with a list of characteristics they already know, and try to communicate them via the human senses. By constructing a posterboard.

1) Real memories (most students will be familiar with these in the Berks Co. area) Teacher: We’re going on a pretend field trip! Most of you have been to a lot of places in Berks County. Let’s see what you can remember about them in terms of (list these on the board at the front of the room):

� How they tasted or what they make you taste in your imagination � How they sounded or what they make you hear in your imagination � How they looked � How they smelled or what they make you smell in your imagination � How they felt or what they felt like ( in terms of physical touching) in

your imagination.

Here are the places:

1. A cold snowy day 2. Any nearby dairy farm 3. Any nearby Mall 4. Any nearby park on a hot sunny day 5. The shore 6. Jason’s Woods or any Haunted House or nearby attraction

Students compile a list for each “memory” they have, and these can be shared at the front of the classroom. Teacher: Now, those are REAL memories or memories we came up with because we had prior knowledge about them. But what if we wanted to find a way to share these memories through music? Through art? Through smelling, touching and tasting? What we want to do is make OUR worlds sharable with others. So, this is what we are going to do: Have students count off into groups so you have at least 6 groups as above. Each group will be required to make a multi-sensory poster of one of those areas: so they can select a picture, select a smell (from your selections), select a taste from the Bertie Bott’s list, select a material for how it would feel ( that may be the most challenging for some groups), and then finally, after about 10 minutes, you ( the teacher) play 5 of the excerpts from the RSO list—recommended are La Mer, Spring, Winter, March to the Scaffold, and Moths and Butterflies—but can certainly change this, and no piece of music must exactly match a descriptor). Each group can choose the excerpt that they think goes best with their posterboard collage. Students can label things on their collage, color, draw, use

The World as the Composer Sees It, RSO 2013 15 picture cut-outs, etc. What they CAN’t do is have a literal pictoral representation. (for example, they can’t actually have the picture of the Pagoda). After these have been worked on, and the music selected, the students can bring their collage up to the front of the class, and ask the teacher to play the musical selection that they decided goes with their collage. The rest of the class can then “hypothesize” about what the poster is showing and why. The students will likely come up with many ideas that will only indicate diversity and differences in perception, which is perfectly fine. Closure: Teacher can remind students that they all came up with different interpretations of the poster boards, and of the music. In the next classes, they will learn more about how composers, artists and writers tried to get their impressions of the world across to their listeners.

Lesson 2: Create a Sound Cinquain Concepts: Daily sounds – things you may not pay attention to—are a part of life. How does a composer or artist put these into music? Objectives: Students will create a daily sound diary, compose a cinquain based on the sounds, and then use found sounds to compose their piece (cinquain + music). Students will critically listen to The beginning of Bach’s Tocatta and Fugue in d minor and dialogue between the Wind and Waves from “La Mer.” The teacher may wish to use the article from the Metropolitan Museum of Art on “ Museums embrace works made of sound” http://www.nytimes.com/2013/08/04/arts/design/museums-embrace-works-made-of-sound.html?pagewanted=all&_r=0 for further ideas. Materials: How to write a cinquain: http://www.mahalo.com/how-to-write-a-cinquain-poem Recording of the beginning of Tocatta in d minor by Bach (organ is best) Recording of Danse Macabre by Saint –Saens Storm section (mvt 4) from Beethoven Symphony #6. Dialogue of wind and sea from La Mer. Vivaldi Spring, Summer and Winter from “The Four Seasons.” Picture of Munch’s “The Scream,” picture of “Dialogue of the Wind and Sea” http://images-1.redbubble.net/img/art/size:large/view:main/2420632-3-the-conversation- between-the-wind-and-the-sea.jpg , any other pictures of nature and daily life. Paper Pencils Procedure: Start class with a discussion of sounds, sights, and occurrences of what your students find scary—such as bad dreams, being sick, pain, bad weather, hurricanes, storms, etc. Investigate the way that visual artists have expressed fear or scary things, and then move to the ways that musicians and then poets try to express this. Listening:

The World as the Composer Sees It, RSO 2013 16 Bach—opening to Toccatta in d isn’t scary, but it’s often associated with scary music. You can additionally contrast this with the scene from Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man’s Chest when Davy Jones plays the organ with his tentacles…the music isn’t inherently scary, but scariness has been associated with it in OUR minds. Saint-Saens: Danse macabre—what are the sounds that may be scary in this piece? Does this mean the orchestra is scared? Dialogue between the Wind and Sea from “La Mer-“ focuses on sounds of nature during a storm. Writing activity: Construct a cinquain of sounds that you hear

in a day: Create a cinquain: example:

Thunder Loud, clang, bang It frightens me Thunder OR Family Talking, TV, dinner Makes me warm Family After the students have constructed a cinquain (either individually or in groups or as a class) then use found sounds in the classroom, sounds based on the ones heard in the music, and vocal sounds to accompany it to up the scariness level. Lesson 3: Portraits Concepts: Visual, verbal and musical portraits. Objectives: students will interpret, critique, and create portraits. Materials: Any of the music in the RSO youth concert

Paintings of nature, people, etc if you wish Cinquains from the last lesson

Procedure: Engage students in discussion of what a portrait is.

Many answers are possible. The usual answers often refer to photographs, and the teacher can help guide the students into discovering that portraits can also be painted and drawn. Students may also mention the current trend of online portraits that are composed of words (adjectives) to describe a person, often with an accompanying picture—which may or


may not actually be the person! There are also portraits of nature and the world.

Students are guided to investigate what a portrait tells them about a person (personality, place in history, place in family, etc) that may go beyond the physical characteristics. The same goes for musical portraits—the composer can add sounds, musical works, or other aspects that present of portrait of what s/he is aurally painting. At this point, the teacher (you) can play” name that portrait” in which you can choose one of the symphony pieces (or more) from which you can select three or four short excerpts that are particularly evocative of the aural painting. The students listen to the short excerpts, and then see if by deduction they can figure out what the portrait is. For example: Spring: all the various birds March to the scaffold: part of the march, the part of the accelerando, and then the blade coming down. Beethoven: any parts of the symphony will work for a portrait of nature. Moths and butterflies—any small excerpts

Other pieces that work well for this but aren’t in the concert:

Lincoln Portrait by Aaron Copland The opening credits to the HBO series “John Adams” The Planets by Gustav Holst After students have figured out the “aural” portrait, then can construct a visual portrait. These “portraits” can be used to illustrate the trip to see the symphony, and can also serve in a follow-up reflection activity after the students have attended the concert. EXTRA: adding the dimension of perspective could be especially illuminating. For example, in a nature painting, the perspective from a caterpillar on the ground would be different than from a hawk flying high in the air searching for prey.

Lesson 4: Is it real?

Concept: Our eyes and our ears don’t always give us correct information. Often, what we see or hear can be affected by what we see or hear around the sight or sound on which we focus.

Objectives: Students will watch and listen to phenomena to see how their perception can be influenced. Additionally, they can play a game called “whisper down the lane” to further investigate how our own senses can trick us into believing something exists that does not, or that something that doesn’t exist does.

Materials:

Audio recordings (download from RSO Education page: http://faculty.kutztown.edu/trolling/rsoed.html)

1. Combination Tones

2. Shepherd Tones

The World as the Composer Sees It, RSO 2013 18 Visual Recordings

1. Joseph Albers’ Interaction of Color demonstration: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FDliuSqCEhw

Procedure:

This lesson is primarily focused on providing students with experiences that show them that our senses can trick us into thinking something exists when it actually doesn’t, or that something exists even though we do not see or hear it. After each activity, ask the children if they can think of other ways their hearing/sight/ taste/smell can be tricked.

Activity 1: Interaction of Color. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FDliuSqCEhw

Joseph Albers (1888 to 1976) was a German –American artist who is best known for his work in color and color perception, resulting in a stunning work called the Interaction of Color. What he shows in the book, or in the boxed set, by the use of color plates, is that our perception of color is affected by the conditions around that color. This set of videos shows how the color shifts depending upon its placement. I have linked you to the video that has all of the samples, however, you can also download each one individually.

Sample 1: “ In dealing with color relativity or color illusion, it is critical to distinguish factual facts from actual facts.” You will notice that when the pencils are placed, the two panels they are each between make the colors on the two different panels actually look alike. The boundary is removed, and our eye reconstructs the way the colors are processed. When the pencils are removed, the boundaries reappear and the color panels now look like 4 different colors.

Sample 2: “ In visual perception a color is almost never seen as it really is—as it physically is. This fact makes color the most elative medium in art.” In this video, you see that the pencils actually enhance the color boundaries rather than smudge the borders.

Sample 3: “ The mutual influencing of colors we call Interdependency, seen from the opposite viewpoint, it is Interaction.” When the diamond shape is moved, you will see that it takes on the color characteristics (perceptually) of the diamond it is placed upon.

Sample 4: “When focusing on factual colors, one is tended to think and communicate in these colors although the actual colors will most certainly differ.” You will see how color A actually becomes color B, as well as other variations of color A.

Sample 5: In visual perception a color is almost never seen as it really is – as it physically is. This fact makes color the most relative medium of art.” This sample shows how you will actually see borders blending back into each other after a pencil covering them is picked up.

Sample 6: “ In dealing with color relativity or color illusion, it is practical to distinguish factual facts from actual facts.” This example shows how a pain chip takes on colors of various blocks depending upon how the three-dimensional item is shadowed.

For another class activity, or just for yourself, see if the class can put the color order from hue to hue in this activity: http://www.xrite.com/custom_page.aspx?pageid=77&lang=en

What the above activities highlight is how easily we can be tricked. The same happens with sound.

The World as the Composer Sees It, RSO 2013 19 The following experiences require a good audio system that can play very loudly, but under no circumstances should anyone try this with earphones ( it can cause hearing damage).

Activity 2: Listening to sounds that don’t exist….or do they?

Phenomenon 1: Combination Tones (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Combination_tone) -- First called Tartini tones, after the violinist who discovered them about 1750.. The phenomenon is a result of a distortion effect on the Basilar membrane in the ear.

When two external tones heard, often a combination tone is generated--but the two external tones must be pretty loud. As you listen, you will hear other sounds that sound like they are swooping lower and lower as the two external tones move apart. This is a similar effect one gets when standing between or near two piccolos who are playing but are not exactly in tune—the low buzz sound one hears is another type of basilar distortion.

The thing is, the tone does not exist. Our inner ears are responding to the vibrations and generating their own sounds that our brain then “hears” even though it doesn’t exist.

Phenomenon 2: Shepard Tones (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shepard_tone) match up with the work “Relativity” by M.C. Escher: ( downloadable from the Web anywhere)

:

Shepard tones are an aural version of this same phenomena. By changing the intensities of all the frequencies in a standard scale, your ear is manipulated into thinking that the scale simply does not end. The wiki page can give you more acoustical information on how they are created, but the experience of it is what is crucial here.

Activity 3: Whisper Down the Lane: Play this standard game in which the class stands in a line, and the first person whispers a sentence to the person next to him/her. Make sure it isn’t too simple. The next person whispers the sentence to his/her neighbor, and so on. Usually by the time the sentence reaches the last person it has been changed considerably.


Useful Links and Resources-Teachers and Students Background on Music: Claude Debussy: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Claude_Debussy

http://w3.rz-berlin.mpg.de/cmp/debussy.html http://www.classicsforkids.com/composers/bio.asp?id=16

Ludwig Van Beethoven: http://www.classicsforkids.com/composers/bio.asp?id=4

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=5478661

The World as the Composer Sees It, RSO 2013 21 Camille Saint-Saens: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hjaBGAfWGSU --Carnival of he Animals on YouTube http://www.classicsforkids.com/composers/bio.asp?id=46 Edward Elgar http://www.classicsforkids.com/composers/bio.asp?id=18

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Wand_of_Youth Antonio Vivaldi http://www.classicsforkids.com/composers/bio.asp?id=61

Sonnets: http://www.classicsforkids.com/composers/bio.asp?id=61 Music and Nature http://musicandnature.publicradio.org/ Website on natural music Paintings and Portraits: Metropolitan Museum of Art: http://www.metmuseum.org/ Museum of Modern Art: h ttp://www.moma.org/ National Gallery: http://www.nga.gov/ Tate Gallery (U.K.) http://www.tate.org.uk/

The World as the Composer Sees It

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