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- Year 10
- OCR
Instrumentation and metre in popular music
I can aurally identify the instrumentation and metre in popular songs.
Copyrighted materials: to view and download resources from this lesson, you’ll need to be in the UK and
- Year 10
- OCR
Instrumentation and metre in popular music
I can aurally identify the instrumentation and metre in popular songs.
Copyrighted materials: to view and download resources from this lesson, you’ll need to be in the UK and
These resources were made for remote use during the pandemic, not classroom teaching.
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Lesson details
Key learning points
- Pop music has been around since the 1950s and includes many different genres.
- Pop music shares common features including instrumentation and structure.
- Instrumentation is which instruments and voices have been used.
- Most pop songs have vocals, piano/guitar, bass guitar and drums, although more modern pop uses synthesized instruments.
- Metre is the organisation of bars and beats. Most pop songs have four beats in a bar or a 4/4 time signature.
Keywords
Instrumentation - the combination and use of different instruments and voices in a song is referred to as instrumentation
Riff - a short recurring or repeated motif used in pop music
Synthesiser - an electronic musical instrument
Metre - the organisation of bars and beats in a piece of music
Time signature - this tells us how many beats are in a bar of music
Common misconception
Synthesiser vs synthesised sound
You can use a synthesiser if you have one or show a youtube clip of one in action. Use keyboard and different sounds to explain synthesised
To help you plan your year 10 music lesson on: Instrumentation and metre in popular music, download all teaching resources for free and adapt to suit your pupils' needs...
To help you plan your year 10 music lesson on: Instrumentation and metre in popular music, download all teaching resources for free and adapt to suit your pupils' needs.
The starter quiz will activate and check your pupils' prior knowledge, with versions available both with and without answers in PDF format.
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Explore more key stage 4 music lessons from the Introduction to pop music unit, dive into the full secondary music curriculum, or learn more about lesson planning.
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