One thing I am doing with my girls this year is highlighting/studying a different composer each month. Since I am a music teacher and have lots of ideas and resources, I thought it would be fun and hopefully helpful for me to share them here. Please copy me and add your own ideas - it's a fun, easy way to incorporate music into your child's education.
I realize I'm late getting this post up, but better late than never! There is still plenty of time to talk about this month's composer - Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart.
I chose Mozart for a couple reasons - he is probably the most recognized composer so it's a great place to start. Most kids have heard of Mozart. Also, his birthday is January 27.
I won't exactly tell you what to do, but I will include resources and ideas you can use. I might do occasional posts to demonstrate what we did.
Anyway....here are some books and other resources to get you started. Use your library - I get most of our books from our library!
BOOKS:
Play, Mozart, Play by Peter Sis
Famous Children - Mozart by Ann Rachlin
Mozart Finds a Melody - by Stephen Costanza
CDS:
Mozart's Magic Fantasy - Classical Kids series
Mozart's Magnificent Voyage - Classical Kids series
**there are countless recordings of Mozart's music - get a couple cds and listen to them every day. My favorites are the Mozart violin concertos (go figure), Symphony No .38 in D, K 504 and Symphony No. 25 in G minor, K 183.
WEBSITES:
A great place to start with Mozart is to point out that Mozart wrote the tune of Twinkle - all kids know Twinkle (I hope!).
I would love it if you came back here and reported what you tried with your kids! Or if you are an adult, educate yourself!
I am learning too. I know twinkle and did not realize Mozart wrote it. Thanks for the lesson
ReplyDeleteHe didn't write the words, but he wrote the melody
ReplyDeleteSomeone gave Baby Bean a set of Baby CD's when he was born and one is a "baby Mozart" CD. I will be honest, I tend to prefer Romantic Era composers with big orchestras (Rachmaninoff, Berlioz, etc..) but then, I am a trombone player and the only Mozart worth mentioning for trombone is the Tuba Mirem from the Requiem (an orchestral except that took years off my life at university). I have been pleasantly surprised by how much I have enjoyed the Mozart CD. It includes two sets of variations on Twinkle which Pk things is really cool.
ReplyDeleteI LOVE doing classical music listening with my kids at school, I don't know why I haven't done more with my own kids. This is an amazing idea, I think I will ghost along with you a bit. Thanks!
I'm smiling a bit because I tend to prefer the composers who actually played the violin - they just know how to write for the instrument better than those who didn't. There is something so light and carefree about Mozart's music (most of it, anyway). What I really admire about him is that what was in his mind was perfection and he didn't have to "work" at his music...it was just naturally there. When you look at original Beethoven scores you see all the re-writing he had to do. But when you look at Mozart's original scores - what you see is what was in his head and what he wrote.
ReplyDeleteThis is an interesting discussion and I am thinking I might follow your lead and maybe even write a few blog posts on it. Your blog is private, right (just thinking in terms of linking - I definitely want to give the credit to you!)
ReplyDeleteI laughed at connections I made to a few things you said - I always said that I wanted to play stuff by people who "knew" my instrument - I used to hate playing pieces by student composers at the university (which we were often roped into doing) but they knew what the instrument "could" do but no necessarily what would be nice to play or sound good. I also had to laugh at your comment about enjoying Mozart as being carefree - that is always what hasn't appealed to me about his music, I tend to be drawn to the moodier types like the Russians LOL. No wonder I have trouble with anxiety!
Thanks for the start of a series that is really interesting to me. I went online and downloaded Mozart's 40 and 41 symphonies, two of my favourites, to start listening to with Pk this month.
I don't need the credit - but thanks for thinking of it!
ReplyDeleteYou should try to get the book Play, Mozart, Play to read to Pippa. It's well-written (in my opinion). We got it at the library and I liked it so much I bought it.
I've already got the composers picked out for each month - I'm going to go through the summer, too. Anyway, next month's composer is from the Romantic Era.
Actually, the first thing I did after I read your post was go online to our library and look for Play Mozart Play. Our library is small and doesn't have it but I might just have to splurge and buy a copy :-).
ReplyDeleteCan't wait to see who's next!