Table of Contents

New Music Alive Book II: Composition Resources in the Classroom

Lesson Six: Group Compositions

Strand: Composing
Strand Units: Improvising and creating; Talking about and recording compositions
Curriculum Objectives:

  • select from a wide variety of sound sources for a range of musical purposes
  • reflect upon and evaluate his/her work and the work of other children
  • record compositions on electronic media

Linkage: Listening and Responding - Exploring sounds
Concept Development: duration, dynamics, structure, timbre, texture
Integration: ICT
Additional Skills: Using music technology creatively

Group Compositions
40 min

Organise the class into groups of 3-5 students. Each group will work together to compose their own tape piece. They may like to use only the sounds they collected themselves or they may prefer to draw on sounds collected by other groups, or even sounds from earlier lessons.

  • Start a new Audacity file for each group. Each composition will be another track on your class CD!

Look at the recordings made by Group one and project them onto the board. As the other groups wait their turn, they might like to offer their suggestions. Alternatively, they could get a head-start on their own piece by jotting down their different sounds onto small scraps of paper and then arranging them on the desk in the order they might like to play them.

Here's a tip: If the students are offering so many ideas that it seems the piece could go in any number of directions, save a copy of the composition up to that point under a different title. Add a note in your Class Composition Journal about where that path might lead before resuming your work on the piece as it was.

Let each group consider:

  • Which of your sounds would you like to start the piece with?
  • Are there any sounds you want to leave out and any sounds you want to use more than once? Are there any sounds you would like to combine together?
  • Always remember to save your work often! The easiest way is to simply press "Ctrl+S" on your keypad after every few changes you make.
  • Should the music play continuously or should there be any silences?

Now look at the list of effects you made in Lesson Three and choose which ones they would like to use. And remember you don't have to put on effects. You can always just chop, layer and loop sounds as they are.

  • Once again, are there any sounds they would like to use more than once or combine together?
  • Keep listening back to your work as the piece progresses so you have an idea of how long each sound lasts and what might come next.

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Lesson Six: Supplementary Notes

Group Compositions

Keep listening back to your work as the piece progresses so you have an idea of how long each sound lasts and what sound might come next.

You can listen to some examples of 'found sound' compositions made by 5th and 6th Class students below.


ICT Skills

If the facilities are available, this would be a good opportunity to let each group work at their own computer while the teacher moves between them to monitor their progress. Or they may prefer to make one class composition first, led by the teacher, and then perhaps work individually with their own found sounds. Let each student/group play their finished work to the class.

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