Kevin+&+Victoria

= **Music Tells a Story, and Vice Versa!** =

**Lesson Overview** Our initial lesson focused on students creating their own story from listening to a piece of programmatic music. While teaching, we used //Abram's Pursuit// by David R. Holsinger. Students listened to the song, wrote down their story, and tied events in the story to specific musical events in the piece. The class then picked a story to expand into a storyboard, and eventually will create a movie or play with the piece serving as background music.

**Teaching Reviews of Music/Art Related Books**


 * 1) ** __Tuesd__ **** __ay__ by David Wiesner[[image:frog.scene.jpg width="326" height="137" align="right"]] **
 * Plot: The story begins at 8 pm on a Tuesday in a swamp. After we see the frogs in the swamp they begin to start flying on lily pads. They leave the swamp and get into their own adventures throughout thenight. There are detailed, lush pictures where the frogs are flying through someone’s laundry, are chasing and being chased by a dog and are seen in an old woman’s house. Then, the sun comes up and the frogs have the hopback to the swamp. The last page of the book says “Next Tuesday around 8 pm” and theaccompanying picture is of pigs flying.
 * Resource: This can be used as a reverse of the first lesson. Our first lesson had students write a story based on music and then create their own pictures and storyboard. This book has no written story and it would be up to students to create their own story and then they can add their own music or compose (for older students).
 * @http://www.amazon.com/Tuesday-David-Wiesner/dp/0395551137/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1323970648&sr=8-1
 * 1) ** __Can You Hear It?__ By William Lach **
 * Plot: The book has an introduction to the different instruments with a brief description and picture. The next section of the book has works of art from the Metropolitan [[image:B2472CanYouHearItBk_0c25.JPG width="315" height="276" align="right"]] of Art and is accompanied with a piece of music. The book comes with a CD that has recordings of all the pieces that were chosen for specific works of art. Pieces included are: Flight of the Bumblebee, American in Paris, Carnival of the Animals, Nutcracker, The Four Seasons ad Billy the Kid: Gun Battle.
 * Resource: For younger students what we could do as an activity is one that is suggested by the book. Next picture are prompted question. The first question is about the artwork and asks the students to find something in the piece. The two questions after are asked after the students listen to the piece to see if they can hear musical ideas. For middle school students we could show them the artwork and ask them to find their own piece or show them a piece and ask them to find artwork. If we were to use this lesson for high school level students, we could have them compose their own music for a piece of art.
 * @http://www.amazon.com/Can-You-Hear-William-Lach/dp/0810957213/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1323970697&sr=1-1

**Review of Web 2.0 Resources**

**Gooveshark**- @http://grooveshark.com/ Grooveshark is an online music website. To use, one simply has to search for song title, album, or artist. The library includes many genres, from pop, to jazz, to a large array of classical and other styles. To incorporate Grooveshark in to this lesson, a teacher would use the website to provide music for the class. A teacher could already have musical examples in mind, and could use Grooveshark to save on space if traveling. Or, a teacher can use Grooveshark as a pinch hitter if he or she forgets some materials. Teachers can use music from Grooveshark to provide students a soundscape to draw. Alternately, students can help to lead an activity by improvising lessons. A teacher could ask students to pick a song, then the class would each create a visual or written response to a favorite song of each student in the class.

**Toondoo-** @http://www.toondoo.com/ @http://www.toondoo.com/View.toon?param=4218153 Toondoo is a website that students and teachers can use to create free web cartoons. This site applies to our lesson because students or teachers can use the site to create visual responses to music. There are all sorts of backgrounds, props, characters and actions from which to choose, and many sizes of comic can be selected. Another way to utilize Toondoo is by creating a comic that students can base an improvisation off of. This is the basis for the example above. Younger students could view the comic, talk about what they believe is happening, then use Orff instruments to improvise background music or create a soundtrack.


 * Hotlist! **

@http://www.youtube.com/user/StoryboardSecrets Disney storyboard artist Sherm Cohen gives a series of detailed lessons on effective storyboarding. This site would be a good tool for students so they can further enhance their storyboard. The link is to his Youtube page where he provides multiple videos on storyboarding.

@http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2nTRUMEbJz0&feature=list_related&playnext=1&list=SP49C23CC02B2C1776 The link is a playlist of 15 videos about how to create a comic strip. This link will benefit our project because it can be an outside assignment where students can explore the art of storyboards/comic strips. The videos are from the ExpertVillage channel and throughout the channel there are tons of videos on storyboarding and comics that students can look into.

@http://nafme.org/ This website would be a good resource for the teacher. It provides an extensive list of lessons and as the teacher you can search lessons by the standards it covers, the age level, the topic etc. This resource is great because if you have a lesson and want to extend it and need ideas, you can search your topic on the website and tons of results come up.

@http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wPQlxHWsemI&feature=share This video of "Shark in the Water" by VV Brown relates to our project because it is a video that tells a story that is not explicitly mentioned in the lyrics. It would be a good video for students to see so they can understand how music tells a story and the video enhances that. As a side project, we could have students try to find their own music video that tells a story (programmatic).

@http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_program_music This could be used as a resource for teachers whether they teach music or not. For example, English teachers could use this website if they want to include programmatic music in their lesson and have students write a story that goes with it.

**ArtsEdge Lesson:** @http://artsedge.kennedy-center.org/educators/lessons/grade-5/Haunting_Music.aspx This lesson is based on programmatic music and uses the pieces "Symphonie Fantastique" by Hector Berlioz and "Danse Macabre" by Camille Saint-Saens. Students will explore the musical terms and elements of the piece, the literary story behind the piece, write a short story based on the piece and then create a class mural based on their listening experiences.