Year 9

Soundtracks

This  unit aims to give pupils the experience of being “film soundtrack composers” and explores the challenges and musical devices used in film soundtrack composition.   The unit focuses on three genres of film soundtrack: Action/Thriller Soundtracks, ‘Western’ Soundtracks and “Horror Movie” Soundtracks.  Pupils begin by exploring Leitmotifs and how they have been used to represent certain “characters” or “situations” in films, before exploring how Themes have been used in film soundtracks and performing a number of “James Bond” Themes.  Pupils compose their own soundtrack to the new James Bond film trailer “Spectre” learning how film composers use “Cuesheets” to create music to fit with exact timings.  Pupils perform a famous Theme from a ‘Western’ exploring how film music composers use instruments “associated” with ‘The Wild West’  to create a sense of Time and Place.  Finally, pupils explore soundtracks to “Horror Movies”, learning about Concords andDiscords and how composers of “Horror Movies” use Discords, instrumentation and extremes of Pitch to create their own “Horror Movie” soundtrack using a Storyboard to help them with their planning.

Element Focus – Pitch, Timbre & Dynamics, Melody & Harmony, Structure & Form

Key Vocabulary

BASS CLEF – A musical symbol indicating to performers to perform the notes and a certain (low) pitch

CHORD – A series of notes played together at the same time e.g. the James Bond Leitmotif

CONCORD – A chord where the notes sound ‘comfortable’ or ‘happy’ with each other e.g. chord of C major.

CRESCENDO – Gradually getting louder.

CUESHEET – A detailed listing of musical cues matching the visual action of a film so that composers can time their music accurately to match the visual images.

DISCORD – A chord where the notes sound like they ‘clash’ together – often producing a ‘tense’ feel

DYNAMICS – The volume of the music or sounds – loud or soft; getting louder or getting softer.

LEITMOTIF – A short melodic theme within a film soundtrack, representing a particular object, idea or character in the story and often returning in the background or in altered form.  For example, James Bond has his own leitmotif in the Bond films.

PITCH – The highness or lowness of a sound, indicated by clefs.  Horror movie composers often use extremes of high and low pitch when creating musical soundtracks to create a feeling of ‘tension’ and ‘suspense’

REPEAT MARKS – A musical symbol made up of two dots and two bar lines, indicating to the performer to go back to the beginning (or to the previous ‘inverted’ repeat marks) and perform the music again.

SOUNDTRACK – The music and sound recorded on a motion-picture film.  The word “soundtrack” can often mean a commercial recording of a collection of music and songs from a film sold individually as an audio CD.

STORYBOARD – A planning tool (similar to a cuesheet) used by film soundtrack composers to plan the music to different scenes within a film.

THEME – A main tune or theme within a film soundtrack, representing a particular character, ideas or object in the story and often returning in the background or in altered form.

TIMING CLICKS – A series of sounds which precede a musical soundtrack recording enabling editors to “sync” the musical soundtrack exactly with the video.

 

Final Project examples

 

Unit 2 – Rock n Roll

This unit introduces pupils to the genre of Rock ‘n’ Roll and its emergence in the 1950’s.  Pupils learn about the origins of Rock ‘n’ Roll and features which are characteristic of its style including bass lines, chords and revise the twelve-bar blues as a basis upon which many Rock ‘n’ Roll songs are constructed.  Pupils learn about the construction of triads and how these are formed from bass lines as a type of chord producing harmony.  Pupil’s take part in an ensemble performance of “Rock Around the Clock” before composing their own Rock ‘n’ Roll songs using features they have learned about during the unit.

Element Focus – Pitch, Texture, Melody & Harmony

Key Vocabulary

BASS LINE – the lowest part of the musical texture upon which the chords and harmony are based

CHORD – a group of two or more notes played together at the same time

CHORD PROGRESSION – a set series of chords e.g. twelve bar blues

FIFTH – the note which is the interval of a fifth (five notes) above the root of a chord or triad

HARMONY – the sound produced by different notes or parts performing together

LYRICS – another term for the words of a song, the title of a song is often taken from the chorus lyrics

PASSING NOTES – notes which “fill in” between more important notes e.g. in a walking bass line

ROOT – the lowest note of a chord or triad upon which it is built

SCAT SINGING – the term given to the sounds of the voice imitating instruments.  Scat singing is usually improvised and uses nonsense syllables and vowel sounds to imitate the patterns and sound performed by the instrumentalists

THIRD – the note which is the interval of a third (three notes) above the root of a chord or triad

TRIAD – a type of chord constructed of the root, third and fifth

TWELVE-BAR BLUES – a type of chord progression upon which much Rock ‘n’ Roll music is based

WALKING BASS – a type of bass line that uses passing notes and “walks” up and down in pitch

 

Project examples. Original compositions.

Unit 3 Minimalism

This unit develops pupils’ understanding of polyrhythmic music and contemporary minimalist styles exploring how different polyrhythmic textures and musical conventions are used by minimalist composers including the use of repetitive and changing rhythmic and melodic motifs in different styles of minimalist music. The main focus of this unit is rhythm: cyclic rhythm, polyrhythm and moving in/out of phase and also looks at structure including cyclic structure and motivic transformation. Pupils explore a range  of minimalist music including “Clapping Music”, “Tubular Bells” and “Oxygene (Part IV)”.

Element Focus – Rhythm, Pitch, Texture, Structure & Form

Key Vocabulary

ABSTRACT – Abstract art – a trend in painting and sculpture in the Twentieth Century.  Abstract art seeks to break away from traditional representation of physical objects.  It explores the relationships for forms and colours, whereas more traditional art uses more recognizable images

MOTIF– also called “CELL” – a short tune or musical figure that characterizes and unifies a composition; usually only a few notes long; motifs can be a melodic, harmonic or rhythmic pattern that is easily recognizable throughout the composition

PHASE IN/PHASE OUT– the gradual introduction or termination of a new rhythmic or melodic idea introduced into the texture of Minimalist music

PHASE SHIFT– the process whereby two or more motifs begin in unison and gradually become “out of time” with each other through displacement either forwards or backwards

POLYRHYTHMS– the use of several rhythms performed simultaneously, often overlapping each other to create a thick texture

 

Examples of student work

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2 Comments
  1. Dear Felipe,
    Thanks for your interesting post! I’m quite surprised to find that you are teaching the exact same schemes of work that I was asked to teach in the UK in 1999 – and with the same results. One of the great features of Musical Futures is the engagement of students with contemporary repertoire – often through songs that the students choose themselves and bring to class. This is a highly motivational and energising feature of MF. The MF website has loads of resources to look at. I hope you can make it to Melbourne for the Musical Futures ‘Big Gig’ later in the year! Kind regards, J

    • Dear Jenny,
      Thanks for your comment. I find these units work very well where i am currently working and where i have worked in the past but I know what you mean. The problem i had in the UK is that I had only 5-6 weeks to deliver a unit which is completely crazy now that I have taken my time to really dig deep and let the unit run for even an entire term. I found that spending longer time on these units gives me room to balance between what I give (old style) and what the students bring (MF approach). I think it’s important to balance the wagging of the tail, if this makes sense… I still want the students to know certain concepts that happen for example in Minimalism.
      From Rock and Roll I can easily go into contemporary repertoire that MF offers making making more connections along the way. Student engagement is important and I find that it not only comes from using music which the students listen to which is the MF approach but engagement also comes from the way in which something is delivered. I am hoping to go to the Big Gig this year!

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