Middle School Instrument Classifications

It is not always easy for a fifth-grader to hear the subtleties that can occur when you hit a triangle in the middle or on the side, or with the tip of the striker or with the middle or the back.   However, differentiating between listening subtleties is an important part of music and music class. 

When the “instruments” are taken away, and students are forced to find exactly the right sound they are looking for from “found sounds” (any old materials at hand that are “found”), it’s a lot of fun to watch.  

Over the past few months, middle schoolers have been busily at work making music through their own created instruments.  This has culminated over the past week with one final invented instrument and composition created out of materials they were provided with or brought in themselves.  The room became part music classroom, part woodshop, and we all got to hear compositions with timbres that were new and unusual.

Middle schoolers classified instruments using the Hornbostel-Sachs method, which uses method of sound production as the classifying factor. 

Here are some older performances for Chordophones and class discussions about classifying Chordophones (mostly pizza boxes with strings):

http://www.vimeo.com/19312954

Here are some older performances for Aerophones (mostly glass bottles):

http://www.vimeo.com/18301509

The invented instruments that were created in the music room over the past few weeks are combinations of chordophones, aerophones, idiophones, membranophones, and other unclassifyableophones.   Stay tuned for a video of some of those instruments, to be coming soon.

Did You Notice Our New Name?!?

The new name for this blog was announced today at Friday morning meeting.

We got many great submissions, so combined our favorites to the title you see above.

What does it mean?

"Plerking" is a term first coined in the Art Room.  It is a combination of playing, learning, and working--what we all do in the Arts Wing at Sage.  When 7th grader Owen M. submitted a suggestion that turned the term into an adjective, we knew it needed a place in the title.

"Shades of Sage" was a submission by 4th grader Matthew M.  The Arts teachers liked this phrase because it represents something we firmly believe--that nothing is ever black and white.  Our lessons are exercises in trying to see how many shades of understanding and perspective can be creative, making this a great idea.

Fifth-grader Kippy S. submitted an idea that included the word "artelligence."  This word immediately reminded me of Howard Garder's Theory of Multiple Intelligences, which made a connotative statement by referring to music as an intelligence, not a skill or talent or ability.  We think Kippy came up with a great word.