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All Students preparing for Grade exams are
recommended to use the Hofnotes on-line
training pages to practise for the aural tests.
At
higher grades you must be able to discuss with the examiner musical
features such as texture,
form,
style, and
period of a piece of music.
My own web pages to help with these parts of the test at Grade 5+ and at
GCSE
are available
here!
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Rhythm games
- Pass the beat
- In a circle, pass a clap from one person to the next.
Try to keep a steady pulse, make sure participants turn towards
or point their clapping hands towards the next person in the
sequence.
- Go the other way, faster, but still to a steady pulse
- Now, it's OK to change direction whenever you want and pass
the clap the other way. Make sure participants make it
clear by turning their bodies who they are 'passing' to.
- Encourage participants to listen to the beat, and critique
it - they are almost certain to get faster or slower, so make
sure this is noticed
- Clap and copy
- Establish a pulse with your bodies, by rocking from one foot
to the other.
- Clap a simple one- or two-bar rhythm and have the
participants echo it back to you
- Keep the pulse 'rock' going and encourage participants to
notice when it gets faster or slower
- Then, have each person think of their own rhythm to clap.
Go round the circle, hearing and copying each one of these
- See and play
(Flashcards)
- Flashcards are widely available for beginner stages - but
you will need to make your own for more complex rhythms or
compound time signatures
- Start with 2-bar phrases in simple time
- Ask the students to clap that rhythm
- Ask them to improvise a melody with that rhythm
- Choose two cards and ask them to identify which one you are
clapping or playing
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Pulse and pattern
- Choose a clearly structured, highly rhythmic piece. I
use Triplets, recorded by Evelyn
Glennie and the Black Dyke Band, but almost any trad jazz track
will work.
- Help participants identify the number of beats in the bar,
and the number of bars in a phrase.
- Sat facing each other, in pairs, participants take turns to
think up a rhythmic pattern of sounds and/or actions they can do
with their bodies for an 8-bar phrase. Tapping knees,
clicking fingers, patting head, etc etc - anything they can
dream up. Their partner copies them. This is fun (if
a little chaotic!) if you role-swap at the beginning of each
phrase.
- See details of the
Improvisation Workshop
for more ideas
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Co-ordination rhyme
Hello, my name's Joe, and I work in
the button factory
I've got a wife, and three kids, one
day my boss came to me
He said "Hi!"
I said "Low"
He said "Busy?"
I said "No"
"Well hit this button with
your....."
Toe, elbow, knee, nose, it doesn't matter. The rhyme is chanted
with a strong rhythm, and an action is added every time. Itis
surprisingly hard to get more than a couple of actions happening at
the same time in sync (which will identify which of your students
have highly developed co-ordination skills and should probably be
learning the organ instead....). When it starts to fall apart
change the words:
He said "Hi!"
I said "Low"
He said "Busy?"
I said "YES!"
...AND STOP!
    
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