Music Links May 1, 2009
Posted by Michael Stokes in : Music , comments closedClassics for Kids: Compose Your Own Music http://www.classicsforkids.com/games/compose/compose.html
PBS Kids: Thumb Piano Tunes
http://pbskids.org/africa/piano/haveflash.html
Pauly’s Playhouse: Freaky Frank’s Music Machine http://www.paulysplayhouse.com/paulys_playhouse/lab_games/franky.html
Sphinx Kids: Classical Music Interactive Learning & Games http://www.sphinxkids.org/
Classics for Kids: The Note Name Game
http://www.classicsforkids.com/games/notename/notename.html
http://www.artsvivants.ca/en/mus/activitiesgames/
ArtsAlive: Activities and Games
Dallas Symphony Orchestra: DSO Kids Games http://www.dsokids.com/2001/rooms/musicroom.asp
Virtual Keyboard
http://www.bgfl.org/bgfl/custom/resources_ftp/client_ftp/ks2/music/piano/index.htm
It’s a Virtual keyboard that can simulate nine different instruments and can even play back chords. It’s a perfect companion for the SMART Board.
Just a quick note for the music teachers, “the piano keyboard goes from ‘Middle C’ to ‘Upper F’ – one and a half octaves (18 different notes). The double bass is pitched lower but still tuned to ‘C’.”
Taking Giant Steps Toward Art and Music Appreciation April 29, 2008
Posted by Jeff Giddens in : Arts, Music , comments closedArt and Music teachers:
Want to inspire your students? If so, make plans to fire up your web browser and check out the beautiful audiovisual work of Michal Levy. Your pupils won’t be disappointed. This talented artist, a former student of the renowned Bezalel Academy of Art and Design of Jerusalem, masterfully blends jazz and colorful animation to create a captivating feast for both ears and eyes.
For example, watch the amazing interplay of shapes and colors in Levy’s Giant Steps and listen to the classic sounds of John Coletrane. Afterwards, read an interview describing how this work was created. This may give students an impetus to design their own interpretations of various pieces of music.
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All That Jazz April 14, 2008
Posted by Jeff Giddens in : Arts, Music , comments closedMusic teachers and other audiophiles:
Listen up and integrate a little technology! Get hep to the jive and allow your students to enjoy and appreciate some momentous music. Those smooth cats over at the Smithsonian Institution site want everyone to know that April is Jazz Appreciation month.
Uncommonly Useful February 25, 2008
Posted by Jeff Giddens in : Audio, Media, Media Literacy, Music, Reference, Video , comments closedSo, your students are working on a multimedia project and they need access to audio and images. Where can you go to help them find resources that aren’t burdened with copyright restrictions? Drop by Creative Commons and you’ll be in the midst of all kinds of rich media that you and your students can legally “share, remix, and use” in classroom projects. Be sure to check out the search feature.
C’mon, Baby, Let’s Do the doubleTwist February 20, 2008
Posted by Jeff Giddens in : Audio, Current Events, Emerging Tech, Innovation, Media, Music, Software, Technology, Video , comments closedMost folks love iPods and other, similar media storage devices. The only problem is that, sometimes, these nifty gadgets come with odious DRM software. If you want to enjoy your digital media on as many devices as you’d like and share what you’ve got with your colleagues and students, you might want to check out doubleTwist. It’s a free application for syncing and sharing your personal media. Although it’s currently PC only, the developers are working on a Mac OS X version. If you’re an Apple owner, check out Floola, it’s a cross-platform application.
Tuesday Tune-Up: SoundPedia January 29, 2008
Posted by Jeff Giddens in : Arts, Music , comments closed
Music/Band teachers: If you haven’t heard about SoundPedia stop what you’re doing and surf on over to the site. It’s a 21st Century tune tool that’s great for finding and playing golden oldies as well as many of the current hits that populate your students’ iPods. SoundPedia is a swingin’, music-centric social community and a snappy music discovery search engine all rolled into one. This rocking resource will connect you with other individuals who are motivated by music and provide audio insights about what your learners like.
Bonus: Why not create a musical message? Make your own Bob Dylan “Subterranean Homesick Blues” signs.
Look out, kid. They keep it all hid…
Hitting All the Right Notes: Muxicall January 22, 2008
Posted by Jeff Giddens in : Arts, Music , comments closedMusic teachers: Here’s something nifty to start off your day. It’s a project called Muxicall that was created by Diana Antunes as part of her work for the New Technologies of Communication degree at the University of Aveiro in Portugal. Diana is a talented individual who is interested in exploring collective composition and improvisation. A particularly snappy feature of Muxicall is that Diana integrates ideas proposed by Sir Isaac Newton (1642–1727) creating a pleasing, visible interface between notes of music and color.
This is NOT Science Fiction… December 13, 2007
Posted by Daniel Rivera in : Arts, Business, Emerging Tech, Music, Science, Technology , comments closedHat-tip: to our own Mike Carter who brought this video to our attention.
We used to speak of robots as a science-fiction concept. Images of the Jetsons came to mind, and we dismissed them with brief amusement. Science, however, has a way of making the impossible a household idea. Scientists are the alchemists and magicians of today. They investigate, understand, experiment, and explore tremendously complex concepts and master the knowledge to do the impossible.
We brought you the Keepon recently, which is a snuggly little dancing robot. Wouldn’t it be cool if he had a friend that would play music for him? Well, on December 6th, Toyota (yes, the car company) raised the bar with one of its new home models. It plays the violin, and it’s not too bad. Toyota plans to further advance the robot’s dexterity to enable it to use tools and assist with domestic duties and nursing / medical care.
Get the Flash Player to see the wordTube Media Player.
Ladies and gentlemen, this is NOT science fiction. This is the level of technology that we are nonchalantly moving towards, and it demands many skills from us as citizens, leaders, parents, and workers. Whether you are a scientist developing the motors, programmer coding the software, biochemist creating a new powersource through algae, sales associate selling these, lawyer dealing with the new challenges on liability laws, or voting citizen considering new civil and ethical issues, there is nothing simple about this single technology. In fact, there is nothing simple about most of the world now.
Why, then, do we continue to teach simple bubble-filling skills??? Why do we continue to ask students to spit out facts that we already know? Why don’t we ask them to defend, judge, or create solutions to problems that are real? The Partnership for 21st Century Skills has even put together a framework to help bold school leaders in addressing this deficiency. Only five states, including North Carolina, have adopted it. Why hasn’t Georgia?
Keepon Keepin’ On November 15, 2007
Posted by Daniel Rivera in : Arts, Collaboration, Emerging Tech, Health, Humor, Innovation, Music, Physical Science, Science , comments closed
This small and cute little guy is a robot, and he dances. It’s a simple dance at first glance, but what is so remarkable about him is that he doesn’t have a pre-programmed dance. Marek Michalowski of Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh, US, and Hideki Kozima of the National Institute of Communications Technology (NICT) in Kyoto, Japan, programmed the squishy, yellow robot, called “Keepon”, to pick out the beat in a piece of music and move along in time. It can also track the rhythmic motion of a person or another object and move in time to that.
One goal of the research is to better program robots to interact realistically with humans. Something as simple as nodding along in conversation is a huge step in making robots more engaging. They argue that human social behavior shares much in common with dance, and that humans use body movement and speech in rhythmic ways during normal interactions. Check out the official site: http://beatbots.org for more info.
What’s interesting to me about this is the kind of work that these scientists are doing. More and more, scientists in one field are teaming with experts in very different fields. For example, scientists working with robotics may team with those from behavioral psychology (programming robot AI) to entymology (researching swarm behavior for robots). Our REAL science is becoming even more multi-disciplinary and requires unprecedented collaboration, sharing, and teamwork. Where is this in our science classrooms? Where is the experimentation and play? Where is the joy?
Watch some videos of this little robot in action below. The last one is an official music video for Spoon’s Don’t You Evah – that’s right, it stars in a music video! Note that we are hosting the files here on SEGATech because YouTube (their original location) is often blocked in school systems…
Songs for Teaching October 25, 2007
Posted by Michael Stokes in : All Subjects, Music , comments closedI got this link from the Martha Puckett Middle School Principal, Denise Voyles. It looks like everything you will need for music and education in all academic areas as well as the fun stuff. Check out Songs for Teaching.