Lesson video

Hi, everyone.

Welcome to the last lesson in our "compose and create" unit, "high and low melodic responses".

Today's lesson is called "Performing a simple melody as part of a call and response song".

So this means we get to put our own compositions into the song that we've been learning.

By the end of this lesson, you'll be able to say, "I can perform my composed melody as part of a call and response song".

So let's begin by looking at today's keywords.

We begin with "perform", which is presenting our work in front of others.

"Melody", a combination of notes to make a memorable tune.

"Pitched percussion".

That's an instrument that can play musical notes of one or more pitches when we strike it.

And "rehearse", very important.

It's practising a piece of music to prepare for a performance.

And "structure".

That's the way the music is organised.

Now, before we go any further, let's get our warmups in, because we know how important they are to warm our body, our voices, and our mind.

We want to make all these big muscles ready and these little ones too, so that we can move and sing safely.

So I would like you to join in with these warmups.

Here they come.

Let's begin by warming up our bodies, because we know how important it is to warm up before we start making music and singing.

We'll begin with a stretch, arms high into the air, onto our tiptoes.

Hold onto a monkey bar.

And we are going to not let go of that monkey bar, but we are going to lower our heels to the ground.

So we're going to get taller! Lowering to the count of four.

Here we go.

One, two, three, four.

Gosh, you're all super tall! Drop your fingers, and your wrists, and your elbows, and your shoulders.

Relax your knees and go (imitates motorboat).

(children imitate motorboat) Very good.

Let's do that one more time.

Stretch up, onto your tip toes.

Hold onto the monkey bar, lowering your heels to account of four.

Going one, two, three, four.

Gosh, you're so tall now! Drop your fingers, and your wrists, and your elbows, and your shoulders.

Relax your knees, and (imitates motorboat).

(children imitate motorboat) Very good.

Now let's take up as much space as we can.

Make a really, really big space.

Huge shapes.

And we are going to shrink down into a tiny shape.

Tiny, tiny, tiny, tiny, tiny.

Like a little seed.

And we are now going to grow back to a big shape.

Are you ready? One, two, three, go! Grow, grow, grow, grow, grow, grow, grow! And relax.

Feet slightly apart, arms by our sides.

Let's focus on our bodies now.

Wiggle your nose.

And your knees.

Fingers.

Toes.

Bottoms. Ears.

Back to nose.

And fingers and toes together.

And relax.

Really well done.

Time to get out our imaginary plasticine.

Mine is kept behind my ear.

Take yours and squidge it into a ball and make a nice shape.

Let's make a body with two legs, arms, a head, some lovely hair, and a smiley face.

And let's give our character a name.

What should we call them? Bob, right.

Now Bob works in the city and lives on the 38th floor of a high rise flat.

And Bob likes to sing when he finishes work and walks home.

Join in with me and Bob.

(scats lively tune) And when he arrives, he needs to call the lift.

♪ Lift ♪ And the lift arrives and the doors open.

(makes whooshing sound) And he steps in, reaches up to the 38th button.

Ding! And copy me and Bob as he goes up in the lift.

Ready to join in? (sings ascending note) Ding! (makes whooshing sound) And the doors open.

Out steps Bob.

(gasps) Oh no! Someone's left a window open! And a huge gust of wind blows plasticine Bob out of the window and he goes.

(sings descending note) Joining in.

(continues descending note) Splat! Let's make him again.

One more time.

Squidge.

Make a body.

Two legs.

Arms. Head.

Beautiful hair.

Smiley face.

And let's give it another name.

Who do we have this time? Sue.

Good, right.

Now Sue works in the city, but she lives over there on the 39th floor of a high-rise flat.

Friends with Bob.

And she likes to sing as she walks home from work.

Join in with Sue.

Here she goes.

(scats lively tune) And she's gonna have to call the lift.

♪ Lift ♪ And the lift arrives.

(makes whooshing sound) And she steps into the lift and reaches even higher up to the 39th button.

Ding! And join in as Sue goes up in the lift.

Here she goes.

(sings ascending note) Ding! (makes whooshing sound) Doors open, and oh! They didn't close the window! And the gust of wind takes plasticine Sue out of the window as she goes sailing, join in.

(sings descending note) Splat! Well done.

We are now going to warm up our mouths because this is going to help us sing well.

And we're going to do this with a tongue twister.

And the tongue twister says this.

Cooks cook cupcakes quickly, which is good, 'cause I really like cupcakes.

My turn, your turn.

Cooks.

<v ->Cooks.

</v> <v ->Cook.

</v> <v ->Cook.

</v> <v ->Cupcakes.

</v> <v ->Cupcakes.

</v> <v ->Quickly.

</v> <v ->Quickly.

</v> <v ->Cooks cook.

</v> <v ->Cooks cook.

</v> <v ->Cupcakes quickly.

</v> <v ->Cupcakes quickly.

</v> <v ->Cooks cook cupcakes.

</v> <v ->Cooks cook cupcakes.

</v> <v ->Cooks cook cupcakes.

</v> <v ->Cooks cook cupcakes.

</v> <v ->Cooks cook cupcakes quickly.

</v> <v ->Cooks cook cupcakes quickly.

</v> <v ->Very good.

</v> We'll try it slowly, and then we'll get a little bit faster.

Cooks cook cupcakes quickly.

<v ->Cooks cook cupcakes quickly.

</v> <v ->Cooks cook cupcakes quickly.

</v> <v ->Cooks cook cupcakes quickly.

</v> <v ->Cooks cook cupcakes quickly.

</v> <v ->Cooks cook cupcakes quickly.

</v> <v ->Marvellous.

Well done.

</v> Now there are three more chants and songs on your screens for you to practise where you are.

We have, "Chop Chop Choppity Chop." That's our fruit salad chant.

We have "Who Stole the Cookie from the Cookie Jar?" That lovely game we can play.

And "Wolf, We are Dancing." Now then, if you would like a reminder of how to play any of those, there are audio tracks and a video for "Who stole the cookie?" for you recap and remember how to play.

Otherwise, pause the video, and enjoy playing those where you are.

See you in a moment.

Brilliant.

You've completed your warmup, so hopefully your body feels relaxed.

It's ready, it's had a chance to move.

Your voice is feeling warm, so it's gonna be safe for you to sing, and we're feeling focused, because today we are all composers ready to perform our pieces.

There are two learning cycles in today's lesson.

The first one is rehearsing our melodies, and the second is performing as part of a call and response song.

So let's begin then.

Rehearsing.

Rehearsing our melodies.

We're going to begin by joining in with Andeep's shopping song.

This is going to remind us of the structure.

Remember, the first thing Andeep puts in his basket is a big green sweet pear, but there are six fruits he takes in total.

We begin with our call and response section with these chanted in between each verse.

Here comes the clip for you to join in along with.

Make sure you have a space.

Here it comes.

♪ Ready steady off you go ♪ ♪ What has Andeep in his basket ♪ ♪ Tell me tell me ♪ ♪ Name a fruit that's in his basket ♪ ♪ Tell me tell me ♪ <v ->Big green sweet pear.

</v> <v ->Big green sweet pear.

</v> ♪ What has Andeep in his basket ♪ ♪ Tell me tell me ♪ ♪ Name a fruit that's in his basket ♪ ♪ Tell me tell me ♪ <v ->Juicy round green grapes.

</v> <v ->Juicy round green grapes.

</v> ♪ What has Andeep in his basket ♪ ♪ Tell me tell me ♪ ♪ Name a fruit that's in his basket ♪ ♪ Tell me tell me ♪ <v ->Purple tangy small plum.

</v> <v ->Purple tangy small plum.

</v> ♪ What has Andeep in his basket ♪ ♪ Tell me tell me ♪ ♪ Name a fruit that's in his basket ♪ ♪ Tell me tell me ♪ <v ->Round pink sharp grapefruit.

</v> <v ->Round pink sharp grapefruit.

</v> ♪ What has Andeep in his basket ♪ ♪ Tell me tell me ♪ ♪ Name a fruit that's in his basket ♪ ♪ Tell me tell me ♪ <v ->Ripe sweet yellow melon.

</v> <v ->Ripe sweet yellow melon.

</v> ♪ What has Andeep in his basket ♪ ♪ Tell me tell me ♪ ♪ Name a fruit that's in his basket ♪ ♪ Tell me tell me ♪ <v ->Bright shiny red apple.

</v> <v ->Bright shiny red apple.

</v> <v ->Absolutely excellent!</v> Good stuff.

Great joining in.

Good chanting in time too.

Now this lesson, we're performing our fruit melodies that we composed last time, and we're going to put them into Andeep's shopping song, as if all the things that we've decided, our fruits that we've put in our melody, Andeep's putting in his basket.

Now Izzy says, when we perform, we are showing our work to others.

We are sharing, in this case, our musical work in front of other people.

So we're going to sing our fruit melody, and we're going to play our fruit melody on pitched percussion.

But first we must rehearse, and rehearsing is all about practising together.

It's doing something again and again to get better, so that when we do share our performance with other people, we feel quite proud of it and we're pleased with what we've made.

Lucas says rehearsing helps him feel confident and prepared.

I agree.

Quick check for you.

Who do you agree with? Sofia says, "Rehearsing is when you practise together so that you feel prepared and confident to share your work with others." Whereas Jacob says, "Rehearsing is needed when you have time to do it.

It's not an important part of performing." So I wonder who you agree with most.

Do you think that Sofia has said a wise and sensible thing, or do you agree more with Jacob? Point to who you agree with.

Yes, I agree with Sofia too.

And that's because, when I want to perform in front of somebody, I want it to be the best it can be, and I want to feel confident in that.

So if I've practised with the people I'm playing with, I'm going to feel that this piece of music is ready to share.

And I know exactly what I'm doing.

Here are some top tips for when you rehearse.

It's really useful to face your partner.

Then you're engaged, you're understanding each other.

You're more likely to play or sing at the same time.

It's also a super top tip to count in before you start.

We've used ready, steady, off we go, which is four beats.

One, two, three, four.

So if you're counting, do count to four.

You could use ready, steady, off we go.

It helps you feel the pulse together.

Very useful.

Top tip number three, before you go straight to the instrument, chant and clap your rhythm first.

So ta, ta-di ta ta-di.

You've got that rhythm in your head.

It's gonna be then easier to put it onto your instrument.

And lastly, when we're deciding which instrument we are playing, which is our high and our low, we can use our pitch actions to remind us of our melody, and then we'll know which ones are our higher notes and our lower notes.

I think that you've got that.

And so we're going to try using all four of those top tips using Sam's melody.

We'll do this one all together, then we'll definitely go and rehearse really effectively.

Okay, remember, step one, we'll be facing a partner.

Step two, we'll count in before we start.

Step three, we chant and clap those rhythms, so ♪ Melon apple ♪ ♪ Melon pear ♪ ♪ Ta-di ta-di ta-di ta ♪ Then lastly, we're using our pitch actions to know the higher note and a low note that we are using.

Okay? Pause the video, practise Sam's melody using those top tips, and I'll see you in a sec.

Super work, well done.

So did we remember each of the steps? Did we remember to face our partner? Did we remember to count in or use a ready, steady, off we go? That four beats to feel the pulse? If you did, super.

Did you chant and clap the rhythm first so you knew exactly what that rhythm sounded like? And then before you put it on the instruments, did you remind yourself of the high and the low notes before you played? If you did, sounds like you were ready to rehearse.

Quick check, then.

What's gonna be really helpful to us when we're going off to rehearse now? A, looking at your partner? B, facing away from your partner? C, starting straight away without counting in? Or D, counting in before you start? A, B, C, and D.

Two of those are right, and two of those are wrong.

What would be your best advice when you're going off to rehearse? I'll give you a moment to make sure you know.

Yes, of course.

We want to be looking at our partner and we will count in before we start.

No use in facing away from our partner, and no real use in starting straight away.

We need to know the steady pulse.

It's time for you to rehearse your fruit melody.

You are going to sing it and you are going to play it, in that order.

So, you will sit facing your partner.

When you are sat, and you're looking at each other, you are going to chant your fruit rhythm together.

Remember to count yourself in.

Then when you've chanted, maybe you've said ready, steady, off I go, ta ta-di ta-di ta, the second time you do it, you can clap.

(claps to the beat) And check that you're still together.

You're really understanding your rhythm, as a pair, ready to perform.

You will sing your fruit melody together and show your pitch actions so you know your high and your low notes.

And then you can play your fruit melody using the ♪ So for the high note ♪ ♪ And mi for the low notes ♪ So that means you will have chanted, clapped, sung, and played.

You might not get it right straight away.

That's fine.

You keep repeating those steps until you feel confident.

Okay? And if you don't have your own fruit melody because you weren't here or you've misplaced yours, you can use this one.

This one says plum, melon, grapefruit, grapes.

Ta ta-di ta-di ta.

And it's sung as ♪ Plum ♪ ♪ Melon ♪ ♪ Grapefruit ♪ ♪ Grapes ♪ Okay, so that's one that you can use if you need to.

You're going to pause now, work through each of those steps, and rehearse so that you are ready to perform.

Off you go.

Gah, hard work, isn't it? Really good! Really good concentrating so that you can work well together.

I wonder how it went for you.

If you rehearsed well, you might be thinking like Andeep is.

"I know how to sing my fruit melody correctly." And hopefully your partner does too.

Jun says, "I can play so mi at the right time." And that's neat and will sound good.

Sam's actually feeling excited about performing with her class, about putting this whole piece of music together.

And Jacob says, "I understand what to do," and that's really important.

So we know when it's our turn and what we are going to do.

It is time to move onto our second learning cycle where we are performing.

We are performing as part of our call and response song.

This means we are ready to add our fruit melodies into Andeep's shopping song, and perform it in front of others, in front of an audience, in front of a camera.

Doesn't matter.

What we need to know is when we're going to sing as a whole class and when we're just performing with our partner.

Then we will know what's going on.

So this means we're thinking about the structure of the music, the structure of our performance.

Structure is the way that music's organised.

Alex says, "Yeah, it's like thinking about what comes first and then what comes next." And if we know that, our performance is going to be smooth.

Andeep says, "When we understand the structure, we know when it's our turn, and if we're going to be singing or playing." So let's concentrate.

Structure is how high or low a note is.

Structure is how fast or slow the music's played.

Structure is the way the music's organised.

Or structure is the regular steady heartbeat of the music.

Can you tell me, can you point to A, B, C, or D? Can you tell me what structure is? Yes, it's the way the music's organised, and if we know this, our performance is going to be great.

This is our performance structure.

The first thing.

It's the call and response bit! It's where we sing together.

♪ Of what has Andeep in his basket ♪ ♪ Tell me tell me ♪ We hear the call and the response.

So we need to know, am I in the call group? Am I in the response group? The second thing is each pair will take it in turns between each of these verses to sing their fruit melody, and to play it.

So first of all, they would sing, ♪ Melon apple ♪ ♪ Melon pear ♪ And then they get to play it on their pitched percussion.

Okay? Then we go back to our call and response.

Keeping a steady pulse is essential for our performance.

We want our piece to stay in time and we want it to sound good.

Pulse is the regular, steady heartbeat of the music.

Okay? If we're all feeling this, we're all keeping in time.

We need to be able to sing all together, and then we need to be able to sing and play just as our pair, whilst keeping a steady pulse all the way through.

That way the music doesn't stop, it doesn't race, it just keeps a steady pulse.

So here's Sam's melody as an example.

Have a listen.

♪ Ready steady off we go ♪ ♪ What has Andeep in his basket ♪ ♪ Tell me tell me ♪ ♪ Name a fruit that's in his basket ♪ ♪ Tell me tell me ♪ ♪ Melon apple melon pear ♪ (pitched percussion plays) <v ->So let's just practise that bit.

</v> The call and response, singing Sam's melody and playing it, okay? When we're playing it, we can just for the moment pretend that we are playing the pitched percussion instruments.

Okay.

So it needs to go call and response, sing melon, apple, melon, pear, and then imagine that you're playing it on your pitched percussion.

That is gonna make sure you know the structure, okay? Pause here, and practise that now.

Great.

So do we think we've got that? We've got that structure.

We know it's call and response first.

We know which group we're in.

Then we know that we are singing the melody, and then we play it on our pitched percussion.

And then that repeats with the next person's melody.

And if you are keeping a steady pulse, as you move from the call and response to the fruit melody, this is really important for our performance.

So ♪ Tell me tell me ♪ ♪ Melon apple melon pear ♪ Did you notice the music doesn't stop? It just keeps going.

All right.

By the looks of Alex and Sam, they are ready to perform.

I think they're feeling confident, and they're having this conversation that says, "When we perform, we're ready to do our best.

We prepare for our performance by making sure that everything is ready." So this is your performance checklist.

Do you have, absolutely silently, your instruments ready? Do you know when it's your turn to perform? Whether you're call and response, and which order you are going round in your pairs? Do you remember your melody? And can you see your melody written down if you need to? Is your composition to hand, written down, if you need to look at it? If so, I think we're ready.

And so it's now time to perform your piece.

You're going to make sure you are in that call group or the response group, as well as being in your pairs, and you should know which pair is going next, after the whole call and response bit.

You'll have taken it in turns, so everyone, each pair has had a chance to perform.

Now you can either go call and response, just one pair, call and response, just one pair.

Or if you'd like to, you could have one pair followed by the next pair, back to call and response, entirely up to you, because it's your structure.

And what will be lovely will be to record this so you can watch it back later and see just how well you did.

Are you ready? It's time for your performance.

And do remember that if you didn't have a fruit melody, there is one on the screen that you can use.

I hope you really enjoy yourself.

Really well done for your rehearsing.

And I'll see you after your performance.

Off you go.

Wowee! You performed the whole song! How was it? Did you enjoy yourself? Let's have a little check.

Did we sing in the correct group? I knew that I was a call, or I knew if I was singing the response.

I wonder, did you keep in time together? And the more we do this, the better that will get every time.

Did you play the correct high and low notes for your melody? If you did, on your instruments, that's fabulous.

Well done.

And did you remember to only play your instrument when it was your turn? Not just at any other bits.

If you decided to record this, this would be a great time to watch it back and check through that list and see just how fabulous everyone in your class is.

I hope you really enjoyed yourself and I hope you did very well.

That's all we have time for in today's lesson, and indeed this unit.

So let's have a recap on our learning.

We know that when we're performing, we are sharing our work with others.

Rehearsing really helps us to feel prepared for that performance.

Understanding the structure of the music that really helps us know when to play and when to sing.

And it's important to keep a steady pulse as we sing and play.

It makes our music sound even better.

And lastly, performing gives us an opportunity to share and celebrate our learning with others.

Really well done for this unit, and I look forward to seeing you next time.

Bye-bye.