For the second year in a row, students in Open School clusters that include 3rd, 4th, and 5th grades have the opportunity to participate in Music Karate!
Here are some great resources to help you continue the learning experience at home.
When it comes to drum practice, full-size drum kits can be expensive and take up a lot of space. On top of that, acoustic drum kits are loud and electronic drum kits require additional equipment (headphones or an amplifier) just to hear it. A more affordable and space-saving alternative for drum practice is an electronic […]
Thirty-some years ago when I was in elementary school, I was what you might call overbooked. Let’s see, there was gymnastics, swim class, math club, cub scouts, church functions, school band, school orchestra, piano lessons, trumpet lessons, homework, and the list goes on. On one hand, I am surprised I had time to be a […]
Tuning a drum is not an overly complicated process, but it does require a little “know how”. The two most important things to consider are: Getting the drum to sound good it must be in tune with itself (all places you hit should be the same pitch), and for a drum kit, each drum must […]
Acoustic drum kits are a lot of things including loud, expensive, and big enough to fill a small room. However, if you have the space and the money and you (and the neighbors) don’t mind the noise, an acoustic drum kit is absolutely the best drumming experience both in terms of sound and ease of […]
New musical instruments are shiney and cool, but most decent instruments can equal the cost of a month or two of mortgage. The good news is that there are many places to get used musical instruments at a steep discount. Guitar Center is a good place to start, especially since you can then pick up […]
For the second year in a row, students in Open School clusters that include 3rd, 4th, and 5th grades have the opportunity to participate in Music Karate!
Here are some great resources to help you continue the learning experience at home.
Update (3/17/20): It seems the app reviewed below is no longer available for Android. Not to worry, it is still available for iOS and there are plenty of xylophone apps for Android. I will be testing the other Android apps soon and I will then update this article with my recommendations. In the meantime, here […]
This year at Open School, Red and Silver Clusters are learning basic keyboard percussion, mostly on glockenspiels. And, Yellow Cluster is learning more advanced percussion on glockenspiels, xylophones, metallophones, bass bars, hand drums, and other percussion instruments. Students are not in any way required to have a mallet percussion instrument for home practice. However, students […]
For the first week of music class this year, I chose two great videos to share with the classes as motivation for the coming year. Both videos involved a concept called “live looping”, which involves the use of a electronic pedal or a computer to produce a loop or repetition of a sound. Live looping […]