Day 162 - The 1st All-Town Chorus Concert was a success! - Mrs. Agati

This post first appeared on Mrs. Agati's Blog

Recently, I had the pleasure of being a part of the first ever All-Town Chorus Concert. A small group of our 5th-grade singers participated in this wonderful event. These students sang two songs with the entire group which consisted of singers from all 4 elementary schools, the middle school, and the high school, as well as performing the song In The Wild from our Pine Glen spring concert. This is an event that the music department plans to continue next year, and it will hopefully become a proud tradition int he town of Burlington.  Here are a few videos from the event:

Day 38 - Spooky Sounds - Mrs. Agati - Pine Glen Music Room

This post originally appeared on Mrs. Agati's Blog

The music room has been full of spooky Halloween music! Here are few examples of what we’ve been playing and singing!

Day 88 - 4th Grade 3+1 Compositions - Mrs. Agati - Pine Glen Music Teacher

This post first appeared in Mrs. Agati's Blog

Learning how to read and perform music is an important goal of music education, but being able to use what you know to create your own composition is extremely important as well. This past week the 4th graders completed a composition inspired by our composer of the month, Franz Joseph Haydn.

After listening to Haydn’s Surprise Symphony, we examined the patterns found in the rhythm of the music. What we discovered is that the rhythm had 3 measures of rhythm that were exactly the same, followed by 1 measure that was different. This is the 3+1 formula, and its a pattern that commonly occurs in the music of many composers and songwriters.

With a partner, the students created a 3+1 rhythm and then learned to perform it. I then challenged them to “make it interesting”. We talked about all the different things that Haydn did to make his music interesting (changing dynamics), and we brainstormed ideas of their own. Here are the resulting compositions: