INTRODUCTION TO MUSIC:
WHAT IS MUSIC?

WHAT IS MUSIC LESSON

Directions:

Print the What is Music reading comprehension passage and questions (see below).

Students should read the passage silently, then answer the questions.  Teachers may also use the text as part of a classroom lesson plan.

Lesson Excerpt

The Properties of Music

Music is composed of little pieces of sound that we call notes.  Sound is vibrations in the air decoded through your brain by your ears.  There are twelve notes.  If we heard each one of these notes individually, we would notice that they sound different from each other.  We would notice they sound as if they are climbing a ladder, going from lower to higher.  If we climbed up all of the steps, we would hear that step thirteen sounds like step one.  The only difference is that step thirteen has a higher pitch than step one.  That is what we call an octave.  The sound of the octave is exactly twice as fast as the octave that came directly before it.

The History of Music

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