Hello, and welcome back. I'm Joseph Hoffman.
Today we are going to make our own composition. What's a composition?
Well, just like an author is someone who writes stories or books,
a composer is someone who makes music.
Every song that you've ever heard in your life was written by someone,
and today you get to be a composer.
You are going to make up your own song today.
We are going to do our first song together. We'll make it up,
and then I'll let you try to make up your own song.
The first step will be making up a rhythm.
So let's come on over to the heartbeat mat and compose a rhythm together.
Alright, here we've got our heartbeat mat.
Now, I'm just going to make up a rhythm here.
Using some quarter notes, two eighth notes and a quarter note
I just made up this rhythm.
Let's see what my rhythm sounds like.
Try to say it with me while we point to each heartbeat.
TA TA TI-TI TA.
Well, since I'm the composer I can decide if I like that or not
and I think I want to change it. Let's try...
I think I want to change that quarter note for two eighth notes instead.
Let's try this rhythm now. TA TI-TI TI-TI TA. Ya I like that rhythm.
Now, lets go to the next row and keep going with our rhythm.
In this row, I think I'll go like this.
And then we'll add a quarter rest at the end.
Let's test it out and see how we like this rhythm.
TI-TI TI-TI TA rest. Ya I think I like that.
Now, let's try the whole thing from the start
and just make sure we like what we composed. Here we go.
Ready, try to say it with me.
TA TI-TI TI-TI TA TI-TI TI-TI TA rest.
Ya. Nice. Let's keep this rhythm.
Once you are happy with the rhythm that you are composing,
we are going to write it down on paper. All right.
Now, I'm going to write down the rhythm that I created with these cards
on this rhythm composition sheet which you can download
it is part of the complete materials for unit one.
So I had TA TI-TI TI-TI TA and I'll just draw that over here.
[Drawing notes]
Now let's see if I got that right.
TA TI-TI TI-TI TA. Yep. Okay now.
[Drawing notes]
And
a quarter rest.
Okay. Now I've drawn it on my rhythm composition sheet.
Now, there are lots of things we can do with this rhythm.
First, let's try speaking it. I'll speak it once,
and then I'll give you a turn by yourself.
The first time just listen as I do it.
TA TI-TI TI-TI TA TI-TI TI-TI TA rest.
Now you try by yourself. Point with me and say it. Ready go.
[Pointing at notes]
Great job. Now, another thing we can do with this rhythm
would be to play it on some kind of instrument.
We're going to play it on piano in a minute
but first let's try some kind of percussion instrument.
At your home, maybe you have like a shaker or some kind of drum.
If you don't have a drum, you can turn many things into a drum.
Maybe you can take a pot and a wooden spoon
or ask your parents what would be appropriate to use for a drum.
Ok here I have a couple of egg shakers which we are going to use to shake this rhythm.
So let's say the rhythm once and then we'll shake it right after.
We'll just do one line at a time. First speak this rhythm with me as we point it.
TA TI-TI TI-TI TA. TA TI-TI TI-TI TA.
Good now let's try to speak the second row
and then we'll shake it right after we are done. Here we go.
TI-TI TI-TI TA rest. TI-TI TI-TI TA rest.
And on a rest since there is silence we won't shake.
Good, last of all we are going to try to play this rhythm on the piano.
So let's come on over to the piano and try it out.
Now we are ready to take the rhythm that we've composed
and turn it into a melody.
A melody is something we can sing or play on the piano.
So we are going to take this rhythm and let's use the C-major pentascale
which means we'll put our five fingers of the right hand on C D E F and G like this.
Now, let's look at this rhythm again and just try the first row.
We've got TA TI-TI TI-TI TA.
I'm going to play that rhythm using any note I choose.
I'm the composer so I get to choose. Here's my first try.
TA TI-TI TI-TI TA. Well, I didn't totally like that. So let me try something different.
Remember if you're the composer, you decide if you like it or not.
So let's try something else. TA TI-TI TI-TI TA.
I did like that one, so let's write down the letter names that I played.
I did: C D D E G G. So I'm going to write that down.
Every letter will go underneath the note head that I played.
So I did C D D E G G.
All together it sounds like this: C D D E G G.
Now I'm ready to compose a melody for this next rhythm.
Let's see. I have TI-TI TI-TI TA rest. Let's try it like this.
TI-TI TI-TI TA rest. I'm not totally happy with that. Let's try something else.
TI-TI TI-TI TA rest. I did like that one.
I did F D skip down and then E D C stepping down. So let's write that down.
F D E D C rest.
Now I'm going to try to play my whole song from the beginning
to see if I like it.
C D D E G G, F D E D C rest. Ya! We just composed a song together.
Now at home, I'd like you to try doing that same process yourself.
Let's review all the steps for composing a song.
First, you are going to make up a rhythm using the heartbeat mat,
and those rhythm cutouts.
You can get a mat and the rhythm cutouts by
downloading our complete materials for unit one.
Then once you have a rhythm you like,
you're going to try writing that rhythm down on the rhythm
composition activity page also from the complete materials.
Then you are going to practice saying your rhythm as you touch each beat.
You are going to practice clapping, drumming, or shaking your rhythm.
Then last of all, you are going to go to the piano
and try to make up a melody that uses the rhythm that you composed.
I just did these two rows, but at home you can do a
longer song that uses up all four rows.
Once of the funnest parts about composing is sharing your music with other people.
So once you've done your composition, practice it, and make a video of it.
You can upload it to YouTube, and you can share it with your friends.
You can even upload it to our Facebook page so I can watch it too.
Thanks for watching today, and I'll see you next time.
Now it's my turn to compose a rhythm.
OK, go for it.
Put this here, put this here, here we go, a quarter note,
a quarter note.
Hey, try it out!
OK. TA TI-TI TA TA
Hey, that just sounds like "Frog in the Middle."
I know, isn't it beautiful?