News & Views Tuesday, March 19, 2024

Middle School General Music: Music History Friday, December 22, 2017

recommended by Jen Sper and Alissa Ruth, School Choral and Classroom Music Specialists

The middle school general music classroom can be an exciting (and/or terrifying) place! Throughout this school year, we’ve been sharing with you some valuable resources to help you develop enthusiasm and skills in your middle school musicians! Today, here are some great new options for teaching music history:

alfred-8304358452-fFrom Ragtime to Rock by Daniel Glass
“From Ragtime to Rock” is an educational DVD from award-winning author, historian, and educator Daniel Glass. This 2-disc package walks you and your students through 100 years of music evolution, covering the end of the Civil War (1865) to the dawn of the British Invasion (1965). The 90-minute “Ragtime to Rock” film can be shown in a single setting, or divided into 14 stand-alone units, offering educators a flexible way to customize and strengthen any existing curriculum. “From Ragtime to Rock” includes a 69-page Educator Guide that incorporates reproducible student activity sheets, perfect for planning classes or preparing meaningful substitute teacher lessons. Offer your students a deeper connection to the music they listen to today. As author Daniel Glass quotes, “You don’t know where you’re going until you know where you’ve been.” This resource is a FANTASTIC value for the price of $24.95!

alfred-483440Accent On Composers by Jay Althouse, Judith O’Reilly, and Sally K. Albrecht
Available in two volumes, “Accent On Composers” is a 100% reproducible music appreciation and music history resource! Each volume features 22 composers with a biography, a portrait, a listing of the composer’s musical genres, interesting factoids, a timeline, as well as a CD with listening examples for each composer. Reviews/tests for each plus more than two dozen pages of supplementary material make both valuables great for a composer unit or for your sub tub. Volume One includes: Bach, Beethoven, Brahms, Copland, Debussy, Handel, Joplin, Felix and Fanny Mendelssohn, Mozart, Stravinsky, Tchaikovsky, Verdi and more. Volume Two includes: Berlioz, Bernstein, Chopin, Ellington, Gershwin, Prokofiev, Puccini, Purcell, Mahler, Rachmaninoff, Strauss, and more!

alfred-46048-fThe Women of Western Music: Hildegard to Ella by Anna Wentlent
Balance your music history curriculum with this indispensable classroom resource! This long-awaited manual focuses exclusively on the female artists who haven’t made it into most textbooks. Biographies, student assessments, and recordings are included for 18 important women who enriched the world with their incredible talents, such as Clara Schumann, Amy Beach, Marian Anderson, Ethel Merman, and Billie Holiday. Recommended for grades five and up. Book is 100% reproducible.

Find more resources for middle school general music on our website, or contact us for more ideas! And remember – shop Stanton’s for all your sheet music needs!

About the Authors:
Jen Sper has been with Stanton’s since 2006. A former middle school and high school choral director, she holds a Bachelor of Music Education degree from Baldwin Wallace College Conservatory of Music. An active choral singer and accompanist throughout the Central Ohio area, she also enjoys good food, running (to counteract the good food…) and the Muppets.

Alissa Ruth began working at Stanton’s in the summer of 2016. She is a former middle and high school choir director and holds a Bachelor of Music in Education degree from Capital University. She is an active choral singer in the Columbus area, and spends her free time running, doing yoga, cooking, and watching Netflix.


< Previous|Next >