School Music - introduction
All of music in this section has been generated over the last thirty years for 9 -13 middle schools. There is a number of occasional pieces, starting with Tip Toe Tango, on this page. The instrumentation for these varies. Tip Toe Tango is written for Violins 1 and 2 (of equal difficulty) and Viola and Cello - rather easier. A piano accompaniment is necessary in all cases.
There are also pieces for classroom performance. All these pieces conform to the same orchestration:
a melody suitable for descant recorder, violin, oboe, flute, doubled on the piano
a glockenspiel part (hard beaters best)
two xylophone parts (soft beaters best)
a single line keyboard part doubled on the clarinet (optional)
a percussion part (optional)
a piano part
A strength of the pieces is that they can be performed by melody and piano accompaniment alone. The other elements of the instrumentation enhance the music but are not, strictly speaking, necessary.
There are seventeen classroom pieces altogether. Try the links below to get a flavour of both occasional and classroom music.
All original pieces on this web site are copyright. If you want a copy of any of the pieces for the approximate cost of copying, please get in touch.
Blues Cruise
Another from the collection for Classroom Performance.
This one continues the attempt to try and make stylistic differences in music clearer to young people.
Soft beaters on the xylophones are perhaps more appropriate than hard in several of these pieces
Clog Dance
This is a bouncy, rhythmic (pseudo) clog dance and provides the opportunity to perform accurate dotted rhythms and a gentle crescendo or two.
It was written for descant, treble and tenor recorders, Violins 1 and 2, viola, cello, percussion and piano. It works with Descant recorder, Violin 1 and Piano.
Playing time is 1 minute 25 seconds.
copyright
Hoe Down
Another of the ensemble pieces for classroom orchestra.
This one features first /second time repeat bars.
La Volta
Another short piece in the classroom music selection.
As music teachers will know, La Volta was a popular dance in sixteenth century high Elizabethan society. At different points in the progress of the dance, the male dancer would lift his partner as high in the air as he could.
Here is a replication of the spirit of the dance for youngsters in the middle years. The jump points are obvious and can be re-enforced with percussion.
The change in rhythm may not be quite authentic but is pretty natural.
Party Time Rock'n'Roll
Another piece for classroom ensemble.
War Dance
War Dance - another piece classroom ensemble - with marked dynamic changes.
Tip Toe Tango
A piece aimed at 9 - 13 year old string players with piano accompaniment.
This is one of the occasional pieces for Middle School string players.