Minimalism
Subject: Music
Age range: 5-7
Resource type: Lesson (complete)
An engaging, practical scheme of work of 6 hour-long music lessons for KS3 or KS4, with plenty of activities involving performing, composing and listening. Included in the downloads are everything you need to deliver this project (all of them editable): teacher's lesson plans and notes (including assessment sheet), pupils' worksheets, example composition and presentation, including audio/video links to YouTube.
Tried-and-tested over several years as a Year 9 project, this would also work for Year 7 or 8, or even for Year 10, particularly as a way of getting pupils into composition. The project does not require knowledge of music notation, but there is an additional notation-based composition task for more advanced pupils.
Objectives
• To experience, through listening and performing, how a whole piece music can be created from one simple idea
• To practise minimalist techniques through performing and composing
• To listen to and analyse music by the minimalist composers John Adams, Steve Reich, Philip Glass, Michael Nyman and Terry Riley
Lesson Overview
• Lesson 1 – Motif and Ostinato
• Lesson 2 – Note Addition and Note Subtraction
• Lesson 3 – Canon and Layering
• Lesson 4 – Augmentation and Diminution
• Lesson 5 – Phasing and Phase-Shifting
• Lesson 6 – Class Composition/Performance ‘in C’
Subject-specific vocabulary
• MINIMALISM – a style of music which started in the USA in the 1960s. It is characterised by simple, repetitive patterns which are transformed throughout the piece, using various techniques, including:
o Motif – a basic rhythmic or melodic pattern
o Ostinato – a repeating pattern
o Note Addition – gradually adding notes to a motif
o Note Subtraction – gradually taking away notes from a motif
o Canon – two or more parts performing the same motif but starting at different times
o Layering – the process of adding or taking away parts (or layers)
o Augmentation – the motif played in longer note values
o Diminution – the motif played in shorter note values
o Phasing – two or more parts gradually getting ‘out of sync’ with each other
o Phase-shifting – two or more parts getting ‘out of sync’ by one beat at a time
Assessments
• Performing – Steve Reich’s Clapping Music
• Composing – minimalist piece for two instruments, based on a simple one-bar motif
• Listening – listening exercise on Steve Reich’s Electric Counterpoint
Tried-and-tested over several years as a Year 9 project, this would also work for Year 7 or 8, or even for Year 10, particularly as a way of getting pupils into composition. The project does not require knowledge of music notation, but there is an additional notation-based composition task for more advanced pupils.
Objectives
• To experience, through listening and performing, how a whole piece music can be created from one simple idea
• To practise minimalist techniques through performing and composing
• To listen to and analyse music by the minimalist composers John Adams, Steve Reich, Philip Glass, Michael Nyman and Terry Riley
Lesson Overview
• Lesson 1 – Motif and Ostinato
• Lesson 2 – Note Addition and Note Subtraction
• Lesson 3 – Canon and Layering
• Lesson 4 – Augmentation and Diminution
• Lesson 5 – Phasing and Phase-Shifting
• Lesson 6 – Class Composition/Performance ‘in C’
Subject-specific vocabulary
• MINIMALISM – a style of music which started in the USA in the 1960s. It is characterised by simple, repetitive patterns which are transformed throughout the piece, using various techniques, including:
o Motif – a basic rhythmic or melodic pattern
o Ostinato – a repeating pattern
o Note Addition – gradually adding notes to a motif
o Note Subtraction – gradually taking away notes from a motif
o Canon – two or more parts performing the same motif but starting at different times
o Layering – the process of adding or taking away parts (or layers)
o Augmentation – the motif played in longer note values
o Diminution – the motif played in shorter note values
o Phasing – two or more parts gradually getting ‘out of sync’ with each other
o Phase-shifting – two or more parts getting ‘out of sync’ by one beat at a time
Assessments
• Performing – Steve Reich’s Clapping Music
• Composing – minimalist piece for two instruments, based on a simple one-bar motif
• Listening – listening exercise on Steve Reich’s Electric Counterpoint
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£12.00