Check out this great story from Paraguay. Instruments made from materials from a landfill garbage site and played by local children and young adults.

Both are appearing this week at Muang Thong Thani (Impact Arena). Sting on Wednesday, Elton John on Thursday.

Dave Brubeck, famous American jazz pianist and composer, died today, age 91.

Here is a link for more details: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment-arts-20609327

Here is a video of his most famous jazz piece, ‘Take Five’.

Dave Brubeck is playing the piano, not the saxophone.

Unusually, the music is organised into groups of 5 beats.
You can count 1 2 3 4 5 throughout the music.

The saxophone player is improvising, that means he makes up his music to fit with the piano music.

Listen to this very famous piece of music by the German composer Carl Orff (1895-1982).

How is the music changing?
Can you imagine a story to go with the music?
If this was film music, what would the film be about?

href=”https://blogs.nist.ac.th/elemusic/wp-content/uploads/2012/11/Beethoven.jpg”>

In year 2 we will be using IT to explore the decisions composers make when they create music.
Why repeat musical ideas?
Why use ideas that contrast one another?
Why are some sounds long and some sounds short?

Check out Beethoven’s famous Symphony Number 5 below and notice how some sounds are short and some long.

Why do you think he chose to organise his sounds like this?

Charles Ives – The Unanswered Question

As we draw our current “How we express ourselves” unit to a close, I would like to offer the students in year 2 an opportunity to share a musical example of their cultural identity. This is optional and should not create any extra work in any way. Examples can be shared over the course of the next 2 or 3 music lessons, as part of our ‘Music and Me’ time and we will continue to study musical examples from Thailand, Kenya and other parts of the world.
Examples might be: a significant musical instrument (or a photo or video of one if it is difficult to bring to school), a dance move or a song. The most important thing is that there is some brief thought or discussion as to how the artefact is connected to your child’s culture. It could be an example from a home country, a country lived in for a while or even a country visited on holiday that has significance.
I have shared my East African drums and instruments from Kenya and Tanzania with the students as they embody a very important part of my musical life, when I lived in Africa for 3 years.

East African drums are an important part of my cultural identity.