Week 3

I have to say; I don’t really care for the blues style of music. “St. Louis Blues” is a fine piece of music, but it is not my cup of tea. Personally, the slow tempo mixed with the sad sounds of the blues, makes listening to the blues painful. However, I could see using the blues as a creating element in the classroom. The blues follows a simple, easy to follow form and has a slower tempo, which is perfect for younger students. When composing with my students, the kids always have a difficult time coming up with topics and a place to start. The blues is all about being sad and miserable, which I could see most of my students jumping at the chance to “complain” about something in a song. So, even though I don’t care much for the blues, I do feel it would be a great what to get students to create.

Now on the other hand, I love swing music and the big band  sound. In late middle school, I had a jazz band teacher that introduced me to Glenn Miller. I remember loving the catchy rhythms in “In the Mood” and couldn’t get enough of the big brass sound mixed with the saxophone. I also loved the call and response sections where it sounded like the brass section and the woodwind section were going at it. I got a CD in high school of popular sing music that I listened to all the time.

The saxophone and trumpet in “Wrappin’ It Up” is a great example of how smooth the saxophone and trumpet sound in swing music; which is a sound I love it so much. The other part I love about swing music is how every song sounds happy. “Taking a Chance on Love” is slower than most swing music that I like, but it is a happy tune, unlike the love songs from the blues.

“Paper Doll” is a nice tune, I think the students might get a kick out of the fact that Mills Brothers were a boy band from the 30’s and 4o’s. I would be an interesting project to compare the Mills Brothers and their music with a more current boy band and see what similarities and differences the two groups would have. Students would probably relate more to the music if it were compared to something more familiar with them.

Overall, I think a great teaching element to pull from the Swing era for specifically the elementary leave, would be the idea of call and response. A great way to incorporate Swing music into the classroom might be through a call and response unit. Students could hear what call and response sounds like while also doing listening work. I do so much with call and response with my younger students, giving them the opportunity to hear this in live music is a great lesson.