Norwegian storytellers...



source: http://www.cmuse.org/7-fun-facts-about-edward-grieg/

Contributor: Nicky Watling,
Primary Music Consultant

School: Kings Copse Primary school

Year: 3

Piece: In the Hall of the Mountain King, Grieg

 

Media: video of pupils performing their claves composition

CLICK HERE to watch!

The pupils saw the Ten Pieces film at one of the county cinema viewings and there was a real mix of favourites across the pieces. We decided to work on In the Hall of the Mountain King  because it’s an exciting piece of music that tells a story and the children really engaged with it.

Theme of creativity to engage the children:

·         We listened to the music and thought about the Peer Gynt story (five-part play written by Norwegian dramatist - Henrik Ibsen). 

·         We discussed how Grieg created the impression that Peer was being chased by the trolls (the music gets faster and louder) we then started to think about how we could compose something similar. 

·         We decided that the music has a clear and repeated rhythmic pattern – we worked this out using the words “apple” and “pear” and wrote them down on a 4 x 4 grid.  We identified, worked out then notated both of the main patterns and then played along with the music keeping in time and getting faster and louder. 

·         We then split into small groups, composed our own apple/ pear patterns and notated them on a 4 x 4 grid.  Finally we rehearsed playing our patterns getting faster and louder.

 We learnt to compose 4 beat rhythm patterns and notate them using grid notation.  We thought carefully about how musical devises can be used to convey a musical message and…we had loads of fun! Our biggest challenge was keeping together when we were performing in small groups.

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