GHMS Music Department
December Newsletter - 2022
North Shore Winter Band Festival on December 13th
Following the afternoon rehearsals, the band members will enjoy a pizza dinner together with Maple Dale and Nicolet High School band members. The evening concert will begin at 6:30 PM and is open for anyone to attend. The concert will also include performance from each grade level, both high school ensembles, as well as a performance of the 8th grade bands combined with the Nicolet High School musicians performing Gonna Fly Now by Bill Conti.
Orchestra Preparing for January Concerts
Orchestra wrapped up the trimester working on concert music for our upcoming concerts in January! 4th Grade is working hard learning how to read and play music on the D and A strings out of their Essential Elements books. 5th Grade is learning how to play at different times in the same piece and how to count rests with their most recent piece, Pepperoni Pizza Rock. 6th Grade is continuing to work on their concert music, Burst and Fiddles on Fire, while practicing how to count more complex rhythms. 7th Grade is working on pieces with more complicated finger patterns as well as learning ensemble skills of changing tempos quickly in their piece Medieval Wars. 8th Grade is learning the challenging ensemble skill of switching meters (i.e. counting to 2 then counting to 3, then switching back to counting to 2) throughout their fast-paced piece, Afterburn. Finally, the Chamber Orchestra will present a piece called Curse of the Rosin Eating Zombies from Outer Space, which contains some extended techniques that you must hear at our concert.
How Can I Keep From Singing?
November and December have been all about preparing for our January concert!
4th and 5th Grade choirs have started creating a script to go along with one of our songs for the concert, they have been coming up with all of the settings and ideas themselves!
6th, 7th, and 8th Grade choirs have been learning how to pronounce Hawaiian words that are part of one of their songs! Although challenging, they have been nailing it every time! They’ve even started helping other students who may have missed a day or two!
All Grades have started learning the melody to Lift Every Voice and Sing and the use of 6/8 meter.
GHMS 6th, 7th & 8th Grade Winter Concert
GHMS 4th & 5th Grade Winter Concert
General & World Music
The week is ending and we're off to an excellent start for the 2nd semester. The 6th-8th graders are now finishing their world presentations on Asia. The class was excited to have speakers from the community come and speak on behalf of their cultural background and to share different styles of instruments and traditions from their native countries.
We will begin playing the piano, drums, and percussion instruments. We look forward to learning together and sharing new information during the second trimester of school. We are excited to have our drum line and dance team be a part of the Steam Program that will occur on December 10, 2022. We have also been invited to perform at different schools, during Black History Month. The students are very excited and ready to go.
Recently, we have had multiple speakers come and present. Scholars have also presented their reports on countries in Asia as well. Students are also working on their notations and world music presentations.