Vocal Techniques Grades 9-12

This course is open to any student who wishes to learn to sing properly. This course concentrates on introducing vocal music through vocalizes, solo, and part-singing.

STANDARDS METCONTENT/SKILLS/ACTIVITIES
ABCD 
    Performing and Creating
1-4   a. Develop nuances of music notation, style, and interpretation.
1-5   b. Gain a working knowledge of voice through individual and small ensemble performance.
1-4   c. Demonstrate proper solo practice techniques, concentration skills, and well-developed voice skills.
1-4   d. Perform a large and varied repertoire of literature with expression and technical accuracy at a difficulty level of 4-5 on a scale of 1-6, including pieces performed from memory.
1-5   e. Perform music written for solo presentation with and without accompaniments.
1-4   f. Improvise stylistically appropriate harmonic, rhythmic, and melodic variations.
1-4   g. Compose and arrange music in different styles and voicing, demonstrating understanding of elements of music.
1-4   h. Demonstrate ability to read a vocal score (up to four staves), and sight-read accurately and expressively at a difficulty level of 4, on a scale of 1-6.
7968i. Investigate careers in music fields.
     
    History and Cultural
33  a. Explore a variety of repertoire including examples from each music period: Renaissance, Baroque, Classical, Romantic, and Contemporary.
3, 41-3, 7, 8  b. Classify by genre or style and by historical period or culture, unfamiliar but representative aural examples of music and explain their classifications.
 1, 2, 4  c. Identify sources of American music genres, trace their evolution, and cite well-known musicians associated with them.
 4, 6  d. Identify various roles musicians perform and describe those musicians' activities and achievements.
 1-6  e. Explore music from various historical periods.

*Prerequisite: Permission of instructor
STANDARDS METCONTENT/SKILLS/ACTIVITIES
ABCD 
    Evaluation and Analysis
1-4 1 a. Develop advanced vocal techniques: pitch matching, interval study, scales, diction, enunciation, and breath control.
3   b. Set personal goals.
1-4   c. Develop individual discipline.
3 1 d. Learn the fundamentals of music notation: note and rest values, names, articulations, simple and compound meters and rhythms, dynamics, tempos, time and key signatures, interval and chord structures.
3, 4 1, 2 e. Analyze aural examples of a varied repertoire of music representing diverse genres and cultures by describing the uses of music and expressive devices.
1-3 1 f. Demonstrate extensive knowledge of the technical vocabulary of music.
3, 461, 2 g. Identify and explain compositional devices and techniques used to provide unity, variety, tension, and release in a musical work, and give examples of other works that make similar uses of those devices and techniques.
3, 4 1-42h. Develop specific criteria for making informed, critical evaluations of the quality and effectiveness of performances, compositions, arrangements, and improvisations.
3 1-42i. Evaluate a performance, composition, arrangement, or improvisation by comparing it to similar or exemplary models.
     
    Aesthetic Appreciation
3   a. Develop and maintain an individual practice discipline for self-enrichment.
3 2 b. Recognize aesthetic values of the eras: Renaissance, Baroque, Classical, Romantic, Impressionistic, and Contemporary.
3 1, 42c. Explain how elements of imagination, craftsmanship, unity, variety, repetition, and contrast are used in various ways in all the arts; cite examples.
3, 6   d. Compare characteristics of two or more of the arts within a historical period or style, and cite examples from various cultures.
   2, 5e. Attend various musical events.

ASSESSMENTS
• Participation
• Progress reports
• Rehearsal discipline
• Self-evaluation
• Teacher evaluation of overall performance
• Vocal proficiency

*Prerequisite: Permission of instructor