Introduction
- Music is a universal language that embodies one of the highest forms of creativity.
- A high-quality music education should engage and inspire pupils to develop a love of music and their talent as musicians, and so increase their self-confidence, creativity and sense of achievement.
- As pupils progress, they should develop a critical engagement with music, allowing them to compose, and to listen with discrimination to the best in the musical canon.
Aims of the Clavering Curriculum for Music
The Clavering Curriculum for Music aims to ensure that all pupils:
- perform, listen to, review and evaluate music across a range of historical periods, genres, styles and traditions, including the works of the great composers and musicians;
- learn to sing and to use their voices, to create and compose music on their own and with others, have the opportunity to learn a musical instrument, use technology appropriately and have the opportunity to progress to the next level of musical excellence;
- understand and explore how music is created, produced and communicated, including through the inter-related dimensions: pitch, duration, dynamics, tempo, timbre, texture, structure and appropriate musical notations.
Clavering Learning Foci for Music
1. To listen and appraise.
2. To perform.
3. To improvise and compose.
The Interrelated Dimensions of Music within the Clavering Curriculum for Music
Pulse (duration): steady beat
Rhythm (duration): long and short sounds over a steady beat
Pitch: high and low sounds
Tempo: fast and slow
Dynamics: loud and quiet
Each unit contains elements of all three learning foci and all eight interrelated dimensions of music.
Year 1:
Hey You! (Hip hop style)
In the Groove (a song demonstrating different styles of music)
Rhythm in the way we walk (Reggae style) and The banana rap (Hip hop style)
Round and Round (a Bossa Nova Latin style)
Year 2:
Hands, Feet, Heart (South African music)
Glockenspiel Stage 1
I wanna play in a band (Rock)
Zootime (Reggae)
Year 3:
Three Little Birds (Reggae – Bob Marley)
Glockenspiel Stage 2
There was a monkey (a Friday Afternoons Song – Benjamin Britten)
Let your spirit fly (R&B)
Year 4:
Mamma Mia (70s Pop - Abba)
Glockenspiel Stage 3
Cuckoo! (a Friday Afternoons Song – Benjamin Britten)
Lean on me (Soul/Gospel)
Year 5:
Don’t Stop Believin’ (80s Rock – Journey)
Classroom Jazz 1
A Tragic Story (a Friday Afternoons Song – Benjamin Britten)
Stop! (a song/rap about bullying)
Year 6:
Livin’ on a Prayer (80s Rock – Bon Jovi)
Classroom Jazz 2
Fresh Prince of Bel Air (Hip Hop – Will Smith)
Make you feel my love (Pop Ballad – Adele)