Experiences and Outcomes:
I have experienced the energy and excitement of presenting/performing for audiences and being part of an audience for other people’s presentations/performances. EXA 2-01a
I can sing and play music from a range of styles and cultures, showing skill and using performance directions, and/or musical notation. EXA 2-16a
I can use my voice, musical instruments and music technology to experiment with sounds, pitch, melody, rhythm, timbre and dynamics. EXA 2-17a
Inspired by a range of stimuli and working on my own and/or with others, I can express and communicate my ideas, thoughts and feelings through musical activities. EXA 2-18a
Lesson Outcomes
After this lesson, pupils will be able to:
- Listen and reflect on a piece of orchestral music
- Create their own Latin inspired rhythmic ostinatos
- Learn rhythms from Bernstein’s ‘Mambo’ and structure them into a piece
- Perform as an ensemble
- Learn musical language appropriate to the task
Curriculum Checklist
Learners will:
- Play and perform in ensemble contexts, using voices and playing musical instruments
- Improvise and compose music for a range of purposes using the interrelated dimensions of music
- Listen with attention to detail and recall sounds with increasing aural memory
Activities
Warm up. As usual, begin with a quick focusing warm-up. This is a good chance to recap all of the rhythms you have worked with so far on body percussion.
Recap. Put your children back into their three groups and ask them to remember their piece from last time. Each group should have a pulse, a mambo rhythm and the mambo tune.
Get out the instruments and allow for a minute or two of chaos as everyone remembers their ideas. Then, hear each group separately.
Structure. Ask the class to come up with a structure for their pieces so that you end up with one full class mambo rather than three little ones. Prompt them with the following questions –
- What order should the groups play in?
- Should they overlap and if not, how do you get from one group to the next without a gap?
- Should you all play at the same time and if so, how do you line up the mambo tune?
Try out a few suggestions before deciding on the perfect shape and then write it up on the board as a list of events. It might look something like this:
- Group 1 – ends with ‘Mambo!’
- Group 2 – ends with ‘Mambo!’
- Group 3 – ends with ‘Mambo!’
- Pulse: 8 beats
- All three groups together
- Cymbal crash signals all three mambo tunes together
- Everyone shouts ‘Mambo!’
FINALLY – record your finished piece or perform it to another class.
Additional resources and a more detailed lesson plan can be found here on the BBC Ten Pieces website;
