Welcome to the Elizabeth College Music Department.
Use the menu to the left to navigate to resources pages for each year group.
If you are looking for extra-curricular music (choirs, ensembles, orchestra) please click here
About the Music Curriculum at Elizabeth College
Music is compulsory for all students in Y7 and Y8. It is one of the Creative Arts options in Y9. Music qualifications are available at GCSE and A Level.
To find details of KS3 Music (programme of study and assessment criteria) please click here.
To find details of KS4 Music and the GCSE Music programme please click here.
To find details of the A Level Music programme please click here.
Teachers:
Director of Music: Mr Andrew Morley
Teachers of Music: Mrs Gaynor Laird
Music lessons at Elizabeth College are likely to involve:
- Group singing and music making
- Folk songs, art music and contemporary music from a range of cultures
- Singing as a means to understanding or internalising sound, which will consequently build a good ear (know as aural skills or audiation). Good aural skills are vital to musicianship, and are more fundamental to a developing musician than, for example, skills on a specific instrument.
- Musical literacy; this is school after all! All pupils have the right to learn to read and write in traditional notation. These are visual aids to accessing musical ideas
- Tonic solfa (do re mi etc) used to assist assigning function to pitch. Curwen handsigns accompany the solfa, and are used to reinforce the intervals and relationships between pitches. They also help kinaesthetic learners. It offers boys who have learnt alphabetic names a new perspective on pitch.
- French time names used to assist rhythmic understanding. These onomatopoeic alternatives are taught in conjunction with English names (crotchets, quavers etc) and fraction names (quarter note, eighth notes etc). They contain the same number of sounds as the rhythm being read.
- Layered music (requiring multi-tasking, and higher order processing)
- A general understanding of musical historical contexts and genres
- Games, challenges, listening and self-direction
As pupils progress they are introduced to:
- Composition and creative music tasks
- Music technology programmes & practices
- Extended study of selected genres and works
- Development of individual performance and composition portfolios
You might be interested to listen to some of Dr Anita Collins' research into the benefits of Music Education