Lesson video

Hello, musicians.

It's me again, Mrs. Steele, and I'm so excited to be back with another music lesson for us today.

Today's lesson is called How singing softly makes me feel.

By the end of today's lesson, you will be able to control your soft singing voice to suit a song.

Here are the key words that will be important in our learning today.

Dynamics: how loudly or quietly the music is played or sung.

Sing: to create musical sounds with our voice that can be a mixture of high sounds and low sounds.

And lullaby: a gentle, soothing song to help us sleep.

But first, before every music lesson, it's important to warm up our bodies, voices, and minds so that we're ready to move, play, and sing together.

We need to gently warm and then stretch our vocal chords to prevent our voices from injury.

Warmups help develop our music and our singing skills too.

Plus, they're lots of fun.

Follow these warmups so that you're ready for music.

Here comes the video.

<v ->Let's begin by warming up our bodies</v> 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 (blabbers).

(students blabber) Very good.

Let's do that one more time.

Stretch up onto your tiptoes.

Hold onto the monkey bar.

Lowering our heels to a count 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 (blabbers).

(students blabbering) 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 dinky, tiny shape.

Tiny, tiny, tiny, tiny, tiny, like a little seed.

And we're 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.

<v ->Let's learn how to breathe like a singer.

</v> I want you to imagine that your body is a balloon.

If you were a balloon, I wonder what color you would be.

What color would you be? <v Student>Blue.

</v> <v ->You'd be blue, okay,</v> so some of you are blue balloons.

You might be a different color.

We're gonna blow up our balloons by breathing in like a singer.

Are you ready? (Mrs. Steele and students inhale deeply) And out.

(Mrs. Steele and students exhale deeply) This time, let's see if we can make our balloon even bigger by making sure we get lots of air into our lungs, keeping our shoulders down.

Are you ready? (Mrs. Steele and students inhale deeply) (Mrs. Steele and students exhale deeply) Let's try one more.

(Mrs. Steele and students inhale deeply) Oh, no, I've let my balloon go! (Mrs. Steele and students imitate balloon hissing) Zup! (claps) (students clap) Follow me.

(Mrs. Steele and students vocalizing) (Mrs. Steele and students vocalizing) (Mrs. Steele and students vocalizing) <v ->Let's sing "Che Che Kule" three times,</v> each time with a different dynamic.

Don't forget to sing the response.

♪ Ready, steady, off we go ♪ (Mrs. Steele singing in foreign language) (Mrs. Steele singing in foreign language) (Mrs. Steele singing in foreign language) (Mrs. Steele singing in foreign language) (Mrs. Steele singing in foreign language) (Mrs. Steele singing in foreign language) (Mrs. Steele singing in foreign language) (Mrs. Steele singing in foreign language) Let's learn about when and why we sing softly.

Here are some examples of songs we might sing softly, a lullaby to fall asleep, a calm religious song, a gentle or sad song, or perhaps a spooky song.

We've got two examples to listen to.

As you listen, can you think about what words you could choose to describe the singing? Let's start off by listening to the lullaby, "Heno, Heno." Here it comes.

(gentle music) (singer singing in Welsh) (singer continues singing in Welsh) <v ->And now listen to "A La Nanita."</v> What words would you choose to describe the singing? (singers singing in Spanish) ♪ Gently, we come to see the little baby ♪ ♪ See the little baby sleeping ♪ (singers singing in Spanish) ♪ Gladly, we bring a melody ♪ ♪ We bring a melody to the baby ♪ <v ->It's time for a check-in with our learning so far.

</v> True or false? A lullaby should be sung loudly so that we can hear the words clearly.

Show me a thumb up if you think that's true, or a thumb down if you think that's false.

Show me your thumbs.

Here comes the answer.

That's false.

Well done if you spotted that.

Lullabies suit softer singing because they're gentle songs sung to help little ones to fall asleep.

We can't fall asleep if we're singing loudly.

Listen to this clip of "Crooked Castle." Is it sung loudly or quietly? Listen to the music.

(gentle eerie music) ♪ Midnight at the eerie castle ♪ ♪ Whispers start to creep ♪ ♪ Can you hear those crooked creatures ♪ ♪ Stirring in their sleep ♪ <v ->Hello again.

</v> Did you spot that it's sung quietly? Why does quiet singing suit this song, I wonder? Let's try singing it loudly and then very quietly.

Which dynamic suits the song better, loud singing or soft singing? Give both a try.

Here comes the music twice through.

The first time, sing it loudly, and then very quietly.

Which do you think is better? (gentle eerie music) ♪ Midnight at the eerie castle ♪ ♪ Whispers start to creep ♪ ♪ Can you hear those crooked creatures ♪ ♪ Stirring in their sleep ♪ (gentle eerie music) ♪ Midnight at the eerie castle ♪ ♪ Whispers start to creep ♪ ♪ Can you hear those crooked creatures ♪ ♪ Stirring in their sleep ♪ <v ->Why does soft singing suit a spooky song?</v> Press pause now to share your ideas with your class.

Did you share some ideas about why soft singing might suit a spooky song? Here are some of our Oak friends' ideas.

I wonder if you thought the same, or perhaps you shared something different.

Laura says, "I think quiet singing sounds more spooky than loud singing." And Jacob says, "It's a bit like a whisper.

It's a more exciting way to hear a story in a song." And Alex says, "Loud singing sounds too joyful, but quiet singing helps it feel mysterious." Great ideas, Laura, Jacob, and Alex.

After the quiet, spooky start, this bit of the song gets a bit louder.

Have a listen.

♪ Open up the doorway wide ♪ ♪ What's that going on inside ♪ <v ->Jacob says, "I can imagine the big door opening</v> with a creak." And Sam says, "I can make my singing sound exciting and dramatic." Rehearse singing this part of the song, getting gradually louder and very dramatic.

Here comes the music.

Rehearse this big dramatic part of the song.

♪ Open up the doorway wide.

♪ ♪ What's that going on inside ♪ <v ->Now let's try singing the first part of the song.

</v> We're singing softly to make sure it sounds spooky and exciting.

Imagine you want the audience to have goosebumps as they're listening to you tell a soft, spooky story with your voices.

Press pause to try that now.

Some of our Oak friends enjoyed that challenge.

Andeep says, "Singing softly can sound really dramatic." And Aisha liked the soft singing.

She thought it sounded spooky and exciting.

And Laura says, "When we started to sing louder, it was like a big buildup for the big door opening with a creak." Now let's move on to learning about singing a lullaby.

"Heno Heno" is a Welsh lullaby.

Have a listen and see if it makes you feel sleepy.

Here's the music.

(gentle music) (singer singing in Welsh) (singer continues singing in Welsh) (gentle music) (singer singing in Welsh) (gentle music) (singer singing in Welsh) (gentle music) (gentle music fades) <v ->Lullabies help us to fall asleep.

</v> We sing them softly to soothe and relax us.

Sing the first verse as softly and gently as you can.

Here's the music.

(gentle music) (singer singing in Welsh) (singer continues singing in Welsh) <v Mrs. Steele>Now imagine you're rocking a baby</v> gently to sleep.

Take a relaxing breath, and sing softly and gently.

Here comes the music again.

(gentle music) (singer singing in Welsh) (singer continues singing in Welsh) <v ->Soft singing needs just as much air as loud singing.

</v> To help us practice this, try this exercise for our breathing.

Repeat it three times.

Here comes a video to help you.

Join in with these breathing exercises.

Copy me.

(hands scraping) (Mrs. Steele blows) (hands scraping) (Mrs. Steele blows) (hands scraping) (Mrs. Steele blows) (Mrs. Steele hissing) Now that our breathing is more warmed up, sing the song with one breath for each line.

Here comes the music again.

(gentle music) (singer singing in Welsh) (singer continues singing in Welsh) <v Mrs. Steele>Only the first words change</v> in each verse of our lullaby.

Let's try singing the first line of each verse and see if you can spot the words Heno, which means tonight, gwely, which means bed, and fory, which means tomorrow.

It's my turn to sing.

Then it will be your turn.

(Mrs. Steele singing in Welsh) <v ->Well done.

</v> Let's try the second line.

(Mrs. Steele singing in Welsh) Great, and now the last line.

(Mrs. Steele singing in Welsh) Great soft singing.

Now let's sing the whole song, imagining we are gently sending a baby to sleep.

Here comes the music.

(gentle music) (gentle music continues) (gentle music continues) (gentle music continues) (gentle music continues) (gentle music fades) How did it go? Here are some of our Oak friends' ideas.

Lucas says, "I felt so calm and relaxed by the end of the song." I did too.

This whole thing is making me quite sleepy.

Jacob says, "We still needed plenty of breath to sing quietly." That's very true.

And Laura says, "When we all sang quietly together, it feels warm and nice." We've come to the end of our lesson today all about how singing softly makes me feel, and I certainly feel very calm and relaxed now.

Before you go, let's take a moment to think about everything we've been learning together today.

We know that singing softly can help the listener to feel relaxed and that soft singing can be useful at times, like bedtime or when we want to feel calm.

We know that some songs suit a soft dynamic more than others and that we need plenty of breath when we're singing softly.

What wonderful musical learning, everyone.

Beautiful singing, and I can't wait to see you again soon for another music lesson.

Buh-bye.