In this Composing at Home blog, we are going to be learning about a style of music called Minimalism. This blog will incorporate some Listening, Reading & Composition. I will be bringing together a range of resources, videos and ideas including the wonderful resources on the BBC Ten Pieces website.
This work is aimed at Key Stage 3 students and all of the work can be completed at home without the need for any formal instruments or expensive music technology. You will need:
- Computer, Laptop, Phone or Tablet
- Internet Connection
- Pen & Pencil for taking notes
- A brain ready to think about listening & creating music.
Stage 1 – Listening to Minimalism
Minimalism is a style of music that brings together short ideas, patterns & motifs. Minimalism is where composers use, repeat and layer these ideas together in order to create an interesting piece of music. A musical idea could be as simple as a short clapping pattern, or a little melody that you start humming and keep repeating. Each layer will have its own sound, colour or shape. This means that each layer will bring something unique to the piece.
For this first stage you need start by visiting the BBC Ten Pieces Website. This webpage focusses on a famous Minimalist Composer called Steve Reich. In order to learn about this style of music you will watch two videos that explain one of his famous minimalist pieces “Music for 18 Musicians”. Here is the Link you need:
BBC Ten Pieces: Music for 18 Musicians
- When you listened to Music for 18 Musicians, what stood out to you the most?
- What different Layers can you identify in the music?
- What did you enjoy about the music?
Key Terms
There are a number of Key Terms that are linked to this piece of music and it would be good for you to get to know them. Understanding key terms will mean that you start to spot them in the music that you listen to. You might like to listen back to “Music for 18 Musicians” and try to spot these features:
- Rhythm – The Horizontal organisation of beats/note values
- Melody – The Horizontal organisation of pitch
- Crescendo – gradually getting louder
- Diminuendo – gradually getting softer
- Dynamics – the term used for louds and softs/volume
- Ostinato – a repeating (often rhythmic) pattern
- Pitched percussion – percussion instruments that can play different pitches – xylophones, glockenspiels, chime bars, etc.
- Tempo – Speed
- Unpitched percussion – percussion instruments that can only make a limited number of sounds – drums, shakers, woodblocks, tambourines, etc.
Move on to Page 2 for the next stage in this project
Stage 2 – Your first Ostinato
One key feature of Minimalist music is the presence of an Ostinato, or several of them. As we have learnt, this is a repeating pattern. An Ostinato could be Rhythmic or Melodic. Here are some Rhythmic Ostinati:
You are going to create your first Rhythmic Ostinato using your hands, yes that’s right Clapping. So, warm up your hands and come up with a Rhythm, a simple, short Rhythm. We will come back to Melodic Ostinati later.
How did you get on? Not too tricky to clap something.
But now a challenge, can you write it down? It doesn’t need to be formal notation like above, it could just be come dots, lines or graphics on a piece of paper. You might like to put these dots on a single line as above. This will help move towards notating it with traditional musical notation. Another approach is to use a grid of squares where each square represents beats & sub-beats of the bar, see the examples below which match the Rhythms used above:
I wonder if you now want to change your Rhythm by maybe adding a rest or a new rhythmic feature. All of these examples have been just one bar long. You might like your Rhythm to be two bars long. It is up to you as you are now the composer.
Extension Task
Steve Reich composed a piece of music called “Clapping Music”. Why not have a listen and you can even download an app to try your own performance of the piece.
If you enjoyed watching Clapping Music then you can download an app which helps you learn to perform the piece. It is a bit of a game really, but it is great fun and teaches you more about the piece.
https://londonsinfonietta.org.uk/clapping-music-app
And if you are enjoying Rhythm then you should check out:
Now move on to Page 3 for the next stage in this Minimalism Composing at Home project
Stage 3 – Bringing your Ostinato to Life
For Stage 3 we are going to start to bring these Rhythms to life. In order to do this you will need a computer, laptop, tablet or phone with internet connection. We are going to use an online music making platform called Bandlab. It is totally free but you will need to use Google Chrome as your browser. Visit the following website and sign up for a Free account:
This website is totally free and there is also a free app for phones & tablets. It is easier to use on a bigger screen, but you can certainly do everything you need to do on a smaller screen.
Composing at Home – Rhythmic Ostinato in Bandlab
The first thing we are going to do is create a Rhythmic Ostinato inside Bandlab. Watch the video below to learn exactly how to do this:
Once you have watched this video you can then start to create your own Rhythmic Ostinato. It is entirely possible to create a piece of music entirely from Rhythms. There is no need for melody and this can be seen in the following video. Whilst this video isn’t Minimalist, it shows the power of layering rhythms to create Samba:
Now lets go to Page 4 to find out how to make our first Melodic Ostinato
Stage 4 – Melodic Ostinato
Now that you have created a Rhythmic Ostinato you will want to create a Melodic one. Here are some examples of Melodic Ostinati for you to look at and listen to:
If you do play an instrument and have one to hand, then why not try playing these through. If you can’t read music then maybe you could listen and following and start to work out what the music is telling you.
Composing at Home – Melodic Ostinato in Bandlab
We are going to move back to Bandlab now and start to create a Melodic Ostinato. You can of course use other software or you could record your own instrumental playing. But Bandlab is Free and online, so it is quite useful.
Here is the next video to guide you through creating your first Melodic Ostinato:
Now you might be thinking – how do I play in a Melodic Ostinato, where do I start?
In the video above I used just 4 notes to create my melody – CDE&F. In many respects it doesn’t matter what notes you use. What matters is that you experiment and try creating different patterns. Once you have something recorded, listen back to it and see if you like it. Composing is all about creating ideas, changing ideas and then making final musical decisions.
There is no right or wrong way to create a Melodic Ostinato, so just enjoy the process. You can try changing the instrument in Bandlab and you can also try changing the tempo of the music.
Now we move on to the final stage in our Composing at Home Minimalism Project. Move on to page 5 now.
Stage 5 – Combining your Rhythmic & Melodic Ostinati
By now you should have created some Rhythmic & Melodic Ostinati. We are now going to bring these ideas together and start to create our minimalist piece. This piece is going to represent the starting point of a Minimalist composition.
A composition Brief tells us exactly what our composition needs to contain. Here is the Brief for our Minimalist composition. Your Piece must:
- Include at least 1 Rhythmic Ostinato
- Contain 2 Melodic Ostinati
- Be no more than 60 seconds long
- Use both Tuned & Un-Tuned Percussion
Now watch this video to learn how to combine Rhythmic & Melodic Ostinati:
In this video I use 3 layers, one Rhythmic & two Melodic. For the melody I use just 4 notes – CDE & G. As you can see from the video, one of my melodies rises and the other falls. This means that they are both different. Once you have tried the steps in the video you can start to extend your work:
- You could try varying your beat so that it changes halfway through.
- One option is to have a moment of silence in the middle of your piece before bringing everything back in again. This varies the dynamics.
- You might like to try adding some more Rhythmic layers to create a piece of music similar to the Samba piece we looked at in a previous stage.
- Bandlab can record your voice or your own instrument. So you might like to try adding a real-life recording of you playing over the top of the minimalist piece that you have already created.
The more you can listen to music as you compose the more you will learn. If you are stuck for ideas then you could listen to another Minimalist piece on the BBC Ten Pieces Website:
https://www.bbc.co.uk/teach/ten-pieces/KS2-3/zkthsrd
Composing at Home
Composing at Home is lots of fun and can be done with or without technology. You could easily build up a minimalist style piece using instruments. But it is great to be able to record & create ideas using technology.
This process has started to develop your knowledge of Minimalism and also composition. We have been using Bandlab to create Rhythmic & Melodic Ostinati, which we have then combined to create a short piece of music. We have learnt some key terms and listened to some music.
Now that you have started to look at Minimalism you might like to do some more listening and some more composition. There is no need to stop here and you can use Bandlab to create a more complete piece of music should you wish. There really is no end to this and you can be as creative as you like.
Whenever you do compose, make sure that you use your ears to assess your work as you go. If something doesn’t sound good then try to work out why and make changes. Be prepared to experiment and if necessary delete ideas. When you create a piece of music it is yours. Feel free to change and adapt the piece as you go. Composing at Home is entirely possible and lots of fun.
For more ideas on how to engage with music at home please see my Corona Virus Blogs which bring together a number of ideas.
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