“When I get into the studio, it's not about trying to get a good song, it's about whatever comes naturally …” Jessica Mauboy
A note on sounds, frequencies and vibrations – music isn’t limited to sounds and simply hearing them - indeed music is made up of these three expressions and we use the three terms in this article because some of us hear sound, some of us experience frequencies and some of us feel vibrations - and some of us experience some or all of these when we encounter musical expressions. Our rationale is both the accurate science of music and the social inclusion of how humans diversely and differently experience music and might compose music.
What is musical composition?
Musical composition is essentially the creation of sound, frequency and vibration. We create a series of sounds, frequencies and vibrations by putting them together. While there are seemingly ‘traditional’ ways of composing music, when we are in the worlds of children, we can twinkle into less experienced, and, therefore, more unexpected opportunities for creativity in composition. The conditions for creation lie within a liveliness for learning and the openness for expansion of somatic experiences.
Composition of music then, becomes a highly creative and innovate process to play with all kinds of sounds, in all kinds of ways, in all kinds of places, with all kinds of players, and all kinds of people. So, by gathering a collection of sounds and putting them together - you are essentially composing music. This can happen in the moment, over time or it can be collected and recorded. It can occur as a sporadic spontaneous event or as something curated, rehearsed and coordinated. Sometimes the spontaneous event can lead to a curated one. The possibilities are endless.
Before we dive into some possibilities, let’s explore why musical composition is important, and then how we might go about it in our everyday lives and in educational settings.
Why is musical composition important?
Creating new musical compositions is a most satisfying creative event. In moments where children bring together their collections of sounds frequencies and vibrations, they experience a ‘wonder moment’. A wonder moment is an important part of brain development where the recognition of something new and different is met with curiosity – in practice, wonderment where the expression of newness (delight, a sigh, a physical expression and so on is - what I like to think of as ‘wondermental’. The body simultaneously expressing the experience of newness in the brain where the possibility of new neural pathways are formed and opened. Even more extraordinary is, that when these ‘wondermental’ moments occur in groups, the collective expression makes the learning experience stronger and richer because the experience is authentically shared.
A vision for children’s collective ‘wondermentalism’
Belonging, Being & Becoming: The Early Years Learning Framework for Australia (EYLF) V2.0 opens with a specific goal for children aspiring to ensure that “all young Australians become confident and creative individuals” (2022, p. 4). Those of us who practice the arts believe that creativity derives from and thrives in enquiry, experimentation, exciting encounters, open reaching and making processes.
While experiences that have hypothesis, provoke puzzles and have outcomes are also important – it is more likely that children can engage in such experiences when they have lots of practice at what might seem ‘non-traditional’ and therefore creative encounters. This reifies that musical composition teaches children ‘how to think’ more prominently than simply ‘what to think’ alone (Mead, 1928). Put another, rather eloquent way – ‘ensure that children are making the dots rather than joining the ones that are given’ (McArdle & Ohlsen, 2016, p. 213). Wondermental!
Let’s turn now to explore a few simple ideas for ways to get started with musical composition.
How do we do musical composition?
In musical composition we don’t aim to recreate that which already exists – indeed it is the newness and uniqueness of the creative moment that we are seeking, encouraging and creating the conditions for. So, we make the dots with children rather than joining existing ones.
You don’t need to be able to play an instrument to compose music. Music is all around us - sounds, frequencies and vibrations. The more aware of our surrounding environments we become, the more music we hear and the more music we can create in our everyday lives. It’s recognising the wondermental - receiving of sounds, frequencies and vibrations and the expression of them as new and different.
It might be the everyday experience of intentionally noticing the sound, frequency and vibration of movement around where you live – inside and outside. Imagine giving them names and dotting them together for the first time to compose a home or house song or a garden song or a Country song (here they are Gadigal Songlines – where are you?).
For example, a child in an apartment block nearby opens and closes a cupboard door that slides and bangs shut rather quickly because it’s on runners! It provides a quick experience of anticipation as it opens and then a bang! So, we have ‘rrrrrrrrrrrrrr’ (rolling the tongue!) ‘bbwwwffbbdd’ (a thudding elongated bang!) to describe - not simply the sound - but the feltness of doing the opening and closing as well as the response to the sounds, frequencies and vibrations. The wondermental part is that you also have the opportunity to try to translate environmental music into words that are new and describe the three-pronged experience of sounds, frequencies and vibrations. That’s probably the most fun part of all – and it will always be new. Awareness through movement, and describing that ‘feltness’, is essentially the musical composition – that’s the wondermental inspiration for learning.
Listen and feel for the sounds in your immediate surroundings. Notice which ones children already pay attention to - because they are familiar or because they are new and draw their attention to them. For example - if you’re going for a walk from your lounge room to your garden you might draw attention to the sound of the footsteps – yours and the children’s/child’s and note how they are different using some the elements of music (loud-soft, fast-slow, high-low, long pause-short pause, repetition or rhythm).
Simple every day explorations might include:
- Noticing the sounds that come from the way we move within an environment – footsteps on any surface, the echo of footsteps in hallways or other indoor or closed in spaces, crunching of grass, dirt, sand or leaves underfoot, shoes on rocks, splish splashes in puddles, swishing fingers through leaves on trees and bushes in your house, garden or other public places you might visit.
- Noticing the sounds of where you live (this might be a house, caravan, apartment, in the bush or the many other dwelling places groups of people can inhabit) sounds might include sounds of each room, bathroom sounds, kitchen sounds, loungeroom sounds. Each of these rooms gives meaning and feeling to the sounds that they produce – like the kettle warming up water for a bottle.
- Noticing the sounds of your body – it is in continuous movement – even when we think we are still our hearts are pumping, blood is rushing around our bodies, our eyes are blinking, our bodies are regenerating. Tuning into the autonomic movement of the body can teach us to be sensationally sensorial.
- Notice the sounds of everyday objects – opening the fridge, flushing the loo, switching on a power point, opening a letter, drawing on paper, squeezing paint out of a bottle, sweeping up the leaves, doing the washing up and so on.
- Notice the sounds of encounters with living things – patting the cat, wind blowing in trees or through the window, bees buzzing, running water…
There are myriad things to notice in our everyday lives that then attune our bodies to sense the elements of music.
The elements of music
Louise Dorrat – early childhood teacher and dramaturgical thespian sets out the elements of music in this way:
| Pitch | High and low sounds |
|---|---|
| Beat | Underlying pulse |
| Rhythm | The interplay of long and short sounds and silences |
| Dynamics | From loud to soft sounds and from soft to loud |
| Tempo | Speed |
She argues that musical elements are at their most powerful when they are personal and relevant to the person, people or communities involved (Dorrat, 2018a).
So, if we think about applying the elements of music to the ‘noticings’ I suggested above we begin to craft an understanding of music and we begin a kind of musical composition. This is our wondermentalism at work!
We begin to notice that bees buzz in rhythm. They make high and low sounds, there is an underlying pulse to their buzzing, there is an interplay between long buuuzzzz and short ones, they buzz loudly and softly, they buzz fast and slow.
By engaging the elements of music in our everyday experiences we begin to notice, process, comprehend and feel the music of everyday experiences. This attunement then often inspires an expression of what we have noticed and so we begin to express that music in diverse ways. We might mimic the bees, move our bodies to become bees, buzz together to create a bee chorus. The benefit of this kind of organic and environmental musical composition is that it is achievable for everybody. In addition, if we are engaging with the music of environmental sounds, frequencies and vibrations - we build an awareness of their importance in the world. We become curious about them and investigate further the connection and interconnection between our environments and ourselves. We create a bigger collective care-filled story.
Musical composition with instruments
Of course, musical composition can also come from the exploration of instruments – but you do not have to be an expert in an instrument to compose music. The pure exploration of the sounds musical instruments can make is in itself an opportunity to encounter how sounds come together. It also affords to opportunity to wander through the ways sounds are made on an instrument. For example, playing piano is different from playing a harp or yidaki or drum. The way we build a relationship with the instrument will offer many wondermental moments of enquiry.
If you play a musical instrument or you feel confident enough to play a few notes, beats, or sounds on an instrument then the same processes can be engaged to compose music. You might ask children questions like:
- Which notes or beats sound like you?
- Which notes or beats or sounds tell us how you feel?
- Which notes or beats or sounds capture how you feel about your friends?
- Which notes or beats or sounds express your family?
- Which notes or beats or sounds reflect things you like to do?
- Which notes or beats or sounds invoke your imagination?
(Scarlet, Dorrat, Thatcher, 2023, p. 56)
This kind of enquiry situates children into learning about and expressing their preferences for different sounds. We can learn a lot about children by their likes and dislikes. This is always a cultural experience and so the expressions of preference then help us to work with children to compose music that is reflective of who they are, where they are and who and what else is with them (Scarlet, 2020).
Poetry in musical composition
Some music might come from the environment, objects in it, companion species, musical instruments and it may or may not include words. Poetry is in itself a musical art. We use the ‘majik’ of rhyming and chiming to create sounds that express story. Our voices already have a timbre and tone and we already speak (if not sing) with all of the elements of music.
So musical composition might be a story or a collection of words with or without a tune. Either way the musical composition is just that – a musical composition!
Getting started with musical composition
The first step to getting started is to get started! Just have a play and see where it leads you. Be curious. Be experimental. Follow children, for they are indeed the most creative leaders into encounters with sound frequencies and vibrations. Get wondermental!
About the author
Dr Red Ruby Scarlet is an early childhood consultant, artist, activist and academic. She holds numerous degrees in early childhood education and performing arts. Red is devoted to creative, imaginative, inclusive practices that promote dignity and integrity in early childhood. Over her 30 year career, Red has published widely including the development of curriculum and learning frameworks nationally and internationally. She has won numerous awards for her teaching and advocacy. She is a highly sought leader and mentor in the early childhood profession. Red is the co-writer and performer of wildly popular “The National Quality Framework – The Musical!”. For more more information go to redrubyscarlet.com.au
Books and resources
- ‘That Music Book’ by Dr Red Ruby Scarlet, Louise Dorrat & Benny Thatcher
- ‘Becoming With Art in Early Childhood’ Edited by Red Ruby Scarlet
Photo Credits
Paddington Children’s Centre. Provided by Red Ruby Scarlet from the teacher research project ‘Making Music With Children - A Gadigal Songline: Natalie Cordukes, Giuliana Ricci and Catherine Stephenson’.
References
Australian Government Department of Education [AGDE] (2022). Belonging, Being and Becoming: The Early Years Learning Framework for Australia (V2.0). Australian Government Department of Education for the Ministerial Council.
Dorrat, L. (2018). ‘The power of dramatic arts with adults’. In in Becoming With Art in Early Childhood curated by R. R. Scarlet (pp. 145-148). MultiVerse Publishing. Erskineville.
Dorrat, L. (2018a). ‘The power of dramatic arts with children’. In in Becoming With Art in Early Childhood curated by R. R. Scarlet (pp. 63-72). MultiVerse Publishing. Erskineville.
McArdle, F., & Ohlsen, A. (2016). Anti-bias curriculum: Art comes before the idea and after it. In R. R Scarlet (Ed) The Anti-Bias Approach in Early Childhood (3rd Edn) pp. 203-216) MultiVerse Publishing: Erskineville.
Mead, M. (1928). 'Education for Choice': Coming of Age in Samoa. William Morrow and Company: New York.
Scarlet, R. R. (2020). The Anti-Bias Approach in Early Childhood (4th Edn). MultiVerse Publishing: Erskineville.
Scarlet, R. R. , Dorrat, L., & Thatcher, B. (2023). That Music Book. MultiVerse Publishing: Erskineville.