Lesson video

Welcome everybody to lesson six in your unit, all about melody.

So in this lesson we're going to be really stretching and challenging our voices, by learning all about variations, arias and jazz singing, let's get started.

In this lesson, you will need some headphones if you'd like to use them.

If not find somewhere that you can focus that's quiet.

You'll also need pen and paper for notes and you will definitely need your singing voice.

So to begin this lesson, we will recap what we've previously learnt We're then going to look at music variations and learn sticky toffee pudding theme, We're going to follow it on a graphic score.

We're then going to learn about opera arias and something called coloratura.

And then we're going to finish with a jazz scat singing challenge.

Let's cover all the songs we've learnt throughout this unit, starting with.

a tune-full song, can you find the beat with me.

♪ Off we go ♪ ♪ A melody is a tune ♪ ♪ Sometimes memorable for me and you ♪ ♪ Made by pitches and a rhythm too ♪ ♪ To satisfy your every mood ♪ Great, slow that beat down a little bit for.

♪ Lowlands away, off we go ♪ ♪ Lowlands, lowlands away my boy ♪ ♪ Lowlands away I heard them say ♪ ♪ My lowlands away ♪ Great, let's do the flying dragon theme.

Remember our actions.

♪ Off we go ♪ ♪ I want to fly away on dragon's wings ♪ ♪ Fly to the moon and back again in spring ♪ ♪ Fly to the castle, hear the butterflies sing ♪ ♪ When I'm home again on Saturday ♪ ♪ A present I'll bring ♪ Brilliant, let's do Woolly Mammoth in our minor key.

♪ Off we go ♪ ♪ Thump, thump, thump ♪ ♪ Thump, thump, thump ♪ ♪ The mammoth is on the move ♪ ♪ Lump, lump, lump ♪ ♪ Bump, bump, bump ♪ ♪ Let's get in the mammoth dance groove ♪ ♪ Let's dance the mammoth thumpety thump ♪ ♪ Let's dance the mammoth humpety hump ♪ ♪ Let's dance the mammoth thumpety thump ♪ ♪ We're on the move and we're in the groove ♪ ♪ Thump, thump, thump ♪ ♪ Thump, thump, thump ♪ ♪ The mammoth is on the move ♪ Brilliant, let's do our folk songs.

Let's start with the great fox spider.

♪ Off we go, the night hunter ♪ ♪ The great fox spider discovered once again ♪ ♪ What a find ♪ ♪ The night hunter ♪ ♪ The great fox spider ♪ ♪ 21 years I cried ♪ Brilliant, let's finish with the Bailer of Cumbria with fray yon yet, and you can clap.

One, two, three and.

♪ Fray yon yet ♪ ♪ He is his bonnie bet ♪ ♪ He drinks his scam ♪ ♪ He eats his scran ♪ ♪ And waits for work to begin again ♪ ♪ Fray yon yet ♪ ♪ He is his bonnie bet ♪ ♪ He drinks his scam ♪ ♪ He eats his scran ♪ ♪ And waits for work to begin again ♪ One of the ways we can make melody really exciting is by changing and adapting it every time it returns and this was all already happening in the 14th century, the 1300's, I'll leave you to figure out when that was.

They were called music variations.

As long as the music underneath was staying the same, then melodies could be made really complicated, much higher, much quicker.

Let's have a listen to what I mean.

That's the Oboe D'amore, there's also a bassoon and a harpsichord, a bit like an old piano.

So the melody was quite steady, even though it had these little twiddle parts, it was still quite slow and steady.

Let's have a listen to the first variation.

You can hear how the oboe and bassoon call and response.

Let's have a listen to another variation now, see what you think about this one.

Can you hear how the harpsichord has more of an interesting part? And the oboe was doing all sorts of really quick notes.

Let's have a listen to our final music variation.

Can you hear how the bassoon's got a real chance to shine now.

It's now time to do our own set of variations using our singing voices and based on a sticky toffee pudding theme because I love sticky toffee pudding.

It is delicious and yummy and great with custard or ice cream, but it is very rich and very sugary.

So if you are going to try it at some point, just try the tiny, tiniest little bit.

Okay, back to the music.

So we are going to have a first round, our tune, is actually going to be the ground base.

You might just come across this term in another unit.

Our ground base is just a repeated pattern that can go round and round and round and round and round.

And we can change the melody over the top of it but we're going to sing it.

It sounds like this.

♪ Sticky toffee pudding is my fave ♪ ♪ It tastes delicious, yummy ♪ ♪ Sticky toffee pudding is my fave ♪ ♪ It tastes delicious, yummy ♪ Can we have a go singing that together? ♪ Off we go ♪ ♪ Sticky toffee pudding is my fave ♪ ♪ It tastes delicious, yummy ♪ Brilliant, well done, let's do it one more time.

Off we go.

♪ Sticky toffee pudding is my fave ♪ ♪ It tastes delicious, yummy ♪ Great, so now we're going to do our first variation.

So our second part here our first variation though, is very, very similar but we're going to add something called ornaments.

Ornaments are like ornaments that you find on your fireplace, on your mantle piece or think of ornaments like decorations.

That's what it means, decorations, like jewellery maybe or different patterns, wallpaper, to just make something bright to and more interesting.

So have a listen, we have.

♪ Sticky toffee pudding is my fave ♪ ♪ It tastes delicious, yummy ♪ Did you notice we're just doing a little, twiddles on our melody.

Have a go, you need a deep breath and sitting up straight, 'cause it's not easy.

♪ Off we go ♪ ♪ Sticky toffee pudding is my fave ♪ ♪ It tastes delicious, yummy ♪ Brilliant, so our little ornaments are decorating our melody to be more interesting.

We have our next variation and this time, we're going to slightly change our rhythm within our melody.

So our rhythm is going to be on the offbeat.

Have a listen to what that means.

♪ Sticky toffee pudding is my fave ♪ ♪ It tastes delicious, yummy ♪ Can you have a go with me? ♪ Off we go ♪ ♪ Sticky toffee pudding is my fave ♪ ♪ It tastes delicious, yummy ♪ Great, so we have main theme then we have twiddles, then we have offbeat, so it's like, bam, bam, bam, it's more exciting.

The next one we have is going to sit a little bit higher.

So rather than starting here, it's going to start here and it's going to have some moments like this, then some smooth moments and then some short and choppy moments, so have a listen.

♪ Sticky toffee pudding is my fave ♪ ♪ It tastes delicious, yummy ♪ Okay, sitting up straight, try it with me.

♪ Off we go ♪ ♪ Sticky toffee pudding is my fave ♪ ♪ It tastes delicious, yummy ♪ Let's try that one again, off we go.

♪ Sticky toffee pudding is my fave ♪ ♪ It tastes delicious, yummy ♪ So we have a main one, which is naturally our ground base, then we develop on that melody to have twiddly bits, ♪ Sticky ♪ Then we have our.

♪ Sticky toffee ♪ And then we have.

♪ Sticky toffee pudding is my fave ♪ And our last variation.

♪ We're going to sit on this note ♪ ♪ And we're going to do something called a trill ♪ ♪ I'm going to sound like a bird ♪ ♪ So think of it like ♪ ♪ Just do it very gently, off we go ♪ ♪ Sticky toffee pudding is my fave ♪ ♪ It tastes delicious, yummy ♪ ♪ Sticky toffee pudding is my fave ♪ ♪ It tastes delicious, yummy ♪ That is our hardest one, so you really need a good breath for that one.

And then we've got all five variations.

We're going to put the whole song together with the variations following a graphic music score.

So rather than following music notes, we're looking at shapes to remind us.

So line one.

♪ Sticky toffee ♪ We have our blue shape, line two, our first variation.

♪ Sticky ♪ With that purple part.

♪ Toffee ♪ Line three, our second variation.

♪ Sticky toffee ♪ With that big pink.

Line four, the lighting strikes.

♪ Sticky toffee pudding is my fave ♪ And line five, for our first trill, we have this squiggly line.

♪ Sticky toffee ♪ Are you ready to have a go with me? Stand up if you'd like.

♪ Sticky toffee pudding is my fave ♪ ♪ It tastes delicious, yummy ♪ ♪ Sticky toffee pudding is my fave ♪ ♪ It tastes delicious, yummy ♪ ♪ Sticky toffee pudding is my fave ♪ ♪ It tastes delicious, yummy ♪ ♪ Sticky toffee pudding is my fave ♪ ♪ It tastes delicious, yummy ♪ ♪ Sticky toffee pudding is my fave ♪ ♪ It tastes delicious, yummy ♪ ♪ Sticky toffee pudding is my fave ♪ ♪ It tastes delicious, yummy ♪ Well done on our sticky toffee pudding song.

So our key words are variation, when a tune is repeated multiple times but altered and changed to make it interesting.

Maybe making it faster, maybe it includes more notes or has a rhythm change.

And ornaments, they're the notes added to a melody to decorate the tune, like adding sprinkles to a cake or putting on jewellery.

For example, this is your melody.

It might change to.

We're speeding ahead now to the height of opera.

When singers were pushing their voices to the max and they'd perform these really extravagant, complicated songs with lots of different ornaments.

This type of melody was called coloratura, it was a chance for the singers to shine.

So let's have a listen to this soprano singing all sorts of amazing coloratura.

She's playing the role of a mechanical doll, singing about the birds in the arbour.

Can you hear it in her voice, the bird calls? And can you also here the parts where she sounds like a mechanical doll, might be moving and sometimes she might wind down and need to wind back up again.

Let's have a go at learning the Opera Aria.

I'm kidding, it's too difficult, but we are going to try just a tiny bit of coloratura singing.

So can you sit up tall for me? Get your most beautiful opera voices ready and repeat after me.

Have a go.

My turn.

Have a go.

Well done, let's try this one.

Have a go.

Beautiful, and let's do together our mechanical doll winding down and then winding back up.

With me, breathe in.

And the other way.

Okay singers, here are our key words.

We have coloratura.

This is the detailed ornamentation of a melody line heard mainly in opera.

And we also have the soprano, which is the highest of singing voices.

And maybe you notice this word, arbour.

When the birds are in the arbour, that's a sheltered walkway in a garden.

Let's whiz ahead now to the era of jazz music, which is a ginormous topic in itself.

We're looking at jazz scat singing.

This is really fun.

I want us listen to a singer improvising, so making up and creating on the spot, different sounds to nonsense words and syllables over the top of chords.

It's now your time to try out jazz scat singing.

So first of all, we need to think of some words.

Can we try Scooby dooby doo, see what it sounds like? Repeat after me.

♪ Scooby dooby doo ♪ ♪ Scooby dooby doo ♪ ♪ Scooby dooby doo ♪ ♪ Scooby dooby doo ♪ Brilliant, let's try out duap.

♪ Duap, duap, duap wa ♪ ♪ Duap, duap, dua ♪ ♪ Duap, duap, dua ♪ ♪ Do, do, doa ♪ Great, let's try my favourite, which is boing.

Boing is an amazing word to say.

♪ Boing, boing, boing, boing, boing, boing ♪ ♪ Boing, boing, boing, boing, boing ♪ ♪ Boing, boing, boing, boing ♪ ♪ Boing, boing, boing, boing ♪ And now we have our words, we're going to try and improvise, so I will play the chords.

I will also improvise, I'm going to make up a tune.

You can follow me, copy me or you can do your own, whatever you'd like.

One, two off we go.

♪ Scooby dooby doo ♪ ♪ Scooby dooby doo ♪ ♪ Scooby dooby doo ♪ ♪ Duap, duap ♪ ♪ Scooby dooby doo ♪ ♪ Scooby dooby doo ♪ ♪ Duap, duap ♪ ♪ Boing, boing, boing, boing ♪ ♪ Boing, boing, boing ♪ ♪ Boing, boing, boing ♪ ♪ Boing, boing, boing, boing ♪ ♪ Duap, duap ♪ ♪ Scooby dooby doo ♪ ♪ Scooby dooby doo ♪ ♪ Boing, boing, boing, boing ♪ ♪ Boing, boing, boing, boing ♪ ♪ Scooby dooby ♪ ♪ Scooby dooby ♪ ♪ Scooby dooby doo, boing, boing, boing ♪ ♪ Scooby dooby doo, boing, boing, boing ♪ ♪ Duap, duap, duap ♪ ♪ Duap, duap, duap ♪ I hope you enjoyed that as much as I did.

And remember if you'd like to go back and try again, you can do, just rewind.

Let's look at our keywords.

So we have to improvise, which means to create in the moment to make it up on the spot which is what we were doing with scat singing, which is where you improvise singing with nonsense words and syllables.

Here is a statement for you.

A soprano has a very low singing voice.

Is this true or is this false? It is false.

Do you remember from our Opera Aria before, the soprano has the highest singing range.

So thank you for joining me in this last lesson.

And I hope you've enjoyed doing all the weird and wonderful things with your singing voice today.

If you would like to share any of your work with Oak National, for instance, any of the singing that we have done, and please ask your parent or carer share it on Twitter, tagging @oaknational and hashtag learn with Oak.

All the very best and take care, bye.