Music
By the end of Key Stage 3, students will have gained an in depth knowledge of some of the great musical output of human civilisation (popular, world and classical) to broaden musical knowledge, breadth and appreciation of composers and styles of music, engaged with creative processes through improvisation and composition using music technology and classroom instruments, explored the musical elements to develop their ideas and become fluent in notating their ideas using traditional methods of reading and writing music and considered various pathways they may take to use these skills within the music industry.
The foci of the Year 7 unit Folk Music explores Sea Shanties, British and World folk songs to build confidence in using their voice, singing traditional songs and introduces students to reading treble clef music notation, diatonic melodies, intervals of an octave and fifth and performing melodies with simple accompaniments on the keyboard including Drones, Pedals, Ostinati and basic chords (major and minor) either using keyboard functions or as full chords.
The following units (Film Music – Introduction to the elements of music) will develop their listening, composition skills and reinforce keyboard skills further while broadening their understanding of the elements, basic time signatures, chromatic scales and instruments of the orchestra. Students will also consider how the great canon of Western Classical music, including composers such as Hildegard Von Bingen (unusual to have female composers in this time period), Palestrina ( a good example of vocal unaccompanied music, Monteverdi (the pioneer of opera), Bach (a leading light of church music), Vivaldi (a crossover composer bridging the Baroque and the Classical period , Mozart (a great example of Repetition, Contrast and Structure in music) Beethoven (seen as the bridge between the Classical and Romantic period - developing expression in music), has enriched the musical kaleidoscope that is cinematic music from the 1940s onward (John Williams).
Students are encouraged to explore music and culture from around the world and the Fusion Music unit will introduce the concept of fusion music, mixing World and Popular music, while developing voices further singing in basic harmony and build rhythmic skills and further notation awareness. Students will also explore the folk tradition of India focusing on Bhangra to introduce basic music sequencing using a DAWS Programme – creating bass riffs reinforcing bass clef notation and inputting the Chaal rhythm as the main groove. Previous knowledge includes names of notes and values basic straight rhythms.
Year 8 will introduce the students to the Music Industry as a whole preparing them for Key stage 4 option choices - either the BTEC Tech Award or GCSE Music. The priority is to engage the students and build their performance and composition skills and ensure students understand career paths available to them using music as a platform.
Unit 1 is a performance unit, using Daft Punk as the stimulus and will reinforce treble clef notation and introduce bass clef notation and create a class instrumental ensemble using keyboards.
Unit 3 and 4 will focus on The Music Industry with a BTEC style brief to develop a song, learn basic mixing skills and market the end product (job roles in the music industry). Students will learn how pop music has developed since the 1950s, encompassing genres including Soul, Rock ‘n’ Roll, Disco, Punk, Hip Hop, Grunge, Britpop. Students’ are encouraged to discuss how British culture influenced changes in pop music and how this compared to the American market. Previous knowledge includes major and minor chords, bass riffs and rhythmic notation.
Unit 5 will explore Minimalism to reinforce skills introduced using a DAWS programme. Previous knowledge includes major and minor chords, ostinato, rhythmic notation, FX effects. Links back to film music - Minimalist composers such as Steve Reich and Philip Glass (Modern composers). This links in to the Computer Music unit investigating how writing for computer games has developed over the decades and links back to the Film Music unit in Year 7 – considering the elements of music to create effective game scores.
Year 9 will begin with South American Music focusing on Samba to develop rhythmic skills further and will discuss the influences of Cuban music on vocal pop tracks and embed skills developed in Year 7 and 8 using a DAWS Programme.
Unit 2 will link year 7 African music and demonstrate the link to Blues music (Cultural – Slavery – Black American History). Students will create a Blues remix linking to Rock and Pop drawing on folk (modes) blues tradition (blues and pentatonic scales) and the classical tradition to develop harmonic awareness, improvisation and formal music structures preparing them for the BTEC programme of study .
Unit 3 and 4 is a performance and composition unit using Ariana Grande as the stimulus to refresh key concepts of treble and bass clef notation and working with chords and continue their journey of exploring popular song through the ages from Year 8 – developing sequencing skills further using a DAWS programme and consider basic song structure and harmonic progressions and use of the pentatonic scale to develop melody writing.
In the final units the students will take a journey through Reggae (Mento, Rock Steady, Ska, Dub and Dance Hall) and modern day artists such as Twenty One Pilots) reinforcing the use of a DAWS programme and refining work using music technological effects and offbeat chordal sequences and this links back to the Year 8 unit The Music Industry.
