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12 Bar Blues Lesson 3/7/14

Objectives: -After learning to execute a 12-bar blues pattern, students will improvise solos both with others and individually.

Assessment: (formative, informal) -Students will each give the notes for a single chord, which the teacher will write on the board. -Teacher will check each students paper to make sure they wrote down the information, then the teacher will listen when the class plays the chords to ensure that the class has written down the correct notes. -Teacher will listen and not let the students move on until all are correctly imitating the pattern. -Students will solo simultaneously using the information learned in class. Students that volunteer will solo individually.

Materials: pencil and scratch paper for each student, white board, marker, recording of rhythm section playing B-flat blues

1) On the board, write the 12 bar blues chord progression: (all major triads with a minor seventh) I IV I I IV IV I I V IV I I

2) Explanation of structure. -Tell students that each number represents a degree of the concert scale. -Students find each chord root in their own key. -Discuss what the starting pitch for each student is in the key of their own instrument. -Write the starting pitch for each note on the board. -Students play chord roots with recording of 12 bar blues in the key of B-flat

3) Chord tones -Show students how to build a major triad with a minor seventh. -Taking turns, each student builds a chord in their own key. -Teacher writes chords on the board in each instrument's key for I, IV, and V chords in the key of concert B-flat. -Students copy their own chord tones on their paper.

4) Playing within the chord structure. -Give students sixty seconds to play the chord tones so that they can become comfortable with the notes. -Teacher demonstrates a pattern, swinging eighth notes to the 1, 3, 5, flat 7 scale degrees. -Students repeat pattern on the I chord. -Students play the pattern over the chord structure with the recording of 12 bar blues. -Repeat the previous three steps with a different pattern using chord tones.

5) Soloing -Students solo simultaneously, experimenting with different chord tones over the chord structure. -Three students volunteer to each solo over four bars, completing one 12 bar blues form. -Three more students volunteer to go through the 12 bar blues pattern. -All students solo simultaneously, still just using chord tones. -Inform students that they will be soloing individually over the course of the next few weeks.

6) Audition prep -Discuss the audition that will require soloing in the next week. -Answer any questions that arise.

Reminders: -Remember that the content is new, and pause for questions often. -Give ample aural examples for students so that they understand what a solo using chord tones sounds like. -Challenge students, but do not make them solo individually if they are uncomfortable with the new ideas.