Visual and Performing Arts Curriculum Exemplar: Music
Aligned to the 2009 New Jersey Core Curriculum Content Standards
ENGAGING STUDENTS • FOSTERING ACHIEVEMENT • CULTIVATING 21ST CENTURY GLOBAL SKILLS
An American Elegy Unit OverviewContent Area: Visual and Performing Arts: Music
Unit Title: An Amercian Elegy by Frank Ticheli
Target Course/Grade Level: Middle or High School Concert Band
Unit Summary
Through the study and performance of An American Elegy—a commissioned composition written by Frank Ticheli as a memorial to the April 20, 1999, Columbine High School shooting—students learn how a composer uses the elements of music to create particular moods and feelings. Mastery of the piece requires advanced ensemble skills—balance, blend, accurate intonation, playing at a wide range of dynamics with control—without a high degree of technical facility. Thus, students can focus on the composer’s musical intent, which is clearly articulated in his Composer Notes. Using ongoing, Web-based recordings of their individual, sectional, and ensemble rehearsals, students continually self-assess and reflect on their progress and delve deeper into the music. Once rehearsals for the spring concert are well underway, students explore other memorial compositions and together create a class Wiki that illuminates how music has been used to memorialize tragic losses across historical periods, cultures, and genres. This broader understanding of memorial music then becomes the context from which students evaluate the contribution of An American Elegy, which takes the form of Program Notes for the spring concert. The unit culminates in a live performance that is recorded and published on the school website. Following their performance, students reflect on the unit and explore the role music plays in helping people understand and process the deep feelings that we collectively experience in response to tragic events.
Primary interdisciplinary connections: Social studies, language arts
21st century themes: Global Awareness
Unit Rationale
With the passing of the 10-year anniversary of the April 20, 1999, Columbine High School shooting, the performance of this powerful and uplifting piece has much to teach young people about the role music plays in memorializing and moving beyond tragic events. In Frank Ticheli’s program notes, he writes that An American Elegy was intended to celebrate “great strength and courage in the face of a terrible tragedy.” The hope he articulates—that “the work can serve as one reminder of how fragile and precious life is and how intimately connected we all are as human beings”—is fulfilled in this unit. In working to bring the composer’s intent to life through their performance, students learn individual and ensemble skills that are transferable to other pieces they play and compose, now and in the future. They also learn how music, throughout history and across cultures, is used to channel, release, and move beyond powerful emotions that we experience as a consequence of our humanity and our interconnectedness.
Learning Targets
Standards: Visual and Performing Arts
· 1.1 The Creative Process: All students will demonstrate an understanding of the elements and principles that govern the creation of works of art in dance, music, theatre, and visual art.
· Strand B: Music
· 1.2 History of the Arts and Culture: All students will understand the role, development, and influence of the arts throughout history and across cultures.
· 1.3 Performing: All students will synthesize those skills, media, methods, and technologies appropriate to creating, performing, and/or presenting works of art in dance, music, theatre, and visual art.
· Strand B: Music
· 1.4 Aesthetic Responses & Critique Methodologies: All students will demonstrate and apply an understanding of arts philosophies, judgment, and analysis of works of art in dance, music, theatre, and visual art.
· Strand A: Aesthetic Response
· Strand B: Critique Methodologies
Content Statements
Related Content Statements for Standard 1.1, Strand B
· Understanding nuanced stylistic differences among various genres of music is a component of musical fluency. Meter, rhythm, tonality, and harmonics are determining factors in the categorization of musical genres.
· Musical proficiency is characterized by the ability to sight-read advanced notation. Musical fluency is also characterized by the ability to classify and replicate the stylistic differences in music of varying traditions.
Related Content Statements for Standard 1.2, Strand B
· Cultural and historical events impact art-making as well as how audiences respond to works of art.
Related Content Statements for Standard 1.3, Strand B
· Technical accuracy, musicality, and stylistic considerations vary according to genre, culture, and historical era.
· The ability to read and interpret music impacts musical fluency.
Related Content Statements for Standard 1.4, Strand B
· Contextual clues within artworks often reveal artistic intent, enabling the viewer to hypothesize the artist’s concept.
CPI # / Cumulative Progress Indicator (CPI)
1.1.12.B.1 / Examine how aspects of meter, rhythm, tonality, intervals, chords, and harmonic progressions are organized and manipulated to establish unity and variety in genres of musical compositions.
1.1.12.B.2 / Synthesize knowledge of the elements of music in the deconstruction and performance of complex musical scores from diverse cultural contexts.
1.2.12.A.1 / Determine how dance, music, theatre, and visual art have influenced world cultures throughout history.
1.3.12.B.1 / Analyze compositions from different world cultures and genres with respect to technique, musicality, and stylistic nuance, and/or perform excerpts with technical accuracy, appropriate musicality, and the relevant stylistic nuance.
1.3.12.B.2 / Analyze how the elements of music are manipulated in original or prepared musical scores.
1.4.12.A.2 / Speculate on the artist’s intent, using discipline-specific arts terminology and citing embedded clues to substantiate the hypothesis.
Unit Essential Questions
· How does a composer create a piece of music based on an event as horrific as a mass shooting in a school?
· What source materials might a composer use to create a new piece as a commissioned work?
· How does a composer use the elements of music to create the appropriate mood and feeling in a piece?
· How might a performer have to adjust his or her interpretation of a composition in order to create a musically accurate performance?
· How might a conductor have to adjust his or her interpretation of a composition to accommodate inherent problems with the ensemble (i.e. instrumentation issues)? / Unit Enduring Understandings
· Music has the power to create new understandings and deep feelings that go far beyond the original inspiration for a new piece of music.
· Performers have the responsibility to reflect the musical intent of the composer through their accurate performance of a written composition, and then to go beyond the written piece by using interpretation to convey the appropriate mood or feeling.
· The conductor has the responsibility to recreate the intent of the composer through his or her interpretation of the written score, taking into consideration all variables of the program (such as the size of the ensemble, instrumentation issues, and so on).
Unit Learning Targets
Students will ...
· Identify compositional tools Frank Ticheli uses to express his desired intent for An American Elegy.
· Understand related music vocabulary.
· Research the April 20, 1999, Columbine High School shooting.
· Discuss the role of music as a response to horrific events.
· Explore the process composer Frank Ticheli uses to write music.
· Analyze each section of An American Elegy, as described by the composer.
· Learn their individual parts for An American Elegy.
· Self-assess and reflect on their developing performances.
· Create and refine individual performance improvement plans to direct their growth as performers.
· Perform music in long, 4-bar phrases without breaking for breath.
· Perform written dynamics individually and as a section with control.
· Understand how a canon is used as a compositional tool.
· Understand how their individual parts in An American Elegy fit into the larger ensemble.
· Learn music for the rest of the concert program.
· Analyze an example of memorial music by composer Krzysztof Penderecki and compare it to An American Elegy.
· Define the social role of memorial music.
· Identify additional examples of memorial music across history, cultures, and genres.
· Create a class Wiki that captures students’ understanding of the role of memorial music.
· Self-assess their final performances.
· Reflect individually on the social value of memorial music and on their experiences of the unit.
· Discuss the value of information about the composer’s intent to the final performance.
Evidence of Learning
Summative Assessment
This unit culminates with the performance of An American Elegy by Frank Ticheli as the major piece in an annual Spring Concert, which also includes four or five other musical compositions. Prior to the performance of An American Elegy, the band stands and sings the Columbine High School Alma Mater, as was done in the premier performance of the piece at Columbine High School. The Concert Band’s performance is enhanced by what they learn about the April 20, 1999, Columbine High School shooting, the composer’s intentions, and memorial music in general in the weeks leading up to the concert. To contextualize Ticheli’s contribution to memorial music, students research other compositions written across time, cultures, and genres, exploring such things as the lives of various composers, their musical and compositional styles, the inspiration for the respective pieces, and different composers use the elements of music to communicate an emotional response to tragedy. As students develop this understanding, they post their findings and observations on a classroom Wiki, which when finished, demonstrates their collective learning about the cultural role and history of memorial music. This learning provides the context for students to evaluate Ticheli’s composition, which they do by creating Program Notes. Following the concert, students self-assess their work, explore what it felt like to perform the work, and reflect on the cultural role music plays in helping us collectively come to grips with tragic events.
Equipment needed: Digital recorders, SMARTMUSIC music program, teacher computer/projection set-up, student computer/Internet access, student journals
Teacher Resources:
See Broadening the Picture: Memorial Music and My Program Notes for student instructions.
See Technique Rubric, Musical Performance Rubric, and Analytical Writing Rubric for performance expectations.
Formative Assessments
· Completed Listening Exercises
· Class discussion of emotional responses to An American Elegy
· Use of music vocabulary
· Initial responses to Unit Essential Questions
· Research and presentations on the April 20, 1999, Columbine High School Massacre
· Completed Who Is Frank Ticheli? handouts
· Class discussion of their responses to what they learned about the event
· Class discussion of the event as a compositional source for An American Elegy
· Students’ ongoing live performances
· Individual performance improvement plans
· Recordings of students’ developing individual, sectional, and ensemble performances
· Individual lessons / · Student reflections
· Students’ proper use of hand position, posture, and embouchure
· Contributions to class discussions (analysis and comparison of works by Penderecki and Ticheli)
· Definitions of “memorial music”
· Examples of memorial music
· Analysis of examples
· Presentations
· Class Wiki
· Individual My Program Notes essays
· Composite My Program Notes essays
· Concert video
· Self-assessments
· Student-teacher conferences
· End-of-unit reflections
Lesson Plans
Lesson / Timeframe
Lesson 1
An Exploration of Self Through the Medium of Theatre / 40 days
Lesson 2
The Role of Memorial Music / 7 days
Lesson 3
Post-Performance Reflection / 3 days
* A “day” is based on a 40-minute class period.
Teacher Notes:
· The design of An American Elegy and many of the unit’s supporting materials come from now-retired Supervisor of Fine Arts Nicholas Santoro of the South Orange Maplewood School District.
· Prior to teaching the unit, schools must purchase An American Elegy (the score and parts for each student), which may be available from your school’s usual vendor, and is also available online from the composer.
· A choral piece, the Columbine High School Alma Mater, also by Frank Ticheli, is sung just before the Concert Band performs An American Elegy. If your spring concert involves a collaboration with a choral music teacher, you may wish to engage him or her in this part of the performance. This score is provided as part of the unit, as it is a free download from the composer’s Website.
· Before beginning, the teacher/music director will also need to select and purchase music for four or five other pieces to complete the program. You may already have in mind pieces that will help you create a balanced program. If not, one option might be to develop a program of “Music by American Composers.” In this case, the rest of the program could include a Sousa march and music by George Gershwin, Cole Porter, Scott Joplin, and/or others. To see additional examples of how the piece has been incorporated into concert programs, see the Website of the Manchester University Wind Orchestra.
· This unit makes use of SMARTMUSIC, a cross-platform, Web-based computer program (cost is $30 per year, per student at the time of this writing) that guides and records student performance and preserves the recordings for teacher assessment (http://www.smartmusic.com/). Once students are enrolled, they can record their rehearsals from any computer that meets SMARTMUSIC’s system requirements.
· In Lesson 2, students compile their learning in a class Wiki. One possible resource to help you accomplish this is: http://www.wikispaces.com
Curriculum Development Resources
· The video and audio samples provided with this unit were originally published on Composer Frank Ticheli’s Website and on YouTube.
An America Elegy: Lesson Plan 1
Content Area: Visual and Performing Arts: Music
Lesson Title: Tragedy as the Subject of a Musical Score / Timeframe: 40 days
Lesson Components
21st Century Themes
X / Global Awareness / Financial, Economic, Business, and Entrepreneurial Literacy / Civic Literacy / Health Literacy
21st Century Skills
X / Creativity and Innovation / X / Critical Thinking and Problem Solving / X / Communication and Collaboration / Information Literacy
Media Literacy / ICT Literacy / Life and Career Skills
Interdisciplinary Connections: Social Studies
Integration of Technology: Internet research, use of digital recording equipment
Equipment needed: Teacher computer/video projection/audio playback set-up, student computer/Internet access, computers for use with SMARTMUSIC, digital recorders, concert band equipment, music stands, student journals