Olivia's Portfolio

What did I do?

During this unit, my group came together to choose a song and spent time practicing it. We focused on making sure we played together throughout the piece. We also received feedback from other groups, which helped us see areas where we could improve, like intonation and pulse.

What did I learn?

I learned that it’s really important to listen to each other while playing so we can stay in sync and sound better as a group. I also learned how helpful feedback from other groups can be. They gave us suggestions, like making sure our notes were in tune and adding more dynamics. By listening to their advice, we were able to make small changes that improved how we played.

What worked?

Something that worked well was improving based on the feedback we got from other groups. We received suggestions to improve our intonation and pay more attention to dynamics. After hearing their advice, we worked together to practice these areas in our next session. We spent time focusing on spots where our notes were out of tune and where we could add more variation in dynamics to make the music sound better.

What did not work?

Something that didn’t work as well was choosing our song. We had trouble picking a song because there were too many options, and not all of us liked the same one. Additionally, since we chose our song from a book, we didn’t know what it sounded like beforehand. This meant we had to test out a few different options before making a decision, which ended up taking a lot of time.

Personal Relevance

The collaboration skills that I practiced in this unit are important for my future because it’ll help me work effectively with others in school projects, extracurricular activities, and eventually in a job. Being able to communicate, listen, and work towards a common goal is important in almost any group activity. Plus, learning how to give and receive feedback will help me improve and get better at whatever I do.

Our performance today went well and we were prepared. If we were not prepared, something that could have helped us become prepared is listening to each other during the performance and trying to blend as well as we can. I think that the feedback we received from our peers was helpful because it let us know what needs to be improved and what we should focus on during our practices. I grew as a musician and as a collaborator by working better with a group. I know this because we sounded much better during the performance than at the start of the unit.

Last class, our performance was in sync and pretty good. Some feedback that we acquired was for us to improve our intonation and dynamics. We prioritized intonation but we worked on both of them today. We started by rehearsing intonation in specific parts by playing slower. We also worked on dynamics in specific parts and we communicated with each other. At the end, we played the whole song. I think we are ready for our performance on Monday.

Today, we didn’t accomplish much. We only chose our song towards the end. It was challenging because all of us had different opinions and some of us were more hesitant than others. We tried three songs and chose “Harvest Moon” by Larry Clark. It didn’t sound very good when we first played together, but I’m looking forward to improving it next class. I hope we will work well together and have a good result at the end.

The first thing we did was forming our groups. It wasn’t really challenging since me and my partner just merged with another group and created a group of four. Next, we chose our roles. All of us wanted to get exceeding so we each chose both the creator and the performer roles. Then, we chose our music. We looked through the books provided by Ms. Ziegler but we didn’t decide on a piece yet. It was challenging because we wanted to know what the pieces we were looking at sounded like, but we couldn’t find the right recordings online. I think a challenge we will face with the music we decide on will be playing together, since there isn’t a conductor. We can practice using a metronome and stay together by listening and looking at each other. Something I will look forward to when learning our music is learning about the composer, practicing together, and giving each other feedback.

Rose

Something that went well at the concert were the dynamics, like in Thundersnow, the transitions, and the program note readers did a pretty good job. We stayed quiet during the transitions while the program note readers read their very detailed and descriptive program notes. I’m proud of how we listened to each other and looked at the conductor to try to blend together. A highlight from another performance was the Egyptian song from the G7 orchestra. I really liked the solo and how everyone performed together. Something that I liked about the concert was the variety of song styles and difficulties. Something my group did well was executing what the composer intended for us to deliver in the pieces, like the feeling of thunder and snow in Thundersnow. For the spring concert, I would like to be section leader again and to play more exciting and energetic pieces, along with slow and soft pieces.

Thorn

Something that was difficult about the concert was the intonation and the pulse in parts like at the start of Gingerbread Man. It was stressful because we were off-beat and not together. Something else that did not work was the tempo and pulse during Winter With You because we were a few beats slower. It was frustrating trying to get back on track again.

Bud

An area of opportunity is rehearsing more with everyone so that we can perform at the same pace and with each other, especially in Winter With You. Additionally, we were all really squished in the back and some 6 graders couldn’t see the conductor. I also think the VMM could have practiced more and been more expressive. Something that could be improved by me individually is to blend better with the whole orchestra. Something that could be improved by my group is intonation, pulse, and tempo. This can be improved by practicing even more with a metronome and looking up at the conductor. I’m looking forward to playing a variety of different styles and difficulties of songs for the spring concert.