5.2 Arrangement Basics
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Description: Students will use repetition and variation to arrange their new musical ideas from either the 5.1 project OR their existing musical ideas from the 4.3 project to fit a given song form.
Musical Objectives:
Understand the difference between a phrase and a song section and how those are repeated and organized to create a larger song form.Learn that different genres have common song forms.
Technical Objectives:
Copying and pasting regions of different musical elements to fit a song form. -
Prep:
Choose a few songs that you know students like and transcribe the form BEFORE listening to them as a class. This will help your skill of discerning phrases, sections, and structure while giving you examples that you can refer to when working with the class. Take some of your example material and arrange it using different song structures. It is fun to apply the same musical material in different ways to create more than one product. This activity will help you relate to the different song forms that students might choose. Also, remember to be constantly listening to different examples of genres to keep your ear sharp.Materials:
5.2 Project Rubric -
As a Class:
Watch the top video and discuss structure, repetition, and variation.
Complete some of the connection activities to build confidence and understanding of the material.
Arrange the elements from the idea pool of the teacher project example to fit the EDM song structure together.
Individual:
Have students choose a song structure from the cookbook.
Instruct students to copy and paste the assignment URL from their 5.1 project to open in the 5.2 studio page.
Have students watch the short step videos and complete the rough arrangement of their final project.
Remind students to check their work by viewing the checklist.
When students are done, they can show each other their arrangement and make edits.
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Informal Assessment:
Check for understanding of the rules on writing drum grooves, chord parts, bass lines, and melodies by asking questions after the top videos.
Walk around the room while students are completing the individual portion of their projects and check to see if their drum grooves, chordal parts, bass lines, and melodies are being created according to the project parameters.
Formal Assessment:
The musical material should be checked by the instructor or project partner against the rubric.
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Group Song Form Transcription: Listen to a student or teacher song and have students chart out the song’s form. This song is a fun one that can be used for this purpose. They should be listening for larger sections and phrases within the sections. Remind them that there will be small changes within the sections (every 4 bars) and larger changes between sections. They can label the phrases by splitting the song form up with A and B sections.
Example: Intro, Verse 1 A, Verse 1 B, Prechorus, Chorus A, Chorus B, Verse 2 A, etc.What Changes, What Stays The Same: Listen to a song section (Verse, Chorus, Drop, Bridge, etc.) of a student or teacher-selected song and have students determine if the song section stays the same throughout or if it changes halfway through. Have them list the changes (if any) within the section. They can do the same thing for different sections in the same song. It is also fun to have students identify what stays the same between sections. It is often surprising to see how much stays the same between song sections and how small alterations can create variation within and between parts of the form.
Follow The Form: Distribute a sample project that already has the drum, bass, chord, and melody components populated in an idea pool. Provide students with the same song form and have them arrange the musical elements using repetition and variation to fit the song’s structure. There will be some differences in how students handle the variance in energy levels for each element and which melodies will be main melodies for the verse, chorus, and/or drop. These differences will be enough so that most projects will not be the exact same.
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Enrichment: Instead of students using one of the predetermined song structures that have been supplied, they can use the form of a song that they have transcribed. If there are multiple students doing this, they can check each other’s form transcriptions before the arrangement process has begun. This will give them more practice at critical listening while offsetting some of the instructor responsibilities.
Remediation: The entire class can use the same EDM song form that Eric uses in the instruction videos. Students can then watch the videos and follow his arrangement exactly. There will be enough difference in the individual idea pools that the end results will still be unique. Students can also work in partners to put their rough arrangements together. These partners can be in either like ability or mixed ability groupings depending on the differentiation structure you would like to implement.
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Make sure that students are using their original musical ideas and instrument choices and not just copying Eric’s project. To ensure this doesn’t happen, highlight positive individual project decisions that are being made by students to the rest of the class. The arrangement process is something that students REALLY like doing. Taking their original music ideas and putting them together to create a song in its entirety is a magical thing. Plan ways in which students can showcase their final projects during this stage to other classes, the rest of the school, and beyond. Students might have some fun and unique ideas for project distribution that could be used after they add detail in the next step.
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Core Arts Standards
Creating:
Anchor Standard 1 (Generate and conceptualize artistic ideas and work): Understand and conceptualize the difference between a phrase and a song section and how they are repeated and organized to create a larger song form.
Anchor Standard 2 (Organize and develop artistic ideas and work): Organize musical elements by copying and pasting regions to fit a given song form.
Anchor Standard 3 (Refine and complete artistic work): Refine musical ideas by arranging them using repetition and variation to create a complete song.
Performing:
Anchor Standard 4 (Select, analyze, and interpret artistic work for presentation): Select and arrange elements from an idea pool to fit an EDM song structure, discussing structure, repetition, and variation as a class.
Responding:
Anchor Standard 7 (Perceive and analyze artistic work): Analyze selected music to understand song structure, identifying phrases, sections, and their organization within a song form.
Anchor Standard 8 (Interpret intent and meaning in artistic work): Present and discuss their rough arrangements, explaining the choices made in organizing their musical ideas.
Connecting:
Anchor Standard 11 (Relate artistic ideas and works with societal, cultural, and historical context to deepen understanding): Connect their arrangements to common song forms in different genres, understanding how these forms are used to create a complete song.
Technology Literacy Standards
Empowered Learner (ISTE Standard 1):
Use digital tools to arrange musical elements, track progress, and reflect on their work.
Creative Communicator (ISTE Standard 6):
Experiment with arranging musical elements and effectively communicate their musical ideas through their final projects.
Career Readiness
Music Production: Skills in arranging musical ideas using repetition and variation to create complete songs.
Sound Engineering: Technical knowledge of copying and pasting regions to fit a song form and creating a balanced mix.
Broadcasting and DJing: Understanding how song structure and arrangement impact the flow and energy of a track.
Multimedia Production: Integrating arranged musical elements into various multimedia projects to create a cohesive and engaging experience.