Year 8 - Music
Layering parts in Wade In The Water
Year 8 song guides 2
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Study Guides
This pupil-friendly study guide includes a unit summary, clear notes, common mistakes, and quick questions with answers.
Unit Summary
The song guides cover a diverse selection of songs, designed to develop vocal technique, musical expression and ensemble skills, and building confidence and musical literacy. They can be broken down across multiple lessons and intergrated into the sequence, but can also be taught as full lessons.
Lesson Summary
You will learn to sing Wade In The Water in a polyphonic texture with four vocal layers.
Key Notes
- African American spirituals were songs created by enslaved African Americans in the 19th Century.
- They expressed faith, hope, sorrow, and resistance, and sometimes carried hidden messages about freedom.
- A melody is divided up into phrases, each being a musical idea, like a sentence in a story.
- A polyphonic texture means each layer of harmony has a distinct melody that moves at different times.
- An anacrusis is when the opening note or notes of a phrase starts before the first beat of the bar.
Vocabulary To Learn
- phrase: a musical thought, like a sentence in a story
- harmony: the notes that accompany the melody
- texture: the combination of different layers of sounds
- polyphonic: each layer of harmony has a distinct melody that moves at different times
- anacrusis: the opening note or notes of a phrase starting before the first beat of the bar (also called a pickup)
Common Mistakes To Avoid
- In polyphonic textures, it can be hard to hear the blend of all the sounds together, so can sound "messy" while learning.
3 Quick Questions (With Answers)
1. Explain the lesson in two key points.
African American spirituals were songs created by enslaved African Americans in the 19th Century. They expressed faith, hope, sorrow, and resistance, and sometimes carried hidden messages about freedom.
2. What does this key word mean in this lesson? 'phrase'
a musical thought, like a sentence in a story.
3. Correct this common mistake.
Mistake: In polyphonic textures, it can be hard to hear the blend of all the sounds together, so can sound "messy" while learning. Correction: Listen to the performance tracks first to get used to what the different overlapping layers will sound like together.
More Lessons In This Unit
Browse all guides in the Year 8 Music guide library.