Music Notes: End of December 2013

Music Notes

December 2013

Greetings from the Lannoye music room!

I’m very proud of all of our students for the spectacular winter concert performance they gave earlier this week! They were great vocalists, instrumentalists, speakers, and audience members. Audience members were able to witness this cross-sectional view of students’ growth from kindergarten through 5^th grade. We had a great turnout and a wonderful day of performing!

As a reminder, whenever your child goes to any performance (band, choir, etc.) outside of the school day, if s/he brings back a program with a sentence written on it stating one thing s/he liked about the concert and why, s/he will receive a DRUM (Demonstrating Respect and Understanding in Music) card. I encourage everyone to explore the musical performances in the area. Speaking of which, there is a time change for tomorrow night’s Christmas Collage concert, featuring the Pulaski Area Community Band, children’s choir, and Ringers & Singers.

            Thursday, December 19          7 - 8 pm           Community Band Christmas Collage
                                                                                                PHS Ripley PAC

Attending outside performances is not required, but it is a great way to explore the musical happenings in the community (and a way for your child to earn a DRUM card). J

Glancing ahead to area performances in 2014…

If your family is interested, there is a variety of shows coming to the Fox Cities Performing Arts Center in Appleton in the next six months, including Wicked (The Wizard of Oz told from the Wicked Witch of the West’s perspective), Step Afrika! (a professional step show), Disney’s Beauty and the Beast, Sister Act, The Phantom of the Opera (the longest-running show in Broadway history), and the Fox Valley Symphony’s performance of Carmina Burana. There will also be a variety of performances at the Weidner Center in Green Bay, including Man of la Mancha (the musical about the literary character Don Quixote), West African Dance of Madison, and the Green Bay Symphony Orchestra’s performance of Ode to Joy. The Meyer Theatre in Green Bay is also hosting numerous events, including Doctors in Recital (over 50 area physicians perform musically to raise money for local charities), Gaelic Storm, and multiple performances by both the Civic Symphony of Green Bay and the Allouez Village Band. Over break, I will assemble a blog post with all of this information in it and more, including ticket prices and links to the events.

Moving back to the present, the 2^nd graders are finishing up their unit on The Nutcracker this week. In addition to learning about (and listening to) the story, they learned about the similarities and differences between authors, composers, and choreographers. They also learned a fun fact about composer Peter Ilyich Tchaikovsky: He was convinced that if he conducted an orchestra, his head would fall off! He combated this fear by holding his head with one hand and conducting with the other. The students also took a field trip to see the Northeastern Wisconsin Dance Organization perform highlights of Act II of The Nutcracker last Friday, and they found it enjoyable, with “relaxing music,” as one student told me afterward.

I've really enjoyed the portion of 2013 that I spent with your children, and I’m looking forward to continuing our learning and music-making journey in 2014! Happy holidays and safe travels, everyone!

As always, if you have any questions, don’t hesitate to contact me.

Ms. Corinne Galligan
(920) 822-0433
cmgalligan@pulaskischools.org
lannoyemusic.blogspot.com 

Happy Holidays!

In the spirit of the holidays, I thought I would share some fun music-related holiday videos with you all!

Straight No Chaser: "12 Days of Christmas"
Straight No Chaser is a male a cappella group (no instruments). Here is their rendition of "The 12 Days of Christmas"...with some other songs thrown in the middle of it!

Claymation Christmas: "Carol of the Bells"
This piece probably sounds familiar, but it might look different in this video! The narrator has a "hunch" (get it - because Quasimodo, the Hunchback of Notre Dame, is conducting it?) that it will be a good performance. Instead of having people play the bells, the bells play themselves! One of the bells is rather naughty, though...how will they get through the piece of music?!

Claymation Christmas: "Here We Come A-Waffling"
This clip from Claymation Christmas is a parody (silly version) of the song "Here We Come A-Wassailing." This is the original version of the 3rd graders' song "Here We Come A-Caroling." However, "wassailing" kind of sounds like "waffling," so there is a bit of confusion...until some carolers turn up singing the original song and explain that wassailing is caroling!

The Piano Guys: "Angels We Have Heard on High"
This is the 32-fingers-and-8-thumbs (how many people is that?) version of "Angels We Have Heard on High."

The Piano Guys: "Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer"
Isn't it such a bummer when nothing you do impresses your own dog?

The Piano Guys: "We Three Kings"
I'd be a little scared to play on an ice rink...

The Piano Guys: "O Come, Emmanuel"
This has always been one of my favorite Christmas songs. It just has such a beautiful melody!

The Piano Guys: "Carol of the Bells" for 12 cellos
This video shows the awesomeness of video editing.

Pentatonix: "The Little Drummer Boy"
Pentatonix is an a cappella (without instruments) group. They do some really neat song arrangements!

Pentatonix: "Angels We Have Heard on High"'

Lindsey Stirling: Celtic Carol
Lindsey Stirling composes, arranges, and choreographs her own music and dances. She's a YouTube violin sensation with lots of videos and lots of views! (And no, she's not always dressed like an elf.)

"I Want a Hippopotamus for Christmas"

"Christmas Don't Be Late" (The Chipmunks Song)

United States Air Force Band: Holiday Flash Mob 2013
Featuring both "Jesu, Joy of Man's Desiring" and "Joy to the World"
The USAF Band (plus a few strings and singers) did a flash mob performance at the National Air and Space Museum.

Do you have any other videos you think should be in this post? Send me an email at cmgalligan@pulaskischools.org with the link, and if I agree, I'll add it!

Found Instruments: Ice, Garbage Cans, Sports Equipment, Vegetables, Cars...and more!

Not all instruments have a place in the band or orchestra. Some of them are called found instruments, which basically means that if you can pick something up and make a sound on it...congratulations, you've found an instrument!

Not all found instruments fit nicely into the woodwind/brass/string/percussion categories, but they fit into even broader instrument categories. These categories are the following:

• Idiophone (produces sound through vibration, like claves, guiro, xylophone, maracas, etc.)
• Membranophone (produces sound by vibrating a stretched membrane, like that of a drum head; examples include drums and kazoos)
• Chordophone (produces sound by vibrating one or more strings; includes piano, violin, banjo, etc.)
• Aerophone (produces sound using a vibrating column of air, like flute, saxophone, trumpet, trombone, whip, slide whistle, etc.)
• Electrophone (produces sound electronically, like the clavinova (the piano in the classroom) or theremin) 

Now for the cool part: seeing found instruments in action!

Ice of Lake Baikal in Siberia (a super-cold, very large part of Russia)

Stomp!

Basketballs and shoes

Vegetables

All sorts of things...not necessarily all "found," but quite complex (link to the creative process for the music video and all the planning that went into it - super neat!)

Household objects
Please note that this is a Swedish comedy film with trained actors. Do not treat your electrical appliances like this. Do not use other people's toothbrushes. Do not spray all of the hairspray and perfume you can get your hands on at once. Be safe. This has been a public service announcement from the music room.

Created from garbage in a landfill

This video is especially neat because not all areas of the world have the money for music education, and this is one way that a town in Paraguay has devised to combat this issue.

If you want to earn a DRUM card, watch at least 2 of these videos and tell me what you thought about them in at least 3-5 sentences using proper spelling and grammar (as well as proper punctuation and capitalization!).

Music Notes: End of November 2013

Music Notes

End of November 2013

  

Greetings from the Lannoye music room!

We are currently deep in our winter concert preparations here in the music room. As a reminder, our winter concert will be held on Monday, December 16, with performances at 12:30 pm and 2:30 pm. All grades, K-5, will be performing. I will send out a reminder email to all parents closer to the event.

Speaking of performances, I would like to congratulate the 5th graders on their spectacular performance in the first-ever district-wide Kaleidoscope Concert last Thursday, November 14! They were excellent performers and audience members, and judging from the reflection surveys I received, they enjoyed it a lot! I was very proud of them for all of the work they put into the concert. Thank you, 5^th grade parents, for bringing them to the dress rehearsal and the concert. We all appreciate it!

December is a time of plenty of performances. Whenever your child goes to any concert (band, choir, etc.) outside of the school day, if s/he brings back a program with a sentence written on it stating one thing s/he liked about the concert and why, s/he will receive a DRUM card. I encourage everyone to explore the musical performances in the area. Here’s a list of upcoming concerts in Pulaski that may interest your family:

            Tuesday, December 10           6:30 – 8:30 pm            PCMS Choir Concert/Bake Sale
                                                                                                PCMS Auditorium

            Saturday, December 14          7 – 8:30 pm                 PHS Sounds of the Season Concert
                                                                                                Peace Lutheran Church

            Tuesday, December 17           7 – 8:30 pm                 PHS Band and Choir Winter Concert
                                                                                                PHS Ripley PAC

            Thursday, December 19          6:30 – 7:30 pm            Community Band Christmas Collage
                                                                                                PHS Ripley PAC

Again, attending these concerts is not required, but it is a great way to explore the musical happenings in the community (and a way for your child to earn a DRUM card). J

In other recent news, the 4^th and 5^th graders attended a Civic Symphony of Green Bay concert last Friday, November 15. I was very pleased by how attentive they were and by the excitement on their faces as they got to see and hear the instruments in full ensemble action! They had a great time, and it was a wonderful way to culminate our instrument unit.

The 3^rd graders are gaining multicultural experience in music class. One of their songs for the winter concert is a traditional Russian Christmas song. The students learned about the years that Christmas was outlawed, and how the Russian people found a loophole to sing this song. (Ask your 3^rd grader what s/he learned about Russia and the USSR! If a memory trigger is necessary, their Russian history lesson is posted on the music blog.)

Kindergarten, 1^st grade, and 2^nd grade have all been continuing to reinforce topics that we learned about in October while learning our winter music. Notably, the 1^st graders have now learned the proper names for ta (quarter note), ti-ti (two eighth notes), and rest (quarter rest), and can even draw them! (Ask your 1^st grader why dogs and puppies are important to remember…)

Throughout our adventure of concert preparations thus far, I’ve been warmed by your children’s love for music and singing. I’m looking forward to seeing everyone on December 16 for our winter concert!

As always, if you have any questions, don’t hesitate to contact me. Also, please check out the blog! I updated the template so you can sign up for email updates along the right side of the home page.

Ms. Corinne Galligan
(920) 822-0433
cmgalligan@pulaskischools.org
lannoyemusic.blogspot.com

Kaleidoscope Concert

Congratulations to the 5th graders who performed in the Kaleidoscope concert tonight! Everyone did a fantastic job, and you made us all proud.

"Music Alone Shall Live" (music starts at 0:52)

"An American Celebration" (music starts at 2:00)

I got pretty excited when I heard that the high school percussionists were going to do a small feature using rhythms from Riverdance. Fun fact: I, Ms. Galligan, was an Irish dancer for 6 years throughout middle school and high school.

Here's the dance where they got the rhythm:

Another fun fact: Michael Flatley (the solo dancer in the video) toured with Riverdance for a short time before creating his own show, Lord of the Dance. His legs are insured for $40,000,000. Yes, that is the right number of zeros. By the way, he also plays the flute!

3rd Grade: "Yolochka"

The 3rd graders are learning a Russian Christmas song, "Yolochka," for the winter concert.

A Russian cartoon, Masha and the Bear, using the song "Yolochka"

There's another cartoon at the end of this post that shows the story of the tree as the song is sung.

The song is about the life of a Christmas tree (or fir tree) growing in a forest.

Photo courtesy of High Country Christmas Trees

This song has an interesting history behind it. It was first published in Russia in 1903. Russia is a country in the continent of Asia, and it's really big!

Image from mapsofworld.com 

Russia is the largest country in the world - it's almost twice the size of the United States. The map below shows an outline of Russia placed over the United States so you can compare the sizes of the two countries. 

Image from mapfrappe.blogspot.com

In 1917, a civil war started in Russia. It ended in 1922, but with a new government in place, and with larger borders. Russia combined with some other countries to form the USSR (Union of Soviet Socialist Republics). 

The new government was very strict, and they had harsh punishments for people who did not follow their laws. People were no longer allowed to celebrate Christmas! Instead, the people of the USSR moved a bunch of their Christmas traditions (like decorating a fir tree and exchanging gifts) to New Year's, which they were allowed to celebrate. Since "Yolochka" is about a tree, they were still allowed to sing that song. 

The USSR dissolved (broke apart) in 1991, and now the people can celebrate Christmas again. New Year's is still a big holiday, though, after celebrating it as such for so many years.

The lyrics (or words) of the first verse look like this in Russian (which uses a different alphabet than English):

В лесу родилась елочка,

В лесу она росла.

Зимой и летом стройная,

Зеленая была.

 This is what that sounds like in English:

Vlayzoo rodeelas Yolochka
Vlayzoo ohna rosla
Zeemoy ee lee-ehtome stroynaya
Zelyonaya bilah 

And finally, here are all five verses in English:

1. The forest raised a Christmas tree,

‘Twas silent and serene

In winter and in summer

It was slender and so green.

2. The wind sang it a lullaby:

Sleep Christmas tree, sleep tight!

The snow was making clothes for it:

It was a pretty sight!

3. A trembling bunny put himself

Beneath its arms so wide;

The hungry wolf just passed him by -

A lovely place to hide!

4. Some sleigh bells rang throughout the woods,

The snow was crisp and clean,

A horsey brought a forester

To hew that tree so green.

5. And now it comes to visit us,

With lights and garlands bright,

While all the children dance and sing

To greet it with delight!

The Piano Guys (just a few of their awesome videos...)

The Piano Guys have a channel on YouTube that I definitely recommend if you are able to access it. Their story is neat - click on the first link above to check it out. Fun facts: The Piano Guys started in Utah. The cellist has ADHD and is super creative. A bunch of this group met by completely random happenstance.

Star Wars fans: Check out "Cello Wars" - The creative ideas in the video are great (light saber cello bows? Jedi versus Sith? Darth Vader plays a...what?). You'll never guess what Darth Vader plays...

"Mission Impossible" - This one is funnier when you remember that cellists have to sit down to play. Poor Steve is running around with a folding chair, and Lindsey Stirling, who guest stars in this video, is too fast for him to set up.

"Paradise" (originally by Coldplay) - Yes, the piano is actually up there. The Piano Guys have an operations manager who doubles as a "Piano Stunt Coordinator" because he's a fearless piano mover (as evidenced by where the piano is in this video).

"Rockelbel's Canon" (arrangement of Pachelbel's "Canon in D") - The cello part for this song is...repetitive...to say the least. The poor cellist plays the same 8 notes in the same order, in the same rhythm, for the whole piece. This can be bad when the cellist you hire for your wedding comes to the job sleepy...

Rock Meets Rachmaninoff - Check out the piano videos in the string family post - one of them is a Rachmaninoff piece. Here's a rocking arrangement of another Rachmaninoff piece, "Prelude in C# Minor."

I encourage you to check out more of their videos!

If it's hammered, plucked, or bowed, then it is a string, you know!

And finally...the string family.

First, an amusing quartet made up of two violins, a cello, and a piano.

Piano

The piano's strings are hammered, which is how the sound is created.

A cute older couple (married for 62 years when this video was taken in 2008!) playing the piano at the Mayo Clinic

Sergei Rachmaninoff (1873-1943), a famous piano composer, plays the first movement from his Piano Concerto No. 2 

This is a recording of him doing it in 1929, and the recording is set to pictures of him. The Philadelphia Orchestra, conducted by Leopold Stokowski (1882-1977), a famous conductor.

This video shows some ways that contemporary (modern) composers and pianists achieve different sounds on the piano.

The Piano Guys playing an interesting arrangement of One Direction's hit "That's What Makes You Beautiful."

Harpsichord

Remember, the harpsichord's strings are actually plucked!

This is a video of a trio made up of a violin, a cello, and a harpsichord. See if you can pick out the different instruments' sounds.

This is a video of someone's homemade Lego harpsichord and how it works.

Harp

A harp cover of Owl City's song "Fireflies"

Marcel Grandjany's Rhapsodie, performed by Sivan Magen

Guitar

Guitar quartet

Slash (originally from the band Guns N' Roses, later started Velvet Revolver, also has solo career) plays some rhythm and lead guitar parts

Bass Guitar (Electric Bass)

Victor Wooten playing a bass guitar solo in a Dave Matthews Band concert

Laying down a bass line over a drum set

Violin

Joshua Bell playing "Ave Maria"

Pentatonix and Lindsey Stirling (violin) perform "Radioactive" by Imagine Dragons

Viola

Nobuko Imai

Yuri Bashmet

Cello

Yo-Yo Ma playing the prelude from Bach's Cello Suite No. 1

Steven Sharp Nelson (from The Piano Guys) playing electric cello with himself, thanks to technology and video editing

Double bass

Samuel Barber's Adagio for Strings played by double bass quartet

Jazz  bassist Christian McBride

Esperanza Spalding, bassist and singer

Conductors

What do conductors do, anyway? Do they just stand at the podium and keep a beat?

Nope!

Conductors use their faces, hands, and body language to convey (show):

• Tempo (speed)
• Dynamics (volume)
• Time signature (is the piece in 4/4? 3/4? 6/8? etc)
• Mood (is it a bouncy, happy piece, or a slow, mournful (sad) piece?)
• Articulation (is it a light staccato or more of a weighted staccato?)
• Cues (do different instruments play at different times? is there a soloist?)

The conductor also has to study the score (all of the musicians' parts on the same page, usually many, many pages long - for example, the link on the word "score" is for the band version of "Strange Humors" by John Mackey - it's 24 pages long, and it has 36 people's parts on it!) very closely and know what each musician is doing at all points in the piece of music. It's hard to make eye contact if you're staring at the music the whole time, so conductors can express the qualities listed above the best when they have the score memorized.

The video below is an interview with Marin Alsop, Music Director of the Baltimore Symphony. 

(If you'd like, start at 2:00 to skip the not-as-relevant-to-what-we're-learning stuff.) 

(This is the video we watched in class where Katie Couric, the newscaster, tried to conduct an ensemble.)

This video is a CBS This Morning segment featuring Wynton Marsalis (famous jazz and classical trumpet player) explaining the similarities between quarterbacks and orchestra conductors. In it, he interviews New England Patriots quarterback Tom Brady and New York Philharmonic conductor Alan Gilbert. Football players/fans and sports fans, I think you'll appreciate this one!

The last video shows a lot of Gustavo Dudamel's conducting from the orchestra's perspective. He says that the conductor's instrument is not just the baton - it is the whole body. (He definitely embodies that statement!) The orchestra is playing Danzon No. 2 by Arturo Marquez. The camera angles are great - you can see a lot of the instruments we've talked about! (Sorry, no saxophone or euphonium, though.)

Earn a DRUM Card! (PACB concert on November 3, 2 pm, PHS)

Lannoye music students have the opportunity* to
EARN A DRUM CARD!

(Demonstrating Respect and Understanding in Music)

Step 1: Attend the Pulaski Area Community Band and Jazz Band Concert on Sunday, November 3, at 2 pm in the high school auditorium.

Step 2: Write down something you liked about the concert and why you liked it. You can write this on your program.

Step 3: Bring Ms. Galligan your program (with your sentence about what you liked and why) in exchange for a DRUM card! J

* This is not a required event.

End of October Notes

Hello, all!

This has been a whirlwind of a month in the music room at Lannoye! Here’s a snapshot of what we’ve been doing this month:

The kindergarteners are continuing to learn about steady beat, forte/piano, fast/slow, high/low, while singing songs and playing musical games to reinforce concepts.

First graders learned about the difference between rhythm and steady beat, and have begun learning ta and ti-ti (quarter note and two eighth notes). We have explored this using human rhythms (chairs represent steady beats, and students create ta and ti-ti rhythms by sitting on the chairs alone or with a partner to show how many sounds are on each beat) and food rhythms (paper plates represent steady beats, and students create ta and ti-ti rhythms using one- and two-syllable play food).

The second graders have done rhythm studies, learning about the half note (ta-a) and half rest. One of their favorite parts of learning rhythm is music math – it gives them a different way to look at addition and subtraction when we’re using rhythms instead of numbers!

Third graders have also continued their rhythm studies, adding tiri-tiri (four 16^th notes) to their rhythmic vocabulary. We have danced and played games to reinforce this concept.

The fourth and fifth graders have been learning about the instrument families in preparation for their trip to see the Civic Symphony of Green Bay perform in a couple weeks. So far, we’ve gotten through the percussion, woodwind, and brass families, and they’ve really enjoyed seeing and hearing the instruments in class. Their knowledge retention is phenomenal!

The fifth graders are also preparing for the first-ever district-wide Kaleidoscope concert, to be held in the Pulaski High School gym at 7 pm on Thursday, November 14. They will be performing “Music Alone Shall Live” with fifth graders from all of the other elementary schools. There will also be performances from middle school band, middle school choir, high school band, and high school choir. The concert will conclude with a mass performance of “An American Celebration,” a medley of patriotic tunes performed by all of the music students in the concert! I’m very excited to see our students share their talents with the district.

Looking ahead, we will begin preparing for our winter concert quite soon! There are all sorts of fun songs picked for the students, and I’m looking forward to sharing our musicianship with everyone! J

As a reminder, the Lannoye Music Blog is still up and running! There are a lot of instrument videos posted for anyone who is interested – I tried to find a video or sound clip for every single instrument that we learned about! (Students – these are some of the videos I told you about in class, and many more! There’s even a link to a video of me playing a silly piece on the piccolo for my senior recital in college.) Bookmark it on your computer, or sign up for email alerts every time there’s a new blog post! The website is:

http://lannoyemusic.blogspot.com

I love making music with your children, and hope to meet some of you at parent/teacher conferences next week! If you’d like to schedule a conference, please email me. J

Ms. Galligan
(920) 822-0433
cmgalligan@pulaskischools.org
lannoyemusic.blogspot.com

B-b-b-buzz your lips - b-b-brass instruments!

Up next: The brass family!

Trumpet (link to the University of Minnesota Marching Band's 2013 homecoming show with a big trumpet feature on the first piece of music that they play, "Scream Machine")

Adolph "Bud" Herseth plays the trumpet solo in the beginning of this Chicago Symphony Orchestra performance of Gustav Mahler's 5th symphony

Maynard Ferguson and his band performing "Birdland" (Can you pick out the other instrument sounds in the video as well?)

Horn

Dale Clevenger (who retired as the principal hornist of the Chicago Symphony Orchestra in 2013) performing Mozart's 2nd horn concerto (the solo starts about 50 seconds in)

Mellophone

This is the marching band version of the horn (kind of like the sousaphone is the marching band version of a tuba). Listen for it in the following Drum Corps International clip of the Bluecoats performing their 2011 show, "Brave New World." The mellos are the instruments with the melody, and they're in the front of the group doing all sorts of leg choreography. (See if you can find the contras too - that's the other marching version of a tuba, up on your shoulder!)

Trombone

Trombone Shorty

John Philip Sousa's "Stars and Stripes Forever," trombone quartet style 

Listen for the piccolo solo that I played for you in class...on trombone!

Bass Trombone

Euphonium

Adam Frey plays the song "Nessun Dorma" from Puccini's opera Turandot - this was originally a vocal solo, but it sounds beautiful on the euphonium too!

Tuba

This is Carol Jantsch from the Philadelphia Orchestra playing "Flight of the Bumblebee" with some middle school/high school students.

Sousaphone

Nat McIntosh beatboxing into a sousaphone