Hi Everyone, 6/1
This will be my last update for this school year! I’m going to leave the blog up over the summer in case you want to access any of the resources below. Just to repeat myself (again!), if there’s anything you need during the next few months, please don’t hesitate to reach out to me through email. I’ll keep checking it and am happy to help with whatever musical needs you might have. If you are borrowing a school instrument you may keep it through the summer. Just be sure to take care of it and play it often! If you have a brass instrument, keep oiling the valves and greasing and moving the slides.
It’s been quite a year for all of us and I’ve loved getting to know each one of you. It didn’t quite work out the way we all anticipated but then life has a way of doing that sometimes. I’m proud of how so many of you were flexible and persevered! Stay positive and well and have a great summer. I can’t wait to see you all in the fall!
Mrs. Iltis
More…
- Work your rhythm chops by going to this site. For now, keep the settings where they are until you get used to how it works.
- If you want to challenge your note naming abilities click here. Click on the cog in the upper right hand corner if you are a bass instrument and need to change to the bass clef.
- I‘d like encourage everyone to try a little composing (you know, making stuff up). So here is this week’s suggested activity. It will help you start to become familiar with Garageband. Click here .
- If you haven’t done so yet, choose a new solo piece from 8notes.com to learn and perfect. If you want more choices – go to Musicnotes.com and type in your instrument name. You’ll find movie themes and pop music but there is a charge for these – usually $3 – $5 so you’ll need to check with your folks. Before you buy anything, email me the link so I can check it out for you to be sure it’s an appropriate level of difficulty.
Still more!!
- Continue working your scales B flat, E flat and begin to focus on the chromatic scale. The chromatic scale is built on semitones or half steps. The simplest way to tackle this is to look at your fingering chart and move from concert B flat (your tuning note) to the higher concert B flat and play ALL the notes in between that are on your fingering chart (sharps and flats).
- Go to musictheory.net – go to “Lessons” and work through a topic under “Basics” if you haven’t done them all already. This is stuff you should all know as middle school band members so take the time to learn it if you don’t know it!
- For all you stage band folks, here are links for “Birdland” and “25 or 6 to 4“.