Unit 2 – Rhythm and Tempo
Activity 1 – Improvise rhythms 1
“Sing” by Joe Chircop
Students are encouraged to freely improvise different rhythms using given percussion and possibly their recorder. The teacher will guide the children to creatively improvise rhythms to the given poem. These rhythms can be of a different nature – they can be used to create a suggestive atmosphere and background for the poem, they can stress the rhythm and pulse of the poem itself as well as contribute to its correct, effective rendering.
Activity 2 – Improvise rhythms 2
“Count me in” by Celestina Sciberras
Students are encouraged to freely improvise different rhythms using given percussion and possibly their recorder. The teacher will guide the children to creatively improvise rhythms to the given poem. These rhythms can be of a different nature – they can be used to create a suggestive atmosphere and background for the poem, they can stress the rhythm and pulse of the poem itself as well as contribute to its correct, effective rendering.
Activity 3 – Improvise rhythms 3
“Marċ ta’ Nikolaj Nikolajevic” by Miriam Chrsitine Warner
Students are encouraged to freely improvise different rhythms using given percussion and possibly their recorder. The teacher will guide the children to creatively improvise rhythms to the given poem. These rhythms can be of a different nature – they can be used to create a suggestive atmosphere and background for the poem, they can stress the rhythm and pulse of the poem itself as well as contribute to its correct, effective rendering.
Activity 4 – Describing the Tempo
The student will be introduced to different terminology to describe tempo in music. So far, the student was made aware of a slow or fast tempo. A student will now understand a gradual increase or decrease in tempo, and will also learn to describe music in terms of the tempo it is performed in.
Activity 5 – World Music and Tempo
Students will be guided to comment on how a tempo of a piece suits or otherwise that particular piece, and how rhythms are created in these tempos. A large variety of pieces from different parts of the world have been chosen for this purpose.