Lesson video

Hello again, everyone.

It's me, Mrs. Steele, and I'm really excited to be guiding you through another music lesson today.

Today's lesson is called "Playing a Minor Pentatonic Jazz Melody." But before we begin, there's a listening example that doesn't feature in today's video that you're going to need, so please take a moment 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 haven't already done so.

Great.

Now that you are ready, let's get started.

By the end of today's lesson, you'll be able to play the main melody, or the head, of a jazz piece with accuracy and a steady pulse.

Here are the keywords that we'll need in our learning today.

Head, a term for the main melody or theme in jazz music.

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 note, a single sound in music.

But before we do anything else, we know how important it is to warm up our voices, our bodies, and our minds before every music lesson.

We need to warm and stretch our vocal chords gently and safely to prevent injury to our voice and to help develop our vocal strength.

Warmups also are a great opportunity to help us develop many other musical skills too, like singing and playing as part of an ensemble.

Sequence your whole body, breathing and voice warmups to prepare you for music.

Join in with these warmups to develop your sense of pulse and call and response singing.

Start off by joining in with this clapping exercise.

Here's the video, ♪ Ready, steady, off we go ♪ ♪ One, two, three, four, ♪ (foot stomping) ♪ One, two, three, four, ♪ (foot stomping) ♪ One, two, three, four, ♪ (foot stomping) ♪ Clap on number one ♪ ♪ One, two, three, four ♪ (hands clapping) ♪ One, two, three, four ♪ (hands clapping) ♪ One, two, three, four ♪ (hands clapping) ♪ Clap on number two ♪ ♪ One, two, three, four ♪ (hands clapping) ♪ One, two, three, four ♪ (hands clapping) ♪ One, two, three, four ♪ (hands clapping) ♪ Clap on number three ♪ ♪ One, two, three, four ♪ (hands clapping) ♪ One, two, three, four ♪ (hands clapping) ♪ One, two, three, four ♪ (hands clapping) ♪ Clap on number four ♪ ♪ One, two, three, four ♪ (hands clapping) ♪ One, two, three, four ♪ (hands clapping) ♪ One, two, three, four ♪ (hands clapping) ♪ One, two, three, four ♪ (hands clapping) <v ->And now join in with the telephone song.

</v> Watch this video to see how it works, and then have a go where you are using the audio button.

♪ One, two, three, hey, Sam ♪ ♪ I think I hear my name ♪ ♪ Hey, Sam ♪ ♪ I think I hear it again ♪ ♪ You're wanted on the telephone ♪ ♪ It's not Jacob, I'm not at home ♪ ♪ With a rick tick tickety tick, oh yeah ♪ ♪ With a rick tick tickety tick ♪ ♪ Hey Jacob ♪ ♪ I think I hear my name ♪ ♪ Hey Jacob ♪ ♪ I think I hear it again ♪ ♪ You're wanted on the telephone ♪ ♪ If it's not Laura, I'm not at home ♪ ♪ With a rick tick tickety tick, oh yeah ♪ ♪ With a rick tick tickety tick ♪ ♪ Hey Laura ♪ ♪ I think I hear my name ♪ ♪ Hey Laura ♪ ♪ I think I hear it again ♪ ♪ You're wanted on the telephone ♪ ♪ If it's not Sofia, I'm not at home ♪ ♪ With a rick tick tickety tick, oh yeah ♪ ♪ With a rick tick tickety tick ♪ ♪ Hey Sofia ♪ ♪ I think I hear my name ♪ ♪ Hey Sofia ♪ ♪ I think I hear it again ♪ ♪ You're wanted on the telephone ♪ ♪ If it's not Izzy, I'm not at home ♪ ♪ With a rick tick tickety tick, oh yeah ♪ ♪ With a rick tick tickety tick ♪ ♪ Heyy Izzy ♪ ♪ I think I hear my name ♪ ♪ Hey Izzy ♪ ♪ I think I hear it again ♪ ♪ You're wanted on the telephone ♪ <v ->Let's take a moment to check that you're ready for music.

</v> Check that you have a relaxed singing posture, that your voice feels warm and that you feel ready to sing.

We're going to begin by learning about reading the head notation.

Five notes in a pentatonic is a jazzy number that uses only the notes of the minor pentatonic scale.

Let's sing along and clap on the offbeats two and four as we sing.

Here comes the music.

(lively piano 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 ->The head is another name</v> for the main melody in jazz music.

The head is played at the start of the piece by all the instruments before the improvisations begin.

As Richard Barnard demonstrates in this video, we're going to use the beginning of five notes in a pentatonic as the head for our jazz piece.

Watch this video to see.

<v ->So the head is like the main tune</v> or melody in a jazz piece that everyone plays all together at the start usually.

So in this piece, the main head or main melody goes like this.

(lively piano music) <v ->Now it's time to find today's listening example.

</v> Listen to the jazz standard "Sonnymoon for Two" by saxophonist Sonny Rollins.

The head or the theme of this piece is repeated six times before the improvisations begin.

This theme uses only the notes of the minor pentatonic scale descending all the way down, followed by a smaller rise and falling shape.

Press pause to find and listen to this listening example.

<v ->This is the head of five notes in a pentatonic.

</v> This will be followed by improvisations.

The treble clef that you can see here tells us where G is, and the time signature tells us that this song is in four time and there's a bar line at the end of every bar.

There are many symbols that help us understand the rhythms. This instruction, lively swing, tells us that the ta-di is played long-short.

And this is a one beat rest, and this is a one bar rest, which means, in this case, rest for four beats.

And this tie creates a syncopated rhythm.

The minor pentatonic revolves around the tone la.

In this song, D is la and there's D, the first note there.

How many Ds can you count in this head? Press pause to look carefully.

How many Ds can you spot? Hello again.

Did you count them? Here they are.

Did you spot each one? Now let's sing the head, but every time you sing the note D, clap your hands like this.

♪ Five notes in a pentatonic ♪ ♪ We go up and we go down ♪ ♪ Five notes in a pentatonic ♪ ♪ What a pattern we have found ♪ (hands clapping) Here comes the music.

Sing along too and clap your hands each time you sing a D.

(lively piano music) ♪ Five notes in a pentatonic ♪ ♪ We go up and we go down ♪ ♪ Five notes in a pentatonic ♪ ♪ What a pattern we have found ♪ <v ->The bars in this head are grouped into two-bar phrases.

</v> They're like a question and answer: rising and falling.

Here's one, a question, and then an answer, another question and an answer.

Let's sing the head again.

This time show the ascending and descending in each phrase using arm gestures.

♪ Five notes in a pentatonic ♪ ♪ We go up and we go down ♪ And so on.

Sing again, this time showing the ascending and descending in each phrase with your arms. <v ->Here's another challenge for you.

</v> Can you fill in the gaps? There are some missing notes here.

Can you identify what they are? Press pause to work together as a team.

What are the missing notes? Meet me back here for the answer.

Here are the missing notes.

Check it against yours to see if you got it right.

Now let's move on to playing the head on pitched percussion.

To learn to play the head on our pitched percussion instruments, we can break this down into chunks to make our practicing easier.

The first chunk is to start by playing the ascending minor pentatonic scale only, but you sing all of the lyrics.

You can see the notes that you need to play on the screen here, but remember to sing all of the lyrics as you do that.

Press pause to get ready to play and then meet me back here and I'll play the music.

Are you ready to play? Here comes the music.

Just play the ascending minor pentatonic scale each time you need to.

(lively piano music) ♪ Five notes in a pentatonic ♪ ♪ We go up and we go down ♪ ♪ Five notes in a pentatonic ♪ ♪ What a pattern we have found ♪ <v ->Next, let's add in the three final Ds</v> with a swing rhythm.

♪ we have found ♪ At the end.

Here comes the music again.

Play the ascending D minor pentatonic scale like you did before, but add on those three final Ds with a swing rhythm at the end.

(lively piano music) ♪ Five notes in a pentatonic ♪ ♪ We go up and we go down ♪ ♪ Five notes in a pentatonic ♪ ♪ What a pattern we have found ♪ <v ->Now for the next chunk, we can add in the descending parts</v> of the phrases with the syncopated rhythms and you can see the extra notes that you'll need to play on the screen here.

Remember that adding all of these little chunks together can take a lot of practice and you might need to practice each chunk a few times before you're ready to move on to the next one.

Here comes the music again.

Use it when you're ready to add in this next chunk.

(lively piano music) ♪ Five notes in a pentatonic ♪ ♪ We go up and we go down ♪ ♪ Five notes in a pentatonic ♪ ♪ What a pattern we have found ♪ <v ->And finally, once you've mastered all of that,</v> we can add the swing rhythm.

♪ D, F, D, C ♪ And note that this is a low C below the D, the extra bit at the end.

And then we've played everything.

Here comes the music.

Try playing the whole head, but remember, you can always go back and practice any of the other chunks as you need to.

(lively piano music) ♪ Five notes in a pentatonic ♪ ♪ We go up and we go down ♪ ♪ Five notes in a pentatonic ♪ ♪ What a pattern we have found ♪ <v ->Let's pause and have a check in with our learning.

</v> Tick all the statements that apply.

A, the head is eight bars long.

B, there are four phrases.

C, the phrases are built around the note A.

And D, the phrases are mostly shaped in an ascending, then descending pitch pattern.

Press pause to decide how many of these statements are you going to tick? Here come the answers.

You should have ticked A, the head is eight bars long, and B, there are four phrases, and D as well, the phrases are mostly shaped in an ascending, then descending pitch pattern.

Well done if you decided to tick A, B, and D.

As you're playing, here are some top tips for obtaining a good clean sound.

Remember to hold the beater loosely.

Let the beater bounce when you play so that the bar resonates and the sound can ring out.

Remember to play at the center of the bar and try playing hand to hand, so alternating left hand, right hand, left hand, right hand.

It's time for another check-in.

True or false, it's important to hold the beaters tightly so you don't drop them.

Do you think that's true? Show me a thumbs up.

Or false, show me a thumbs down.

Hopefully you're all doing this 'cause it's false.

Can you think why? If we hold the beaters gently so they bounce off the bar and allow the bar to resonate, we'll produce a good bell-like sound.

We can't do that if we hold the beaters too tightly.

Let's practice playing the head looped three times at a steady pulse.

Listen to the backing track to help you do this as you play.

Here comes the music.

(lively piano music) (lively music) Now we're going to try playing the head in three different tempi.

Play the head twice through each time and focus on keeping a steady pulse whatever the tempo.

Press pause to try each of these three tempi.

We've got one that's quite slow, one with a moderate tempo, and then one that really is quite fast.

Press pause to try each of those now.

Remember to play each one, A, B, and C, twice through.

Some of these Oak pupils have been reflecting on their playing.

It's your turn now.

Watch this video.

How does your playing compare? (lively piano music) (lively music) As we reach the end of our lesson together today, let's take a moment to think about everything we've been learning.

We know that the head is a term used when referring to the main theme in jazz music, and the head is played by the whole ensemble, then followed by individual improvisations.

We know that chunking up a melody can make it easier to learn, just as we've done today.

And we know that a song that uses the D minor pentatonic scale will have phrases that revolve around the note D.

And finally, when playing barred instruments, we know to focus carefully on how we play the instrument.

For example, striking the bar right in the center.

Thanks so much, everyone.

What great musical learning today.

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

Bye-bye.