Tune: "Look at All the Happy Faces
Tonality: Aeolian
Meter: Unusual Unpaired (7)
Teaching Ideas
Use this tune to acculturate students to music in 7. The microbeats are organized into 2, 2, 3. I use this tune to focus on uneven macrobeats.
1. Listen to the tune several times. Move to all levels of beat (Continuous Flow in Space, Microbeats, Macrobeats). Watch this video for example movements to try. My default movement props are scarves for the macrobeats (bouncing them is very effective!) and bean bags for microbeats. Watch master MLT teacher Natasha Sigmund acculturate adults to 5/8 in this video from the GIML YouTube channel.
2. On a subsequent day, I set up a hula hoop "obstacle course" on the floor. I use smaller rings for the groups of 2 microbeats, and a larger one for the groups of 3. I send one student at a time through the obstacle course, and they walk the macrobeats. When they have finished, they go back to the end of the line and go through the course a second time.
Here is the notation:
You may download a PDF of this tune here.
Fifty Tunes for Teaching
Check out this book which contains 50 new songs with and without words for use in the general music class. Sequenced according to Gordon's Music Learning Theory.
