Lesson video

Hello, musicians.

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

But before we start, there's a listening example that doesn't feature in this video, so you'll need to take a moment if you haven't already, to find that listening example now.

There's a teacher guidance slide at the beginning of the slide deck to help you with this.

Press pause to find that listening example if you need to.

Great.

Let's get started together.

Today, we're going to be improvising longer phrases using the D minor pentatonic scale.

By the end of today's lesson, you'll be able to improvise a stylistic longer phrase using notes from the D minor pentatonic scale.

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

Head, the main melody or theme often used when referring to jazz music.

Arrangement, adapting how an existing piece of music is going to sound, for example, changing the instrumentation.

Phrase, a musical thought, like a sentence in a story Bar, a measure of musical time with a set number of beats, for example, four beats in four-time.

And improvisation, creative, in the moment, musical composition.

First, before every music lesson, we know how important it is to warm up our voices, our bodies, and our minds to make sure that we can sing safely, develop our vocal strength, and to have a great opportunity to rehearse our other musical skills too.

Sequence your whole body, breathing, and voice warmups so that you're ready for music.

Now join in with these warmups to develop your sense of pulse and ensemble work.

Let's start with H-E-L-L-O.

Here's the video.

♪ H-E-L-L-O ♪ ♪ This is how we say hello ♪ ♪ March your feet to the beat ♪ ♪ Can you feel your heart beat ♪ ♪ H-E-L-L-O ♪ ♪ This is how we say hello ♪ ♪ March your feet to the beat ♪ ♪ Can you feel your heart beat ♪ ♪ H-E-L-L-O ♪ ♪ This is how we say hello ♪ ♪ March your feet to the beat ♪ ♪ Can you feel your heart beat ♪ ♪ This is how we say hello ♪ ♪ March your feet to the beat ♪ ♪ This is how we say hello ♪ ♪ Can you feel your heart beat ♪ ♪ March your feet to the beat ♪ ♪ Can you feel your heart beat ♪ <v ->Now join in with,</v> "Who Stole the Cookie from the Cookie Jar?" Watch the video to see how it goes, then press pause to try it where you are.

♪ Who stole the cookie from the cookie jar ♪ ♪ Alex stole the cookie from the cookie jar ♪ ♪ Who me? Yes, you ♪ ♪ Couldn't have been, then who ♪ ♪ Lucas stole the cookie from the cookie jar ♪ ♪ Who me? Yes, you ♪ ♪ Couldn't have been, then who ♪ ♪ Jacob stole the cookie from the cookie jar ♪ ♪ Who me? Yes, you ♪ ♪ Couldn't have been, then who ♪ ♪ Andeep stole the cookie from the cookie jar ♪ ♪ Who me? Yes, you ♪ ♪ Couldn't have been, then who ♪ ♪ Izzy stole the cookie from ♪ <v ->And finally, join in with "Bate Bate Chocolate."</v> Here's the music.

(upbeat music) ♪ Uno, dos, tres, cho ♪ ♪ Uno, dos, tres, co ♪ ♪ Uno, dos, tres, la ♪ ♪ Uno, dos, tres, te ♪ ♪ Bate bate chocolate ♪ ♪ Uno, dos, tres, cho ♪ ♪ Uno, dos, tres, co ♪ ♪ Uno, dos, tres, la ♪ ♪ Uno, dos, tres, te ♪ ♪ Bate bate chocolate ♪ ♪ Uno, dos, tres, cho ♪ ♪ Uno, dos, tres, co ♪ ♪ Uno, dos, tres, la ♪ ♪ Uno, dos, tres, te ♪ ♪ Bate bate chocolate ♪ ♪ Uno, dos, tres, cho ♪ ♪ Uno, dos, tres, co ♪ ♪ Uno, dos, tres, la ♪ ♪ Uno, dos, tres, te ♪ ♪ Bate bate chocolate ♪ (drum beating) <v ->Let's check that you're ready for music.

</v> Make sure you've got a relaxed singing posture and your voice feels warm and ready to sing.

Let's begin with developing the head as an ensemble.

We're going to listen to the beginning of the jazz standard "Sonnymoon for Two" by saxophonist Sonny Rollins.

We've listened to this piece before.

Do you remember that the head of the piece is repeated six times before the improvisations begin? Listen out for the saxophone, which leads with the first improvisation about 46 seconds in.

Then at 1:35, the trombone improvises, and then it's the piano's turn to improvise.

Press pause to find and listen to the beginning of this piece, and listen out for the head at the beginning and then the improvisations from the saxophone, the trombone, and then the piano.

In this piece, before all the individual improvisations begin, all of the ensemble are involved in playing the head.

Mostly, the instruments play in synchronization with some added offbeat rhythms. Synchronization means happening at the same time.

So let's listen again and identify the instruments playing in synchronization.

Press pause to find and listen to the same piece again.

Can you spot the instruments playing in synchronization? We know this song well now.

It's "Five Notes in a Pentatonic," and it's a jazzy number that uses only the notes of the minor pentatonic scale.

Let's sing along and clap on the offbeats as you sing.

Remember, the offbeats are the weak beats two and four.

Here comes the music, sing and clap along to the offbeats.

(upbeat music) ♪ Five notes in a pentatonic ♪ ♪ We go up and we go down ♪ ♪ Five notes in a pentatonic ♪ ♪ What a pattern we have found ♪ ♪ We can improvise make our own tunes ♪ ♪ We can play what we want ♪ ♪ Starting at the bottom then we move up to the top ♪ ♪ And hear the notes become the same as before ♪ ♪ Five notes in a pentatonic ♪ ♪ We go up and we go down ♪ ♪ Five notes in a pentatonic ♪ ♪ What a pattern we have found ♪ <v ->Today, we're going to work as an ensemble</v> to perform the head of this song together, but we're going to add other percussion instruments today.

They're going to perform the same rhythm at the same time the pitched percussion play, and that will create a new arrangement and a richer synchronized sound.

Let's explore a bit more about just how we're going to do this.

Your first task is to choose some unpitched percussion to play, or you could use body percussion and follow the rhythm of the head.

Press pause to find your instruments or get your body percussion ready and meet me back here and I'll play the music.

You ready? Here comes the music.

Follow the rhythm of the head.

(upbeat music) ♪ Five notes in a pentatonic ♪ ♪ We go up and we go down ♪ ♪ Five notes in a pentatonic ♪ ♪ What a pattern we have found ♪ ♪ We can improvise make our own tunes ♪ ♪ We can play what we want ♪ ♪ Starting at the bottom then we move up to the top ♪ ♪ And hear the notes become the same as before ♪ ♪ Five notes in a pentatonic ♪ ♪ We go up and we go down ♪ ♪ Five notes in a pentatonic ♪ ♪ What a pattern we have found ♪ <v ->We've got claves as our unpitched percussion</v> in this example.

Listen to the head accompanied by an offbeat clave rhythm.

Tap along to feel how the claves fit alongside the melody.

It's a good idea to tap two fingers on one palm like this because it creates a great percussive sound, but it's not too loud to make sure that you can hear the claves in the audio track at the same time.

♪ Five notes in a pentatonic ♪ ♪ We go up and we go down ♪ Here comes the audio.

Listen to that offbeat clave rhythm and tap along.

(upbeat music) (claves clinking) (xylophone dinging) Here's a partner challenge for you now.

Working with a partner, take turns practicing the head with an offbeat clave accompaniment.

So one of you is going to play the head on their pitched percussion instrument and the other one is going to play the offbeat clave accompaniment on their claves or using body percussion, then swap roles.

Press pause to try that partner challenge now and you could use the audio button to support you whenever you need it.

Now let's put all of that together.

As a class ensemble, divide into groups to perform the head in your new arrangement.

Group one are going to perform the melody on pitched percussion, just as we've done a few times before.

Then group two, you're going to play the rhythm of the head on unpitched percussion and you could use any selection of unpitched percussion you happen to have, or you could use body percussion.

And group three are going to play their claves on the offbeat.

Now there's a slow tempo track to help you with this.

It's a really good idea to use that as you practice.

This challenge is going to take a fair bit of practicing.

Before I send you on your way, let's take a look at the slide that shows in more detail what each group are going to do.

Here comes the slide for group one.

Group one, these are your notes here.

You're going to play the melody of the head on your pitched percussion instrument.

Group two, you're going to play the rhythm of the head on your unpitched percussion.

Group three, you're going to play the offbeat with your claves.

Press pause now to try that musical challenge and use the slow tempo track audio button to help you, and you can scroll back through any of the slides for any of the groups if you want to refer to them again.

Good luck, I'll see you soon.

Great musicians always reflect on their performances afterwards, so let's take some time to reflect on your arrangement of the head.

Was there a good balance of sound between the melody and the rhythm? Did you like the arrangement and the instruments you've chosen, or are there any changes you might like to make next time? And can you feel the steady pulse so that you could play the offbeat pattern accurately? Press pause to share your ideas about the answers to these questions.

Let's move on to longer improvisations with the D minor pentatonic.

Today, we're going to create longer improvisations.

They're going to be four bars long.

Now although we know that improvisation is creative, in the moment, musical composition, there's lots of thinking to be done when we improvise, as there are a lot of effective strategies that we can use to make sure our improvisation is really successful.

Let's take a moment to review some of those now.

We can borrow musical ideas from the head, like rhythms or melodic shapes.

We need to remember to allow room to breathe.

It also gives you time to think whilst you're improvising.

So remember to use some rests or longer notes.

Remember to mark your tonality.

We're going to revolve around la or D for the minor pentatonic so we can start and end on D and return to D often throughout.

Remember, we're trying to create something singable, playable, and memorable, so we don't want to include too many leaps in there.

And finally, remember to repeat your ideas, play a phrase multiple times, perhaps exactly the same, or with just one very small change.

Remember, we're only using the notes of the D minor pentatonic scale.

Here they are.

You could use higher or lower notes too, as long as we only use D, F, G, A, and C.

Before you have a go, let's take a look at these two bar phrases of the head.

Notice how they're very similar in shape.

♪ Five notes in a pentatonic ♪ ♪ We go up and we go down ♪ ♪ Five notes in a pentatonic ♪ ♪ What a pattern we have found ♪ We can create longer improvised phrases by improvising a call and response with a partner.

So like a question and answer, we can listen to our partner, and then try to play an improvised response that's similar in style and shape.

Let's have a go at this.

Working with a partner, improvise minor pentatonic melodies together.

So player one, you're going to play a simple two bar improvised question, and then player two, you're going to listen, and then play a simple two bar improvised answer.

Remember to only use the notes of the D minor pentatonic scale.

Press pause to try that partner challenge where you are.

Great work.

Let's consider our top tips for effective improvising once more.

Remember to borrow ideas, include rests and allow room to breathe and to think, revolve around that D, ascend and descend the scale, and remember to repeat ideas too.

With those things in mind, swap roles with your partner and improvise a call and response again.

Press pause and swap roles.

Let's check in with our learning so far.

Listen to this example of a four bar improvised phrase.

What do you think makes it effective? Listen carefully, then press pause to share your ideas.

(upbeat music) (xylophone dinging) What did you spot that makes that improvised phrase effective? Here's what I spotted.

I wonder if you thought the same.

I noticed that it has a balanced shape with the question starting low and rising and the answer starting high and falling.

It uses simple syncopated rhythms. The melody was very simple and singable, and the rhythm included rests too.

Did you spot those things? We're improvisation experts now, so we are ready to improvise longer musical conversations with a partner.

Using the D minor pentatonic scale, improvise a stylistic four bar phrase of your own.

Then your partner will respond with a four bar answer that compliments your improvised question.

There are different tempo backing tracks for you to choose from, so choose the one that's right for you and improvise over the top.

You could experiment with using different ones.

Press pause to try improvising with a partner, using the backing track of your choice.

Your final challenge is to improvise again for a small group or for your class and listen to other groups improvise.

It's a great opportunity to appraise your performance and the performances of others, and you can note any key feedback the next time.

Press pause to have another go at improvising, to share it with your class or with another group.

Or you could record it to share with someone else at a later time.

We've come to the end of our lesson together today, but before we go, let's take a moment to think about everything we've been learning together.

We know that a jazz piece begins with a head, played by all instruments, and improvisations then follow this.

And we know that a new arrangement of a piece can be created by changing or adding to the instrumentation.

We know that improvising with a call and response structure in mind can help to organize an improvisation, and that's just what we did today.

And we know that it's helpful to perform in front of an audience to receive effective feedback.

Thanks so much, everyone.

I'm already looking forward to seeing you again soon for another music lesson.

Bye.