Listening: varying a tune (Year 9)

Learning Intentions

  • We are learning to develop an understanding of how a melody can be varied.

What to look for

  • Pupils listening actively to teacher explanation and demonstration
  • Pupils discussing options and making decisions based on their own musical opinions and preferences
  • Pupils experimenting with melodies and making changes
  • Pupils discussing their work

Learning Activities

Recap on a melody that the pupils have been learning in the previous lesson, for example This Old Man.

Demonstrate ways in which a familiar melody might be varied, for example:

  • by making the tempo faster or slower;
  • by making the pitch higher or lower;
  • by keeping the same rhythm but changing some of the pitches;
  • by changing the rhythm; and/or
  • by changing the tonality from major to minor.

Ask the pupils to work in pairs to discuss and decide how they might begin to alter the melody. Give them time to play the melody (on keyboard/tuned percussion) and experiment with their ideas.

Lead the pupils in an evaluation of how they altered the tune to make it their own.