Year 9 - Music
Scoring a silent movie
Film Music
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This pupil-friendly study guide includes a unit summary, clear notes, common mistakes, and quick questions with answers.
Unit Summary
This unit explores film music and how composers use music to enhance mood, atmosphere and storytelling. Pupils study common film music techniques and themes, and apply this knowledge by composing and performing music to accompany visual scenes, developing their composition and performance skills.
Lesson Summary
You will learn to combine different elements to create a live musical accompaniment for a silent film.
Key Notes
- Music in silent movies has to transition seamlessly between different scenes and moods.
- Many performers played popular songs and used musical clichés in their musical performances.
- One famous example is the 'misterioso' musical cliché.
- To transition between scenes, performers often played a vamp, a repeated pattern based on chords.
- Composing music using a D minor vamp.
Vocabulary To Learn
- musical cliché: a musical idea that is well-known and used often
- vamp: a repeated musical pattern, often based on chords
- D minor: a set of notes starting on D which includes Bb as the flattened sixth
Common Mistakes To Avoid
- When a piano player plays music with a silent movie it is always completely improvised.
3 Quick Questions (With Answers)
1. Explain the lesson in two key points.
Music in silent movies has to transition seamlessly between different scenes and moods. Many performers played popular songs and used musical clichés in their musical performances.
2. What does this key word mean in this lesson? 'musical cliché'
a musical idea that is well-known and used often.
3. Correct this common mistake.
Mistake: When a piano player plays music with a silent movie it is always completely improvised. Correction: While they improvise many aspects, they often use specific musical ideas to create specific effects. This includes vamps, certain chords (e.g. diminished 7th for tension) and musical clichés like the misterioso that create certain effects.
More Lessons In This Unit
Browse all guides in the Year 9 Music guide library.