ARTS & MUSIC
Connections is full of musicians, artists, and performers! Art offers our students an opportunity to express themselves and their individuality. Our commitment to the arts is evident in the theater, circus arts, music, fine arts, and design classes we provide during and after school. As an arts community, we encourage creative problem-solving and risk-taking, and we emphasize process over product. In every performance, piece of music, and work of art, our students show their emotional depth and imagination.
Music class project
Our students composed their own Gregorian Chants, and the process took several weeks of dedication. Students began by choosing a church mode to write their chant using the appropriate notes associated with that mode. They composed their chants in treble clef and transcribed them on paper. Each student chose to write a short phrase to be repeated as their lyrics or one phrase to encompass their lyrics.
Gregorian Chants, different from today, were always composed on a four line staff. Today’s music, however, is composed on a five line staff. Because each student originally wrote their piece on a five line treble clef staff, they were taught how to transpose their piece into Gregorian Chant Notation. This is not an easy skill. Transposing required students to look at the notes on their piece, figure out the correlation between that note and solfege, and then use that information to move their notes appropriately to the correct lines on the new staff.