By the end of this lesson, students will be able to:
Determine what key a piece of music is in by singing the tonic and comparing it to a stable pitch on an instrument or to a tuner.
Listen to an example from the repertoire that incorporates multiple phrases (a full song, movement, or longer excerpt) and:
Recognize and identify repeated material.
Aurally identify the beginning/ending of phrases by analyzing melodic, rhythm, and harmonic cues.
Aurally identify melodic cadences as "closed" or "open" and identify the scale degree that they end on.
Sight read and recognize rhythms in simple time that incorporate 16th note subdivisions (no dotted 8ths).
Sight read and transcribe melodies that incorporate skips between 7 and 2.
"Repetition" (Chenette, Foundations of Aural Skills)
"Closure/Cadence" (Chenette, Foundations of Aural Skills)
"Subdivisions" (Chenette, Foundations of Aural Skills)
Hearing Ti & Re: Open the Drone tool to the right. Select any starting pitch as Do and let it play as a drone. Sing up to Re and hold the dissonance against the done and resolve it back down to Do. Then, sing a half step down to Ti, hold the pitch and resolve it up to Do. Skip between Do, Mi, Sol, Re, and Ti, resolving the latter two to Do each time. Sing slowly and focus on your pitch.
Ti & Re ID: Practice identifying Ti and Re, given Do. Here's the drill in major and minor. Try to get as many correct in a row as you can without hitting the reference pitch between notes. Keep at it until it gets easy.
[insert references here]
Identifying Keys: Discuss strategies for aurally determining what key a piece of music is in. Discuss different scenarios in which a musician might need this skill?
Defining Melodic Cadence: What is the difference between a closed cadence and open cadence as defined in the reading? Without specifically focusing on the chords, which scale degrees does Chenette suggest focusing on? Listen to a few examples as a group and practice identify the cadences as open or closed, singing the syllables identified as defining each.
Multiple Choice Pattern Dictation: A group member or your instructor selects patterns to play (or to string together into melodies) from this selection of patterns using 7 and 2. Notate the pattern number that you heard in the order you heard it. Sing each one back using solfège syllables. For an added challenge add in the patterns from 1, 3, and 5.
Key ID Practice: Have your instructor or a group member play a melody from the anthology. Identify the mode and key for each excerpt. Use strategies discussed for "Identifying Keys" above. Be sure to mix in a few melodies that don't end on "Do."
Recommended melody collections from the anthology that include the stepwise major/minor, skips in 1/3/5, and skips in 7&2.
Large-Scale Listening: Listen to examples from the repertoire and identify melodic cadences and phrases.
Open the activity worksheet here. There are two tabs at the bottom. The first tab provides an example for the activity. The second tab provides an empty table for working through the steps in the following examples. Make a copy of the spreadsheet to edit it. (File > Make a Copy).
Work in groups and utilize one of the following analytical tools for your analysis so that you can mark it up as you listen. Both apps are free and work cross platform. They're useful for mapping out formal sections and makings notes on an audio recording.
BriFormer: This tool runs in the webpage without any downloads. You'll just need the Youtube link for your audio.
Audio Timeliner: This app is a little more powerful, but it needs to be downloaded in advance. You'll need downloaded audio files. MP3s are provided for all of the examples in the anthology if you'd like to use this app.
Select one of the songs from the anthology (in the Listening for Phrases & Melodic Cadence section) and complete the following steps:
Identify the mode (major or minor), the key, and the meter.
Listen to where each phrase begins and ends and mark the timepoints in the table. Then, identify how many measures long each phrase is and where it begins in terms of measure numbers.
Identify the melodic cadence. What scale degree does it end on? Does the cadence sound complete or incomplete?
Did you hear any repetition? Which phrases or melodic segments included repeated material. Add notes to your spreadsheet.
Sight Reading:
Rhythm: Subdivisions in simple time. (No dotted 8ths)
Melody: Skips/leaps between 7 and 2.
Critical Listening: Listening for phrases and melodic cadences