Music Bridges & Learning Experience

Slaven's Music Analysis Project

Here is my music project.  I tried to upload it to youtube to post on fb, but they wouldnt allow the audio even though i had bought the mp3.  Anyway.  Here it is.  If you have problems let me know. Ill try to fix it.

Learning Experience & Bridges

As a child I took lots of different music lessons, among them piano, trumpet, voice, & French Horn. I was part of choirs, band, and concert band.  Its like anything else, if you slack off practicing then you start to forget what you learned.  This unit brought back memories of voice and piano lessons where my teacher would use terms like credenza, mezzo forte, mezzo piano, crescendo, etc.  I remember those days vividly because if I did it wrong she would go into a tizzy in Italian.  I never knew what she said, but I knew I had made her mad.

So to talk about the learning experience with this module.  It reinforced the terms that I had learned along ago, and taught me a few new ones.  I learned how to listen for analysis rather than just listen for pitch, tone, and tempo.  I liked that I could listen to the music and discuss how it made me feel rather than the mechanics of the piece.

Music is supposed to be something that moves people, its a form of art, therefore it is something that people feel strongly about and are moved by it.  So in this unit we spent time learning how to listen to the moving part of the songs, the hook, the rhythm, the dynamics.  All of these things are just as important as the pitch, tone, and tempo.

When it comes to making bridges between this unit and what I do in school.  I think that I could use this idea in a garageband project.  I think that I could ask them to choose a song that is personal to them and put together a movie that represents the music and then record themselves at the end explaining why it is important to them.  This would combine a couple of units and cross curriculum with the music department a bit.  I like the idea of it being personal to them because more students are likely to complete the project and do better with it as a result of the personalization. 

Another way to bridge this with education is to allow the students to create a song on their own.  Write their own lyrics and create the harmonies and melodies using something like garageband or audacity.  I like the idea of allowing them the ability to define their own meaning behind a music clip and apply it to a section of their song that will make the song more powerful.  This same idea could be applied to making a score for a movie.

In short, I think that this is something I know that I dont know enough about to teach it properly and would need to co-teach with a music instructor.  I like that it made me look more closely at music and opened up some  memories from long ago.

Imaginative Bridges

Im posting this to kind of make up for what i have been slacking on.  I realize that I wont get credit for it, but I know I need to do this.  At least it should help me work on the final project.  I am really not a blogger, so doing this is really difficult.  I dont like keeping a diary or journal and this seems very much akin to doing just that.  I think I would rather have to turn in a paper each unit about this topic than post something here.  So anyway here goes. 

Photography - I think what I learned most from doing this unit is that photography is supposed to be fun and that you should shoot what feels right.  I liked working on this project because it made me think about the images I was capturing and how that image might effect another person.  I had to look at the objects, in the view finder in the way that the person viewing my image might look at them.  I had to try to see the meaning that the object would have to them, if any.  Trying to view images in this way made me think about what it would be like to do this for a living and how that kind of constant observation would change me.  I think that it would force me to look at the details more and realize what the feeling is behind the object.  I would have to capture the moment when the moment was right, regardless of my own personal feelings about the image I was going to capture.  Another thing I thought about was how to get students, especially freshmen, to see things like this.  I thought about having them go on a cell phone hunt for something that was unique or something that would last longer than they would live or something that reminded them of their favorite memory.  Then having them write a short story about the photo and what the meaning was to them and what they would want others to see in the image.  I also thought about having them discuss what the meaning of their photo's were in a small group, but im afraid that with freshmen, they would be too inmature to understand that there are feelings behind these images and they might make fun of others for how they feel.  Anyway, these ideas are making me think of ways to get my photo unit to be more meaningful to my students. 

Movie:  I think what I learned from this lesson is recreating a moment is hard, coordinating a moment is harder, and catching a moment is impossible.  I do movie projects with my students often and I know how much work goes into a successful film.  I also realize that sometimes an idea just hits you and you have to go with it.  This project was difficult for me because I didnt know how to make a film more compelling by staging it.  I didnt want to just make a movie about something that I didnt care about but I felt that was what i needed to do.  I tried to write down ideas about what to make a movie on and it was almost impossible to get actors or time since I was home with a new baby.  This was probably the most challenging project in that I really had to think about what to do.  I got my idea from watching a video where a kid was reacting to something in an unusual way, I thought that would be cool, but hard to film.  Then on superbowl sunday, my son reacted in such a wierd way at having daddy eat the spider (sillyband) that I wanted to somehow recreate the moment.  I knew that recreating it would be next to impossible, but I still wanted to try.  So while holding my squirming newborn, we got our chance and tried to make it happen.  I filmed the entire thing so I would have some choices to go with in editing.  In the first instant my newborn cried because big brother was crying.  I really wanted that, but he didnt do it again, so we went with the spider act.  Doing this project made me think about what it would take to have my students make a movie that was emotionally moving.  I thought about the problems that could come up, things that might make others very uncomfortable.  I dont want that.  Having a group work together also causes other issues, they may not feel the same about the same things.  Another limitation to this with my students is that not everyone has a video camera and often will want to use mine outside of school, which I am not allowed to do.  So they have to create their video's in class.  This limits what they can do.  I thought about having them remake a commercial or scene from a show in a way that would better sell the item or better display the meaning behind the scene.  This seemed more doable because the kids would know more about these films and be better able to make it something more moving to others who watched them.  I think overall the movie section would be more dificult to work with in my class because of the limitations I have with my group.  Film is something where you can completely control what the viewer sees and in a way tell them what they should feel about what they are seeing by controlling the lighting, music, pace, and background.  It is this medium that can be most impactful on a person's emotions, but is the hardest to work with.

Architecture:  THis project was the least meaningful for me thus far.  I realize why the requirements were the way they were and that you wanted us to focus on the way the store helped sell the products using decorating, color, lighting, and arrangement.  It was the suggestion that we be descrete that made this project one I did not want to do.  I do not like being sneaky or underhanded and that is what I felt I was supposed to do.  As for what I learned from doing this.  I learned to look at the way the store was laid out to try to see what they were about,  was it effeciency of people movement, or trapping them in to get them to buy more stuff?  Were the colors meant to excite you, calm you, or remind you of what was being placed in that area? Were the arrangment of the product for ease of finding them or to decoratively display so you would think of what they would look like in your home? All are good things to think about when evaluating a store.  I think with this project I would have liked to compare exterior architecture and design while relating the design to what the content of the building was.  I think that relating signage, shape, and purpose would be something more interesting and easier to film.  When it comes to making architecture more compelling, I think of looking at how architecture has progressed throughout the ages.  I think of all the ways that buildings and monuments were constructed and developed.  I think of how the artist (architect) was thinking when developing this. I wonder what that person would have thought to see their building/ monument the way it is today.  I also wonder what that same person would do if their creation were destroyed.  How would they feel?  I know that when I create something I am protective of it and will try to keep it safe for a long time.  I guess when it comes to architecture, the why is more important than the what.

work of art: this project looks like it is going to be something I will really enjoy.  I want to capture things in a new way and make people see something they didnt see before.  I think that photographing the people's reaction to a homeless person's plea for help will be something more compelling than just a photo of a homeless person.  I think making people react is the point of making a photo. 

Bridges for Video

I think video is one way that a message can really get across to people.  I think that the process of making the video is often more compelling than the end result, at least for the videographers.  For example, I watched a video (above) that really spoke to me as a teacher and parent.  As a teacher, I realize that my kids are exposed to this more often than I would like and that it is my job to provide some sense of normalcy for them.  As a parent, it reminded me that my child will do what I do because I am their role model.
When it comes to linking video to a compelling experience I think about the whole process, not just the end result.  It starts with the idea for the video.  sometimes something strikes you and you feel like you just 'have' to record it.  Like the video above, someone probably saw a child reenacting their parents actions and was reminded how much a product of our parents we really are and felt that they needed to show it.  The next part that is compelling is the filming of the movie.  Sometimes things happen while filming that make you really think about it.  Something may happen that changes the course of the film to where you alter your purpose in making it.  Another compelling part is when the film is being edited.  It is often difficult to edit a film that means something to you.  You may find yourself trying to edit for your feelings rather than editing for the meaning of the film.  It is this editing that and working through the difference between feeling and meaning that makes that part compelling, at least to me. 
A link to education is in the idea behind the project.  I think that what will make a video project memorable is allowing the kids to design the video based on their view of the world.  For example, reading Romeo & Juliette then making a video that shows a part of that play.  The kids must internalize the script first, which means that they must derive meaning from the language of the play, then they must organize a film that will show off what they internalized.  this kind of project would really bring the play to life for them and really help them understand the meaning behind the words.