2016 Vce Music Teachers' Conference Session Notes
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Association of Music Educators 2016 VCE MUSIC TEACHERS’ CONFERENCE SESSION NOTES VCE CONFERENCE 2016 SATURDAY 27 FEBRUARY SESSION 1 MUSIC STYLE AND COMPOSITION EAT report Pip Robinson EAT process Mark McSherry Scaffolding Outcome 1 Anna van Veldhuisen I hear, I see – Outcomes 2 and 3 Mandy Stefanakis Context as part of Outcome 2 Matt Pankhurst Transition to 2017 Helen Champion SESSION 2. MUSIC INVESTIGATION MUSIC INVESTIGATION PLENARY SESSION Messages from 2015 and transitioning to 2017 Helen Champion Outcome 3 – Performance Rod Marshall Chief Assessor’s report Outcome 1 – Investigation Lynne Morton State Reviewer’s report Teaching strategy workshop MI:1 MI:1.1: Selecting repertoire for the end of year exam/linking with Focus Statement – Rod Marshall MI:1.3: Preparing students for composition and improvisation via a folio of works – Nick Taylor MI:1.4: Surviving and achieving in the Multi-Study Classroom – Lynne Morton Teaching strategy workshop MI:2 MI:2.1: Selecting repertoire for the end of year exam/linking with Focus Statement – Rod Marshall MI:2.2: Using the new assessment guide numbers for School Assessed Coursework. – Lynne Morton MI:2.3: A systematic approach to teaching improvisation – David Urquhart-Jones MI:2.4: Enhancing and harnessing creativity in Outcome 2: Composition – Matt Pankhurst SUNDAY 22 FEBRUARY SESSION 3. MUSIC PERFORMANCE MUSIC PERFORMANCE PLENARY SESSION Messages from 2015 and transitioning to 2017 Helen Champion Outcome 3 Examiner’s report Barry Fletcher Outcome 2 State reviewers report David Graham Outcome 1 Examiner’s report Eddie Dorn Teaching strategy workshops MP:1 MP:1.1: Surviving and achieving in the Multi-Study Classroom - Lynne Morton MP:1.2: Selecting repertoire appropriate for each student – Outcome 1 - Manfred Pohlenz MP:1.3: The things I wish I knew when I started teaching my first VCE instrumental student - Shannon Ebeling MP:1.4: Dialogue with a mentor - Roland Yeung MP:1.6: Rhythmic dictation - Andrew Philpot MP:1.7: Performance excellence - Jenny Going MP:1.8: NEW - Auralia and Musition 5 – Classroom essentials - Peter Lee Teaching strategy workshops MP:2 MP:2.1: Surviving and achieving in the Multi-Study Classroom - Lynne Morton MP:2.2: VCE Contemporary Voice - Melinda Ceresoli MP:2.3: VCE Music Performance: How the year unfolds in the life of a school - Fiona Branford MP:2.4: Writing about music: Is it beyond words? - Roland Yeung MP:2.5: When it’s too late for sol fa - Jayne Turner MP:2.6: Engaging learning activities in musicianship - James LeFevre MP:2.7: The things I wish I knew when I started teaching my first VCE instrumental student - Shannon Ebeling MP:2.8: Auralia and Musition 5 - Creating dictation, multiple choice and tapping questions with real music! - Peter Lee Teaching strategy workshops MP:3 MP:3.1: Selecting repertoire appropriate for each student – Outcome 1 - Manfred Pohlenz MP:3.2: Performance excellence - Jenny Going MP:3.3: Integrating jazz into the VCE music curriculum - Tim Nikolsky MP:3.4: The technical SAC – Don’t invent problems! - John Ferguson MP:3.5: How to REALLY practice musicianship, aural and theory skills? - Deborah Smith MP:3.6: Developing vocabulary linking musical experiences - Jennifer Gillan MP:3.7: VCE Music Performance: How the year unfolds in the life of a school| - Fiona Branford MP:3.6: NEW - Auralia 5. Testing, courses, assessment and reporting - Peter Lee 5.00pm CLOSE OF CONFERENCE **Notes contained in this document MUSIC STYLE AND COMPOSITION I hear, I see – Outcomes 2 and 3 Mandy Stefanakis 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 Context 1. Watch each sequence a couple of times. 2. Look at the questions. 3. Investigate the context of each piece. For example listen to and view other works by the composers and video makers: Suggest: Drone https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Drone_(music) Fell Music by Luke Altman http://altmann.net.au Screenplay by Natasha Pincus (video for Gotye’s Somebody I Used to Know) Watch visuals accompanying music. Missy Higgins’ Everyone’s Waiting also about a kind of loss and landscape http://www.starkravingproductions.com.au/music_videos.html Paper Planes Music by Nigel Westlake http://www.rimshot.com.au Listen and view other scores by Westlake, many snippets available on You Tube. Pavane https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pavane Score Reading 4. Where a score is available (Paper Planes) use it to follow the interactions between instruments, identify patterns, variations in pattern and instrumentation, repetition, texture, key and metre changes for example. Lost and Found 1 Responding 5. Respond with as much detail as possible. Sharing 6. Discuss your responses with other class members and audio this sharing. Refer to aspects of the elements of music on page 135 of the Music Study Guide the compositional devices on page 136 and the contextual guidelines on page 137 to guide your responses. Question Fell Paper Planes (Pavane) (2 sequences) (2 sequences) What is the role of the drone in each of these examples? Lost and Found 2 What methods are used to alter the nuance of the drone throughout? Refer, for example to dynamics, articulation, timing, form How is emotional elicitation shaped in these sequences? Refer to, for example: . melodic shape and relationship to drone, key, changes in key . use of beat, or rhythm, timing devices, metre, changing metre . use of expressive devices such as dynamics, legato, staccato, articulation and shaping of specific notes or groups of notes, tempo . form . instrumentation and changes in or additions to instrumentation . tone colour such as use of Lost and Found 3 glissandi, distortion, note- bending . changes in texture . harmonic devices, example chord sequences, modulations, suspensions and harmonic impact on tension and resolution . use of repetition, contrast, variation Why ‘Pavane’? Why ‘Fell’? What impact does landscape have on the characters and on what is conveyed aesthetically? Lost and Found 4 Describe the nature of what you think is being expressed musically in each sequence and how this expression changes. Describe the relationship between the visuals and the music for each sequence and what you think the composer is attempting to achieve. Fell Sequence 1 Sequence 2 Paper Planes Sequence 1 Sequence 2 How is the meaning affected by the music? How is the meaning affected by similar music used with different visual/narration contexts? Lost and Found 5 Describe the relationship between sound effects and music Compare the similarities of the sequences referring to your responses and anything you have not talked about so far. Lost and Found 6 Describe the differences between the sequences referring to your responses and anything you may not have talked about. Write about which sequence you feel ‘works’ most effectively as a score for the visuals it is enhancing and describe why you think this. Lost and Found 7 Lost and Found 8 I have thematically combined outcomes two and three so one feeds the other. I have also combined them because they look at similar musical features to address the common theme. It needs to be remembered that in other music subjects in VCE, the emphasis is on aural development in order to perform with technical proficiency, contextual understanding and expressivity although there are aspects of composition in Music Investigations. In Styles and Composition, however, you will probably need to play well, but the emphasis is on looking at the compositional devices used to create music, because the students need to understand these devices in order to compose themselves. So it is breaking down the strategies and tools used by composers to express and communicate an idea or feeling or concept. Students can find themselves creating formulaic music. There’s sometimes a need to reconceptualise how sounds are sculpted together to make meaning. I like to flog Australian content because we make good music and good art and good films, none of which get flogged enough! Firstly, Fell. This is about a man whose daughter is killed by a logging truck. He seeks revenge on the driver, also a logger. However, their shared environment impacts on this resolution. A warning that this has anMA15 rating but not these sections and not most sections actually. Just ensure you review what you wish to use. There are two sequences. The music does not change but the context does. How does this impact on the musical meaning? Paper Planes is a kids flick but the thematic material is universal. Don’t balk at being ageless in your selections of material. There are, again, two sequences with the same music, though the second time the music is developed further. The score is valuable. The CD version of Pavane has a developed section in it not available in the score. But it is worth following the score even for not so good score readers as its a good way of understanding different aspects of the music. Students can focus on different elements – the use of dynamics, the overlay of instruments, the use of changing metre and tempo the harmonic structure with changes from major to minor tonalities, the use of upper portion of the keyboard and so on, the interpretation of the drone – just from following the score while listening. The listening task sheet is provided in Word format so that you can change it in any way, shape or form to suit circumstances. All it doesn’t look at is the technical construction of the score to music. But you may wish to focus on just a couple of areas such as melodic shape and the interaction of counter-melodic passages and the drone. It’s also important to look at the context for both these films and the music as suggested in the worksheet and replicated here.