This week we continue looking at music that has truly made a giant impact into our musical lives today. As I listened to the music from this list I cam across more and more titles that I would love to use and that I have used in my is curriculum. The wonderful thing that I found with this weeks set do music is that I have found music that my students actually have heard before.
For weeks I have been playing bits and pieces of the music lists for my students, and the first 4 weeks I have to be honest and say I got a lot do blank stares. The last two weeks have been different as I have played songs that they have recognized. A perfect example of a song that truly got my students attention was when I played Superstition by Stevie Wonder. The question that I had to ask was what about this piece made it spark for my students?
Superstition itself is a tune in that was written as the lead single for Wonder's Talking Book album in 1972. This tune comes from the Motown label but is a departure from the music that made Motown famous as mentioned in the previous chapter. For my students, I believe it is the catchy chorus that they find the most infectious. Some new sounds can also be heard on this song like the interesting Hohner Clavinet, which gives this song an interesting timbre.
I did a quick straw poll of my students to see how they like this tune. Even if they didn't like the song, I noticed that they couldn't help themselves from moving to the beat. They felt that the drum beat was really what stuck out. This beat is very strong 4 beat pattern with a heavy back beat style. Wonder's ability to make a catchy hook and mix that with a really catchy drum beat makes this tune a definite classic, but more importantly makes a song that transcends time and is still a popular song even today.
No comments:
Post a Comment