Get Ready!

It's almost time to get another year of piano lessons underway! Weekly lessons resume the week of September 14, and I encourage all current and interested families to attend my free parent orientation session at the Bozeman Public Library large conference room on September 10 from 7-8 pm.

I'm so excited to get the year underway! See you soon!

The Genius of Maurice Ravel

Hello, students! For our last listening assignment of the school year, I'd like to introduce you to Maurice Ravel, a true Impressionist master and one of my favorite composers.

 Ravel was born on March 7, 1875, in France. He remains one of the best known composers of all time and is now regarded as one of the great Impressionist artists.

Ravel began studying at the Paris Conservatory at age 14 and continued there into his early twenties. During his long career he wrote music for all kinds of instruments, including some very famous works for the piano. Ravel loved to take pieces written for other instruments and rewrite them for the orchestra. His best known works for the piano include Jeux d'eau (Fountains), Miroirs (Mirrors), and Le Tombeau de Couperin (the Tomb of Couperin). Ravel's orchestration of Modest Mussorgsky's piano piece, Pictures at an Exhibition, is widely played and well loved. Ravel died in Paris, France on December 28, 1937.

 

This year we've been studying some of the qualities of Impressionist music, and when you listen carefully you will hear many of these ideas in Ravel's music. Can you hear each of the Impressionist ideas we've studied in Jeux d'eau (Playing Water) linked below?

 

1) Dissonance - Notes that don't quite "fit" together.

2) Perpetual Motion - Motion that doesn't stop

3) Intervals of 4ths and 5ths

4) Large leaps between low and high sounds

5) Pedal effects that may sound veiled or blurry

 

 

Big Music Words of the Week: Perpetual Motion

Hello, blossoming Impressionist experts! During the last several weeks in lessons we've been talking about "perpetual motion," an idea Impressionist composers used a lot in their pieces.

Perpetual motion just means movement that never stops. In music, perpetual motion gives the listener the idea that the music is always moving forward. Perpetual motion is created by using a lot of short notes, like eighth notes and sixteenth notes. Very often music with a lot of motion creates ideas of water, wind, snowfall, or other images found in nature.

This week's listening piece, "Une Barque sur L'Ocean" or "Boat on the Ocean," uses perpetual motion to create images of waves and moving water. This piece was composed by Maurice Ravel, one of the great Impressionist composers of the period.

As you listen, try to find places where Ravel uses both dissonance and perpetual motion together. Can you use his piece as inspiration for the piece about winter we're writing?

Big Music Word of the Week: Dissonance

Hello, students! This week many of you discussed the word "dissonance" during your lesson and what it means. Then we talked about using dissonance in your weekly improvisation assignment and what your parents might think of your musical creations. (Parents, you're welcome.)

Dissonance is a fancy word for playing notes together that clash, or at least don't sound lovely in the usual sense. Dissonance can be used to build tension in music or to express anger, excitement, fear, or sadness. Some dissonance, especially when it's used on high notes can sound quite lovely.

What emotions did you end up expressing during your improvisation this week? I can't wait to hear your ideas!

In the mean time, listen to Debussy's Feux D'Artifice for inspiration. This song is about fireworks! How did Debussy use dissonance to create his musical sketch and build excitement?

Claude Debussy, Master of Impressionism

Achille-Claude Debussy was born to a poor family in France in 1862. Debussy is known as the founder and master of the musical style known as Impressionism, even though he didn't like or use this label himself.

Debussy began studying piano at the age of 7, and by age 11 he was considered a prodigy and was admitted to the Paris Conservatory of Music. At age 22, he won the Prix de Rome, a contest for composers and spent the next several years composing in Italy. He became employed by a wealthy woman and travelled all over Europe and Russia as the family teacher and composer.

During his travels, Debussy heard music from all over the world, and this changed the sounds he used when he composed. He used Russian sounds, folk tunes, and percussion sounds in his writing and made his music sound different by using scales and playing notes together that didn't always sound like the music people were used to hearing.

Debussy died of cancer at age 55 on March 25, 1918.

Words to Remember:

Dissonance - Notes that don't sound "pretty" together. Dissonance builds tension or creates sound pictures.

Modes - Scales that move from one white key to the next of the same name without using black keys. (Example: D E F G A B C D)

Pentatonic Scale - A five note scale played all on the black keys (Example: Gb Ab Bb Db Eb)

Whole Tone Scale - A scale made completely of whole steps (Example: C D E F# G# A# B#)

To earn a virtuoso visa this week, play an example of dissonance, a mode, a pentatonic scale, or a whole tone scale at your lesson!

Le vent dans la plaine, by Claude Debussy

Many of our listening selections this year will feature compositions by the most famous Impressionist composer of all time, Claude Debussy.

Do you hear notes that clash? How about big clusters of notes? Notes that are both really high and really low? If you listen really closely, you might even hear some interesting intervals like 4ths.

What do you think this piece is about? (No using Google or asking a French speaking acquaintance!) Why?

To complete this listening challenge, write three things you notice about the music in your notebook, your best guess as to the name of the piece, and three reasons you guessed this.

You'll have the opportunity to write your own Impressionist piece later in the school year!

Impressionism Unit Kick-off Listening Assignment!

Hi, students and parents!

Most of the studio will be starting our year-long unit on impressionist music with a listening activity this week. Impressionism in art and music is one of my favorite styles, and I hope you will all love discovering the music and musicians we'll be covering this year!

Student Reading Assignment:

Impressionism is a style of art that got its start in the 1860's and 1870's in Paris, France. Before this time, artists usually painted indoors and most did not create outdoor scenes or pictures of people doing things they might do every day. Artists like Claude Monet shook up the art world by painting unusual subjects outside. His art used thick brush strokes and he mixed his colors right on the canvas. Many people thought his art looked "unfinished," and this style of art was banned from galleries in Paris.

When you look at an impressionist painting, you might notice the bold strokes of paint. You will probably also notice that these pictures aren't realistic like photographs. They leave with an "impression" of the subject without revealing the whole story. You as the viewer are free to fill in the extra details in your mind.

Famous impressionist painters include Monet, Manet, Cezanne, Mary Cassatt, Degas, Pissaro, and Renoir.

Take a moment to peek at some of their art here.

Impressionism in music embodies many of the same qualities as impressionist art. Impressionist composers paint with tone colors and leave the listener with an idea about their subject. You as a listener are free to fill in the rest of the picture in your own imagination. Some of the composers we will be studying this year include Claude Debussy, Maurice Ravel, Albeniz, Granados, Satie, and Scriabin.

Our first listening assignment will be "The Girl with the Flaxen Hair" by Claude Debussy, written in 1910. Listen to this piece several times and draw your "impression." What do you think the blonde-haired girl in the piece is doing? Be ready to share one thing about the music you observed.