Lesson video

Hi, everyone.

Welcome to this lesson on composing programme music using a golden brick.

This is from our "Compose and Create Unit: Cosmic Programme Music.

" My name's Mr. Croughan.

And I'm really looking forward to discovering with you what on earth it means by composing with a golden brick.

Are we ready?

Let's begin.

By the end of this lesson, you'll be able to say, "I can use a small musical idea called a golden brick to inspire and structure a short piece of programme music.

" Let's begin then by looking at today's keywords.

We'll begin with programme music.

This is instrumental music that aims to represent something non-musical, such as a story, a picture, a scene, or an idea or emotion.

Then movement, a self-contained section of a large scale musical composition, like having a chapter in a book.

Musical map.

On a musical map, you might find lines, shapes, colors, and symbols that represent the flow of the music.

And then golden brick.

This is Eric Whitacre's term to describe a small musical idea that's the core building block on which the whole piece is built.

Before we begin our music lesson, we know how important it is to warm up.

We're going to warm up our bodies, our voices, and our minds.

When we warm up, it could prepare us for singing safely, for playing more accurately, playing or singing together as part of an ensemble, and listening carefully and learning new music.

In a moment, you're going to get into pairs.

Once you're in those pairs, you'll be listening to a piece of music, which is "Cathedral of Reason" from "Deep Field.

" This warmup is called mirror dance.

Person A will lead on a movement and Person B will copy that movement as if looking in a mirror.

So, you'll mirror the movements precisely.

Person A's job is to respond to the music they can hear.

Perhaps that quality of movement changes as they hear changes in the music.

One top tip.

Jacob says, "After a time, you can clap your hands once.

" "And when this happens, Person A and Person B swap roles so the other person is leading.

" You can spend a bit of time as each person whether you are leading or mirroring.

Importantly, if you're leading, you are listening to that music and responding with appropriate movement.

Pause here and do that where you are.

See you in a bit.

Well done.

I hope that was really enjoyable.

Now, onto the learning cycles.

There are two in today's lesson.

The first one is "Deep Field: Pillars of Creation.

" And the second is creating our very own golden brick.

Let's begin with "Deep Field: Pillars of Creation.

" Now, as Laura reminds us, "When a composer uses something non-musical as the inspiration for creating a piece of music, we call it programme music.

" Now, Eric Whitacre's "Deep Field" composed in 2015 is an example of programme music.

"Deep Field" can be described as a symphonic work.

It's a large scale piece, and it's divided into four movements.

And the music takes us on a journey through space with an accompanying film that shows images taken by NASA's Hubble Space Telescope.

Before we listen, I would like you to match the musical term to its definition.

A, programme music, B, symphonic work, and C, a movement.

Now, there are three descriptions there.

You've got a large scale musical composition with distinct movements, usually four.

Then, a self-contained section of a large scale musical composition like a chapter in a book.

And thirdly, instrumental music that aims to represent something non-musical such as a story, picture or emotion.

Your job is to match A, B and C to their description.

Pause here and I'll catch you when you've done that.

Well done.

Let's see how you did.

A, programme music.

Programme music is instrumental music that aims to represent something non-musical such as a story, a picture, or maybe an emotion.

B, symphonic work.

That's a large scale musical composition with distinct movements, usually four.

And then movement.

A movement is a self-contained section of a large scale musical composition, like a chapter in a book.

Well done.

"Deep Field" can be divided into four movements.

The first movement we heard earlier, "Cathedral of Reason.

" The second movement, which we'll explore more today, "Pillars of Creation.

" The third movement is "Impossible Magnitude.

" And then the fourth, "Earth Choir.

" I'd like you to now listen to the second movement "Pillars of Creation.

" Whitacre takes us across space, moving from nebula to nebula.

And he describes this movement, "Pillars of Creation" as aspiration.

So, pause and have a listen and be taken through the nebula of space.

Wonderful.

Now, a nebula is a giant cloud of dust and gas in space where new stars can be created.

Nebula are huge, but they're smaller than galaxies.

And the climax of this second movement that we hear is the exploration of the Bubble Nebula.

Now, this nebula is 45 times bigger than the sun.

A quick check for you then.

You might want to listen again while you answer these.

How does Eric Whitacre let us know that one, we've arrived at the Bubble Nebula.

And secondly that this nebula is pretty impressive.

Pause here and perhaps have another listen and decide which bit says we've arrived at the Bubble Nebula, what do you hear, and what else do you hear to show that it's particularly impressive?

Off you go.

I wonder what you said.

Perhaps one way we know we've arrived is we can hear a brass fanfare-like sound.

Maybe that sort of announces it.

And then secondly, one idea about the nebula being particularly impressive is the snare drum creates a drum roll ready for its appearance.

If we have a drum roll, perhaps that's saying something quite grand is about to happen or be seen.

We can create a musical map as we listen to highlight what we hear.

Now, that is very useful to us to help make sense of what we're listening to.

On the screen there is a musical map that could include lines, shapes, and symbols, and it follows the shape and the journey of the music.

Now, a musical map is not the same as a graphic score although they may look very similar.

Lucas says, "Well, a graphic score, that's created by a composer to notate their musical ideas.

" And Aisha says, "A musical map is created by the listener to make sense of what they are hearing.

" And that's you.

Have a listen to each of these as A, B, and C.

Now, there's a musical map on the screen with single dots, double dots, couple of lines there, and I'd like you to work out which one A, B, or C, do you think is represented in this musical map?

Here comes A.

And now, B.

And C.

And if you were listening carefully and you said B, you are absolutely right.

Really well done.

Now we can see how a musical map can be used to show the journey of a piece of music.

Your first task then is to listen to the beginning of "Deep Field: Pillars of Creation," and you are going to create a musical map as you listen.

Don't think too deeply about it.

Just draw immediately what is it that you hear the most.

And then, you listen again a second time.

And you might have some different things available like coloring pencils, maybe even charcoal or chalk or pastels, whatever's available to you.

And you can then add on your second listen to your musical map.

Perhaps you might hear something different the second time that would layer over or add to your musical map.

Pause here and enjoy doing that.

Here's an example of a first listen musical map.

How does it compare to yours?

If you'd like to at this point, you could pause and share your musical maps by holding them up to let other people have a look too.

Now, it's time for the second part of our lesson where we're going to create our very own golden brick.

So, Eric Whitacre describes his inspiration for each movement as the movement's golden brick.

Now, this is one musical idea, a brick, that the whole piece is built upon.

Now, each movement, each of those four movements in "Deep Field" has its own golden brick.

In "Pillars of Creation," he describes this particular golden brick as aspiration.

And the pitch of that aspiration golden brick is shaped like this.

You see it's one note.

It goes up higher to another pitch.

Then, down to our lowest pitch yet.

And that's the shape if we were drawing the pitch of the aspiration golden brick.

A quick check for you then.

What is Eric Whitacre's golden brick?

Who's been paying careful attention?

Is it a long, complicated melody that repeats throughout the piece like an ostinato?

Is it a strong beat and that helps keep the piece together when the texture builds?

Or is it a small musical idea that's the core building block on which the whole piece is built?

Have a think.

Is it A, long and complicated melody, B, the strong beat, or C, a small musical idea on which the whole piece is built.

Why don't you say that letter out loud?

Let's see who's correct.

It is C, a golden brick is a small musical idea, The core building block on which the whole piece is built.

You're now to pause the video and listen to the start of "Pillars of Creation.

" And I want to see if you can hear the golden brick.

So, on the screen is the shape of the pitch.

The note it starts on.

It goes up, plays that note, goes down to a lower pitch and plays that note.

Listen out carefully.

Maybe you might identify which instrument that you first hear it on.

Does it appear more than once?

Have a careful listen and come back to me.

Well, did you hear it?

And did you hear it once or more than once?

Andeep says, "We hear it clearly two times at the beginning of the movement, and it's played by the violin.

" He describes the sound as distant, gentle, and hopeful.

And then the whole movement built on this golden brick, it's of course used again and the golden brick appears clear and strong as we explore the Bubble Nebula.

Have a listen just to that part to see if you can hear it.

Did you clock it that time?

Now, as the piece explores the Bubble Nebula, how now has the golden brick changed?

What's different about it?

And when you hear it that second time, how does it sound?

How would you describe it?

And is it exactly the same or tiny bit different each time you hear it?

Have a careful listen and we'll come back in a moment.

Well, I wonder what you said.

Andeep suggests that now the golden brick is played by the horns, it sounds stronger and more forceful.

We hear it once and then we hear it change slightly because the first two notes are repeated a few times.

He says, "It makes the Bubble Nebula sound very grand and special.

" You're going to pause now and talk together to describe how Eric Whitacre creates a piece of music using his golden brick.

There's some words on the board there to help you.

You might use words like build or how it builds.

Maybe inspiration.

The structure of the piece is golden brick and what that is.

Movement.

One of our key words.

How might you use the word movement?

Description and a musical idea.

Use some of those words to help you.

But maybe in pairs or as a class discuss how Eric Whitacre creates a piece of music using his golden brick.

Lovely.

You might have said something like.

Well, Alex suggests, "Eric Whitacre finds a small musical idea and he uses that as his inspiration to create each movement.

And he calls it a golden brick and he uses it to build the piece.

" Izzy said, "The golden brick helps shape the structure of the movement.

Each golden brick has its own description.

" And she remembers that in "Pillars of Creation," it was called aspiration.

Okay, your practice task for the end of this lesson goes as follows.

You're going to discuss as a group the beauty of a nebula, and then think how you could create it as a piece of music.

Once you've had a bit of a discussion of how it's beautiful and what it looks like.

You can create your golden brick to create a nebula-inspired aspirational second movement.

So, what you're going to do is think about should we create like we heard a short melodic idea?

And what shape will that take with the pitch going higher and lower?

Perhaps it might be a short rhythm.

And then think, now we've got that simple idea.

Maybe you draw it out like you saw.

How could you translate that onto different instruments?

Maybe some pitched instruments?

What tune might it take?

And even un-pitched too.

What rhythm might it take?

Does it change as your movement progresses?

And then when you've done that, you're gonna build a short second movement around the golden bricks.

So, you start with your golden brick idea.

Your tune or your rhythm.

And then you can think about in your group, what instruments might we use?

When do we hear that golden brick?

Like earlier, we heard it played in the violin.

And then later on the horns.

What instruments might you choose?

And then, does that golden brick change at all?

We heard the second time we heard it when the horns, it sounded more kind of demanding and bold.

Would your golden brick change or would it sound the same?

That's up to you.

And then, any texture that you'd like.

Does one instrument play at a time or do you build them up?

So, begin.

Think about describing that nebula.

Then choose a short, golden brick idea.

And from that, you can build a short second movement piece.

Off you go.

Okie-dokie.

Really well done.

Some wonderful composers in there.

Here's an example.

And I wonder how this example compares to yours.

I'm going to play it for you.

We've got the golden brick jotted down as a musical map, and then how it's changed.

The structure, the first part says GB x3.

This is golden brick x3.

Then the second time, the second part of our structure is a changed version of the golden brick.

Still x3.

There's an egg shaker added and a tambourine that gets louder.

And then part three of the structure, we've got our golden brick three times again.

Back to the original.

Egg shakers, tambourine, and a hand drum with louder shakes.

I would like you to listen to this and see if you can follow that structure, and perhaps see how does that compare to yours.

Here it comes.

If you have time, you can use that piece as inspiration to further develop your second movement.

And if you'd like to have another go, pause here.

Well done, everyone.

That's about all we have time for today.

Today we've been composing programme music using a golden brick.

So, programme music?

That's music inspired by something non-musical, like a story or a piece of artwork, or an image from the Hubble Space Telescope "Deep Field" is composed by Eric Whitacre.

That's a symphonic work in four movements, and it's an example of programme music.

Music could be mapped out as we listen.

And that can help us make sense of the musical journey.

And lastly, a piece of music can be inspired and built from one small musical idea.

And Eric Whitacre calls that a golden brick.

Really well done for today.

I look forward to seeing you next time.

Bye for now.