How is a Lesson on Timbre Designed?

When teaching timbre the teacher should emphasize the awareness of changes in tone characteristics. Activities that emphasize listening and the comparison of sound qualities are effective methods of developing students’ percept abilities.

In the primary grades students should participate in some of the following activities:

1. Match pictures or words to possible sounds.
2. Use an instrument to replace the words "Simon Says." If the cowbell sounds after the command, students should not move, if the woodblock sounds, they should follow the command.
3. Fill sealed plastic cups or old cleaned plastic medicine bottles with dried beans, paperclips, and other materials. Have students use these as shakers, and ask them to match the sounds to make-up a pair.
4. Direct students to move to the drum beat. When the drum is played on the head, students should circle clockwise, and when played on the rim, students circle counterclockwise.

Young students have the ability at an early age to hear or perceive more than one pitch occurring simultaneously. Lessons emphasizing comparisons of solo and multiple sounds with discussions of musical and non-musical sounds are effective in increasing students' musical perceptions.

Students should participate in guided listening activities using a wide variety of recordings that exhibit different solo voices or instruments, duets, trios, quartets, and more for comparison. The use of these materials can be mirrored using the repertoire of other ethnic cultures. For example, a solo song of traditional American folk music can be compared with a song from Norway, Eastern Europe, or China. Ensuing discussions should focus on tonal colors.

Guided listening can be reinforced with performance activities to assist students in analyzing musical qualities. These can include some of the following approaches:

1. Have all but four or five students in a class close their eyes. Ask the remaining students to speak a sentence on command, one at a time. Ask the class to identify the students who spoke. The voice's timbre identifies its owner.
2. Have a small group of students each choose a different small percussion instrument. With the other students’ eyes closed, the group should play the instruments one at a time and ask students to identify the instruments.
3. Have students select instruments to portray characters or depict actions in a story. Students should be knowledgeable of the instruments and the different sound qualities capable of being produced. This teacher is guiding the students’ decisions in this lesson.
4. Perform music of different ethnic cultures.

Teacher-created activities can be combined with guided listening. Listening maps, listening charts or call charts can focus on repertoire in which specific instruments or voices are features. These may include:

• Benjamin Britten, The Young Persons’ Guide To The Orchestra
• Camille Saint-Saëns, Carnival of the Animals
• George Kleinsinger, Tubby the Tuba or Pee-Wee the Piccolo

As part of the activity students can be directed to:

1. Circle the picture or name of the instrument featured.
2. List the instruments in their order of entrance.
3. Track the entrance of instruments by indicating the number or symbol associated with specific musical events.

Nonlocomotor movement can assist the teacher in assessing the students’ timbre percept skills. Students can be directed to:

1. Raise a hand when a specific voice or instrument is heard on a recording.
2. Draw two icons (a circle and a square). Listen to a duet and instruct students to raise the circle for one voice or instrument, and raise the square for the second. This activity can be extended to more voices or instruments.

Play party games or singing games are helpful in engaging students in timbre exercises while reinforcing other musical concepts. The game "Down Came Johnny" is appealing and helps students discriminate between vocal qualities.