First Year CC: Fine Arts and Presentations

This week has been very entertaining, as we have entered our second week of Orchestra learning at Classical Conversations. Last week, in Fine Arts, we were introduced to the orchestra and the different kinds of instruments and their respective families. This past Sunday, we were able to attend an orchestra concert. It was the kids’ first time, and it was a success! It really helped that the concert was geared toward children, so it made it a relaxed family event. It was presented by the Louisiana Philharmonic Orchestra. After the concert, we were able to meet one of the musicians, who played the cello, and with the Conductor, Carlos Miguel Prieto (pictured above), a very kind, humble, cheery, and friendly person. The program’s length was just right for the attention span of little ones, which by the way, were dancing, clapping and jumping with excitement at the beautiful sound of the orchestra’s arrangement with each particular composition. The conductor did an excellent job entertaining and interacting with the children in the audience.

The program included some classics used by Disney movies that most of the kids were familiar with and from other movies:

RICHARD WAGNER (1813-1883)   Overture of The Flying Dutchman

GEORGE FREDERIC HANDEL (1685-1759) Hornpipe from Water Music in D

REINHOLD GLIERE (1875-1956) “Russian Sailor’s Dance” from The Red Poppy

JOHN WILLIAMS (b. 1932) Suite from Jaws

ALAN MENKEN (b. 1949) Under the Sea from The Little Mermaid

JUVENTINO ROSAS (1868-1894) Over the Waves

KLAUS BADELT (b. 1967) arr. Rickets Pirates of the Caribbean

During the week, we reviewed the instruments and their families and Estefania worked on sorting the instruments respectively:

In class with the tutor, the kids listened to Beethoven’s 5th Symphony, First Movement, and were oriented to think about the music and use their imagination to add a scene in their minds that matched the sonata form and to try to distinguish the instruments highlighted by the tutor. At home, we tried to replicate that exercise by listening to the same piece. Estefania quickly remembered her imagined scene in class! Following is Beethoven’s 5th Symphony, First Movement:

For “Hands- On Science”, the kids are working on Bridge Construction:

They will continue to work on it next week and test the strength of their bridge.

For her presentation, she had to choose a painting, monument, etc., and present about it. Since, she wouldn’t want to decide on any of the classical paintings I showed her, I thought we could focus on an art that she would really find interesting, so I chose Thomas Kinkade, “The Painter of Light”, a Modern Era artist.

Estefania, being the little princess she is, loved all the paintings that I showed her from Kinkade’s Disney Dreams Collection. Her two favorite were  “The Little Mermaid” and “Cinderella Wishes Upon a Dream”. Behind her poster, we taped the two printed pictures to show to her class. Here are both pictures of the paintings for your delight:

 

To conclude her presentation, we brought some props which included a canvas, a variety of painting brushes and an art set, all tools used by artists to create beautiful paintings.

Of course, as expected of a classical education, during this week, we went over her core subjects memorization work. We have been using a combination of visuals, audio and tactile activities that have tremendously improved her memorization skills. I thank God for the availability of so many learning tools.

This is it for this week. May you all have a blessing weekend!

~Maritza