MSAD 75 Music Standards
Based on the National Standards for Arts Education

GRADES 9-12
The courses offered by Mt. Ararat High School’s Music Department present a variety of approaches to the study of music. These approaches are designed to teach both music literacy and a perception of the expressiveness and uniqueness of music. Mt. Ararat students may choose to study and experience music through instrumental and/or choral performance and through the study of music theory. Performance oriented courses are sequential and include Concert Band and Wind Ensemble, Concert Choir, Treble Choir and Chamber Singers. Skills such as reading music notation, sight reading, instrumental/vocal technique, tone production, and ensemble performance are developed and refined each year in these courses. Music Theory is available, at both beginning and advanced levels, for students who wish to explore the structure of music. Theory courses develop literacy skills through music composition, which includes music reading, music writing, ear training, and analysis. All of these courses foster flexible ways of thinking and problem solving, develop disciplined effort, build self confidence, and engage the imagination.

The study of music contributes in important ways to the quality of every student's life. Every musical work is a product of its time and place, although some works transcend their original settings and continue to appeal to humans through their timeless and universal attraction. Through singing, playing instruments, and composing, students can express themselves creatively, while a knowledge of notation and performance traditions enables them to learn new music independently throughout their lives. Skills in analysis, evaluation, and synthesis are important because they enable students to recognize and pursue excellence in their musical experiences and to understand and enrich their environment. Because music is an integral part of human history, the ability to listen with understanding is essential if students are to gain a broad cultural and historical perspective. The adult life of every student is enriched by the skills, knowledge, and habits acquired in the study of music.

Terms identified by a bullet (•) are explained in the glossary. Two levels of achievement, "proficient" and "advanced," have been established for grades 9-12. The proficient level is intended for students who have completed courses involving relevant skills and knowledge for one to two years beyond grade 8. The advanced level is intended for students who have completed courses involving relevant skills and knowledge for three to four years beyond grade 8. Students at the advanced level are expected to achieve the standards established for the proficient as well as the advanced levels. Every student is expected to achieve the proficient level in at least one arts discipline (that is, music, dance, theatre, visual arts) by the time he or she graduates from high school.

The standards in this section describe the cumulative skills and knowledge expected of students exiting grade 12 who have enrolled in relevant music courses. They presume that the students have achieved the standards specified for grades 5-8; they assume that the students will demonstrate higher levels of the expected skills and knowledge, will deal with increasingly complex music, and will provide more sophisticated responses to works of music. Every course in music, including performance courses, should provide instruction in creating, performing, listening to, and analyzing music, in addition to focusing on its specific subject matter.

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CHORAL PERFORMANCE 9-12

1. Content Standard: Singing, alone and with others, a varied repertoire of music
(MLR, 9-12: A1, A4, A5, A6, A7, B4, B5, C2, C4)

Achievement Standard, Proficient:

Students rehearse and perform a wide range of high quality choral literature (e.g. music of various styles, tempi and music from various historical periods, national and ethnic origins)
1. sing with •expression and •technical accuracy a large and varied repertoire of vocal literature with a •level of difficulty of 4, on a scale of 1 to 6, including some songs performed from memory
2. sing music written in four parts, with and without accompaniment
3. demonstrate well-developed ensemble skills

Achievement Standard, Advanced:

Students rehearse and perform a wide range of high quality choral literature (e.g. music of various styles, tempi and music from various historical periods, national and ethnic origins)
1. sing with expression and technical accuracy a large and varied repertoire of vocal literature with a level of difficulty of 5, on a scale of 1 to 6
2. sing music written in more than four parts
3. sing in small ensembles with one student on a part

2. Content Standard: Improvising melodies, variations, and accompaniments
(MLR, 9-12: A1, A2, A3, A4, A5, B2, B4, B5, C4)

Achievement Standard, Proficient:

Students
1. improvise stylistically appropriate harmonizing parts

Achievement Standard, Advanced:

Students
1. improvise stylistically appropriate harmonizing parts in a variety of styles

3. Content Standard: Reading and notating music
(MLR, 9-12: no Maine Learning Results standards apply)

Achievement Standard, Proficient:

Students
1. demonstrate the ability to read a vocal score of up to four staves by describing how the elements of music are used
   
2. accurately sight read music with a level of difficulty of 2, on a scale of 1 to 6.

Achievement Standard, Advanced:> Students

1. sightread, accurately and expressively, music with a level of difficulty of 3-4, on a scale of 1 to 6
2. demonstrate the ability to read a full vocal score by describing how the elements of music are used and explaining all transpositions and clefs
3. interpret non-standard notation symbols used by some 20th- century composers

4. Content Standard: Listening to, analyzing, and describing music
(MLR, 9-12: A1, A2, A4, A5, B1, B2, B3, C2, C3)

Achievement Standard, Proficient:

Students
1. analyze aural examples of a varied repertoire of music, representing diverse •genres and cultures, by describing the uses of elements of music and expressive devices ¹
   
2. demonstrate knowledge of the technical vocabulary of music
   
3. identify and explain compositional devices and techniques used to create musical form and melodic/rhythmic/harmonic structure in a musical work and give examples of other works that make similar uses of these devices and techniques

Achievement Standard, Advanced:

Students
1. compare ways in which musical materials are used in a given example relative to ways in which they are used in other works of the same genre or style
2. analyze and describe uses of the elements of music in a given work that make it unique, interesting, and expressive

5. Content Standard: Evaluating music and music performances
(MLR, 9-12: A1, A2, A4, A6, A8, B1, B2, B3, C1, C2, C3)

Achievement Standard, Proficient:

Students
1. use specific evaluation materials for making informed, critical evaluations of the quality and effectiveness of performances, compositions, arrangements, and improvisations and apply similar criteria in their personal participation in music
2. evaluate a performance, composition, arrangement, or improvisation by comparing it to similar or exemplary models

Achievement Standard, Advanced:

Students
1. evaluate a given musical work in terms of its aesthetic qualities and explain the musical means it uses to evoke feelings and emotions

6. Content Standard: Understanding relationships between music, the other arts, and disciplines outside the arts
(MLR, 9-12: A3, A5, A7, A9, B3, B5)

Achievement Standard, Proficient:

Students
1. explain how elements, artistic processes ² , and organizational principles ³ are used in similar and distinctive ways in the various arts and cite examples
2. explain ways in which the principles and subject matter of various disciplines outside the arts are interrelated with those of music ⁴

Achievement Standard, Advanced:

Students
1. compare the uses of characteristic elements, artistic processes, and organizational principles among the arts in different historical periods and different cultures
2. explain how the roles of creators ⁵ , performers, and others involved in the production and presentation of the arts are similar to and different from one another in the various arts

7. Content Standard: Understanding music in relation to history and culture
(MLR, 9-12: A6, A7, A9, B1, B2, B3, B4, B5, C2, C3, C4)

Achievement Standard, Proficient:

Students

1. classify by genre or style and by historical period or culture unfamiliar but representative aural examples of music and explain the reasoning behind their classifications
   
2. identify sources of American music genres, ⁶ trace the evolution of those genres, and cite well-known musicians associated with them
3. identify various roles ⁷ that musicians perform, cite representative individuals who have functioned in each role, and describe their activities and achievements

Achievement Standard, Advanced:

Students
1. identify and explain the stylistic features of a given musical work that serve to define its aesthetic tradition and its historical or cultural context
2. identify and describe music genres or styles that show the influence of two or more cultural traditions, identify the cultural source of each influence, and trace the historical conditions that produced the synthesis of influences

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INSTRUMENTAL PERFORMANCE 9-12

1. Content Standard: Performing on instruments, alone and with others, a varied repertoire of music
(MLR, 9-12: A1, A4, A5, A6, A7, B4, B5, C2, C4)

Achievement Standard, Proficient:

Students rehearse and perform a wide range of high quality band literature (e.g. music of various styles, tempi and music from various historical periods, national and ethnic origins)
1. perform with expression and technical accuracy a large and varied repertoire of instrumental literature with a level of difficulty of 4, on a scale of 1 to 6
2. perform an appropriate part in an ensemble, demonstrating well-developed ensemble skills
3. perform in small ensembles or individually

Achievement Standard, Advanced:

Students rehearse and perform a wide range of high quality band literature (e.g. music of various styles, tempi and music from various historical periods, national and ethnic origins)
1. perform with expression and technical accuracy a large and varied repertoire of instrumental literature with a level of difficulty of 5, on a scale of 1 to 6

2. Content Standard: Improvising melodies, variations, and accompaniments
(MLR, 9-12: A1, A2, A3, A4, A5, B2, B4, B5, C4)

Achievement Standard, Proficient:

Students
1. improvise original melodies over given chord progressions, each in a consistent •style, meter, and tonality

Achievement Standard, Advanced:

Students
1. improvise original melodies in a variety of styles, over given chord progressions, each in a consistent style, meter, and tonality

3. Content Standard: Reading and notating music
(MLR, 9-12: no Maine Learning Results standards apply)

Achievement Standard, Proficient:

Students
1. demonstrate the ability to read instrumental music by describing how the elements of music are used
2. sightread, accurately and expressively, music with a level of difficulty of 3, on a scale of 1 to 6

Achievement Standard, Advanced:

Students
1. interpret nonstandard notation symbols used by some 20th- century composers
2. sightread, accurately and expressively, music with a level of difficulty of 4, on a scale of 1 to 6

4. Content Standard: Listening to, analyzing, and describing music
(MLR, 9-12: A1, A2, A4, A5, B1, B2, B3, C2, C3)

Achievement Standard, Proficient:

Students
1. a. analyze aural examples of a varied repertoire of music, representing diverse •genres and cultures, by describing the uses of elements of music and expressive devices⁸
2. demonstrate extensive knowledge of the technical vocabulary of music
3. identify and explain compositional devices and techniques used to provide unity and variety and tension and release in a musical work and give examples of other works that make similar uses of these devices and techniques

Achievement Standard, Advanced:

Students
1. compare ways in which musical materials are used in a given example relative to ways in which they are used in other works of the same genre or style
2. analyze and describe uses of the elements of music in a given work that make it unique, interesting, and expressive

5. Content Standard: Evaluating music and music performances
(MLR, 9-12: A1, A2, A4, A6, A8, B1, B2, B3, C1, C2, C3)

Achievement Standard, Proficient:

Students
1. use specific evaluation materials for making informed, critical evaluations of the quality and effectiveness of performances, compositions, arrangements, and improvisations and apply the criteria in their personal participation in music
2. evaluate a performance, composition, arrangement, or improvisation by comparing it to similar or exemplary models

Achievement Standard, Advanced:

Students
1. evaluate a given musical work in terms of its aesthetic qualities and explain the musical means it uses to evoke feelings and emotions

6. Content Standard: Understanding relationships between music, the other arts, and disciplines outside the arts
(MLR, 9-12: A3, A5, A7, A9, B3, B5)

Achievement Standard, Proficient:

Students
1. explain how elements, artistic processes⁹ , and organizational principles¹⁰ are used in similar and distinctive ways in the various arts and cite examples
2. explain ways in which the principles and subject matter of various disciplines outside the arts are interrelated with those of music¹¹

Achievement Standard, Advanced:

Students
1. compare the uses of characteristic elements, artistic processes, and organizational principles among the arts in different historical periods and different cultures
2. explain how the roles of creators, performers, and others involved in the production and presentation of the arts are similar to and different from one another in the various arts¹²

7. Content Standard: Understanding music in relation to history and culture
(MLR, 9-12: A6, A7, A9, B1, B2, B3, B4, B5, C2, C3, C4)

Achievement Standard, Proficient:

Students
1. classify by genre or style and by historical period or culture unfamiliar but representative aural examples of music and explain the reasoning behind their classifications
2. identify sources of American music genres^13, trace the evolution of those genres, and cite well-known musicians associated with them
3. identify various roles¹⁴ that musicians perform, cite representative individuals who have functioned in each role, and describe their activities and achievements

Achievement Standard, Advanced:

Students
1. identify and explain the stylistic features of a given musical work that serve to define its aesthetic tradition and its historical or cultural context
2. identify and describe music genres or styles that show the influence of two or more cultural traditions, identify the cultural source of each influence, and trace the historical conditions that produced the synthesis of influences

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MUSIC THEORY

1. Content Standard: Improvising melodies, variations, and accompaniments
(MLR, 9-12: A1, A3, A4, B4, B5, C4)

Achievement Standard, Proficient:

Students
1. improvise stylistically appropriate harmonizing parts
2. improvise rhythmic and melodic variations on given pentatonic melodies and melodies in major and minor keys
3. iprovise original melodies over given chord progressions, each in a consistent •style, meter, and tonality

Achievement Standard, Advanced:

Students
1. improvise stylistically appropriate harmonizing parts in a variety of styles
2. improvise original melodies in a variety of styles, over given chord progressions, each in a consistent style, meter, and tonality

2. Content Standard: Composing and arranging music within specified guidelines
(MLR, 9-12: A1, A3, A4, A5, B4, B5, C4)

Achievement Standard, Proficient:

Students
1. compose music in several distinct styles, demonstrating creativity in using the •elements of music for expressive effect
2. arrange pieces for voices or instruments other than those for which the pieces were written in ways that preserve or enhance the expressive effect of the music
3. compose and arrange music for voices and various acoustic and electronic instruments, demonstrating knowledge of the ranges and traditional usages of the sound sources

Achievement Standard, Advanced:

Students
1. compose music, demonstrating imagination and technical skill in applying the principles of composition

3. Content Standard: Reading and notating music
(MLR, 9-12: no Maine Learning Results standards apply)

Achievement Standard, Proficient:

Students
1. demonstrate the ability to read an instrumental or vocal score of up to four staves by describing how the elements of music are used
2. notate original compositions and arrangements using standard music notation conventions

Achievement Standard, Advanced:

Students
1. demonstrate the ability to read a full instrumental or vocal score by describing how the elements of music are used and explaining all transpositions and clefs
2. interpret nonstandard notation symbols used by some 20th-century composers
3. notate original compositions and arrangements using standard music notation conventions and making use of computer/MIDI technology

4. Content Standard: Listening to, analyzing, and describing music
(MLR, 9-12: A2, A4, A5, B1, B2, B3, C1, C2, C3)

Achievement Standard, Proficient:

Students
1. analyze aural examples of a varied repertoire of music, representing diverse •genres and cultures, by describing the uses of elements of music and expressive devices¹⁵
2. demonstrate extensive knowledge of the technical vocabulary of music
   
3. identify and explain compositional devices and techniques used to provide unity and variety and tension and release in a musical work and give examples of other works that make similar uses of these devices and techniques

Achievement Standard, Advanced:

Students
1. demonstrate the ability to perceive and remember music events by describing in detail significant events¹⁶ occurring in a given aural example
2. compare ways in which musical materials are used in a given example relative to ways in which they are used in other works of the same genre or style
3. analyze and describe uses of the elements of music in a given work that make it unique, interesting, and expressive

5. Content Standard: Evaluating music and music performances
(MLR, 9-12: A2, A4, A6, A8, B1, B2, B3, C1, C2, C3)

Achievement Standard, Proficient:

Students
1. use specific evaluation materials for making informed, critical evaluations of the quality and effectiveness of performances, compositions, arrangements, and improvisations and apply the criteria in their personal participation in music
   
2. evaluate a performance, composition, arrangement, or improvisation by comparing it to similar or exemplary models

Achievement Standard, Advanced:

Students
1. evaluate a given musical work in terms of its aesthetic qualities and explain the musical means it uses to evoke feelings and emotions

6. Content Standard: Understanding relationships between music, the other arts, and disciplines outside the arts
(MLR, 9-12: A3, A5, A9, B3, B5)

Achievement Standard, Proficient:

Students
1. compare characteristics of two or more arts within a particular historical period or style and cite examples from various cultures¹⁷
2. explain ways in which the principles and subject matter of various disciplines outside the arts are interrelated with those of music¹⁸

Achievement Standard, Advanced:

Students
1. compare the uses of characteristic elements, artistic processes, and organizational principles among the arts in different historical periods and different cultures

7. Content Standard: Understanding music in relation to history and culture
(MLR, 9-12: A7, A9, B1, B2, B3, B4, B5, C2, C3, C4)

Achievement Standard, Proficient:

Students
1. classify by genre or style and by historical period or culture unfamiliar but representative aural examples of music and explain the reasoning behind their classifications
2. identify sources of American music genres¹⁹ , trace the evolution of those genres, and cite well-known musicians associated with them

Achievement Standard, Advanced:

Students
1. identify and explain the stylistic features of a given musical work that serve to define its aesthetic tradition and its historical or cultural context
2. identify and describe music genres or styles that show the influence of two or more cultural traditions, identify the cultural source of each influence, and trace the historical conditions that produced the synthesis of influences

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GLOSSARY

Alla breve. The •meter signature indicating the equivalent of 2/2 time

Articulation. In performance, the characteristics of attach and decay of tones and the manner and extent to which tones in sequence are connected or disconnected

Classroom instruments. Instruments typically used in the general music classroom, including, for example, recorder-type instruments, chorded zithers, mallet instruments, simple percussion instruments, fretted instruments, keyboard instruments, and electronic instruments.

Dynamic levels, dynamics. Degrees of ludness

Elements of music. Pitch, rhythm, harmony, dynamics, timbre, texture, •form.

Expression, expressive, expressively. With appropriate dynamics, phrasing, •style, and interpretation and appropriate variations in dynamics and tempo.

Form. The overall structural organization of a music composition (e.g., AB, ABA, call and response, rondo, theme and variations, sonata-allegro) and the interrelationships of music events within the overall structure.

Fretted instruments. Instruments with frets (strips of metal across the fingerboard allowing the strings to be stopped at predetermined locations), such as guitar, ukulele, and sitar.

Genre. A type or category of music (e.g., sonata, opera, oratorio, art song, gospel, suite, jazz, madrigal, march, work song, lullaby, barbershop, Dixieland).

Intonation. The degree to which pitch is accurately produced in performance, particularly among the players in an ensemble.

Level of difficulty. For purposes of these standards, music is classified into six levels of difficulty:

Level 1-Very easy. Easy keys, meters, and rhythms; limited ranges.
Level 2-Easy. May include changes of tempo, key, and meter; modest ranges.
Level 3-Moderately easy. Contains moderate technical demands, expanded ranges, and varied interpretive requirements.
Level 4-Moderately difficult. Requires well-developed •technical skills, attention to phrasing and interpretation, and ability to perform various meters and rhythms in a variety of keys.
Level 5-Difficult. Requires advanced technical and interpretive skills; contains key signatures with numerous sharps or flats, unusual meters, complex rhythms, subtle dynamic requirements.
Level 6-Very difficult. Suitable for musically mature students of exceptional competence. (Adapted with permission from NYSSMA Manual, Edition XXIII, published by the New York State School Music Association,
1991.)

Meter. The grouping in which a succession of rhythmic pulses or beats is organized; indicated by a • meter signature at the beginning of a work.

Meter signature. An indicator of the •meter of a musical work, usually presented in the form of a fraction, the demoninator of which indicates the unit of measurement and the nuerator of which indicates the number of units that make up a measure.

MIDI (Musical Instrument Digital Interface). Standard specifications that enable electronic instruments such as the synthesizer, sampler, sequencer, and drum machine from any manufacturer to communicate with one another and with computers.

Ostinato. A short musical pattern that is repeated persistently throughout a composition.

Staves. Plural of staff (the five parallel lines on which music is written).

Style. The distinctive or characteristic manner in which the •elements of music are treated. In practice, the term may be applied to, for example, composers (the style of Copland), periods (Baroque style), media (keyboard style), nations (French style), •form or type of composition (fugal style, contrapuntal style), or •genre (operatic style, bluegrass style).

Technical accuracy, technical skills. The ability to perform with appropriate timbre, intonation, and diction and to play or sing the correct pitches and rhythms.

Timbre. The character or quality of a sound that distingues one instrument, voice, or other sound source from another.

Tonality. The harmonic relationship of tones with respect to a definite center or point of rest; fundamental to much of Western music from ca. 1600.

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