Carnival of the Animals

I begin by discussing the composer Camille Saint-Saens. We discuss how he enjoyed jokes and wrote this piece to entertain his students. I would ask students to think of a time when they were acting silly with their friends and pretending to be chickens or other animals. Some say that Saint-Saens liked to write songs about his friends and how they acted. This is not bullying because is was good natured humor and his friends knew he was just being silly.

We listen to the piece after discussing how it is split up into parts or "movements".

I share the illustrations as we listen. There are several books available.

On the first listen, we use rhythm sticks and jinglebells along with some movement. We add more instruments each week. 

INTRODUCTION AND ROYAL MARCH OF THE LION. 

We tap on our laps for the roar of the lion. (Second listening we use drums)

HENS AND COCKS. Click the rhythm sticks for the clucking. (Second listening we use woodblocks)

MULES: UP and down with the jingle bells.

TORTOISES. Listening.

THE ELEPHANT. Tap the two-three of the waltz with egg shakers. (Second listening use drums)

KANGAROOS. We hop in place.

THE AQUARIUM. Use jingle bells or hands as fish and bubbles.

PERSONAGES WITH LONG EARS are identified by the braying of the violins. We stand and bow our invisible violins and and down.

CUCKOO IN THE WOODS. Echo the cuckoo with our voices.

THE AVIARY. No parody in this beautiful little scherzo for the flute and fluttering strings.

PIANISTS. Play our invisible lap pianos. Guided movement.

FOSSILS. Rhythm sticks. (Second listening use xylophones with a simple pattern)

THE SWAN. Listening

FINALE. Choose an animal and add movements.

I like to introduce the idea of a listening map. We use the second week to create our own listening maps, draw, and move/play. I play each movement twice so that students can listen/draw or play on the first listen and then trade with their partners on the second one. This takes me two weeks to complete. Template to come soon! I do not use the Introduction or Finale in the Musical Map so that we have twelve boxes. 

Below is the free pdf file I display on the board as a slideshow when we do our second listen to the piece. I have a remote to flip through the slides as students draw their listening map.

Carnival of-the-animals copy from mlauricella68