The Countdowns Begun

Yippee!!!  I made it through the holiday concert.  My kids did an amazing job tonight.  We performed at our local Barnes and Noble, which was a nice change of pace.  They cleared a nice space for us and our parents crammed in around the bookshelves and it ended up being a nice intimate setting.  I think I will definitely do another concert like this but maybe with less instruments.  I tried to limit it but then it felt like I took everything but the kitchen sink.  I'm not good at packing light.

This morning we had our dress rehearsal at school and I snapped these photos of our set up.  Typically I like to use my FlipForm risers for our orff set up but after being sick this week I didn't feel up to any extra movement.  Instead, I used my stash of carpet squares for comfier seating, as well as boomwhackers.

For one of the musical selections we were using boomwhackers with octivators.  I like how they sound when struck vertically against the floor, so the carpet squares were great for this.  When you strike them against tile floor you get an awful plastic sound, not ideal.

Now the that our performance is over, the countdown to winter break is on. 10 days to go!  :)

Music Stands: Not Just for Sheet Music

I like materials to be multi-purpose because, as I'm sure you know, space, no matter how large your room is, is limited.  I'm lucky to have a large storage closet and a row of cabinets but why waste space storing items that only work for one lesson or performance?

I'm always thinking of ways I can use materials I have for another purpose and that includes music stands.  I have 20 stands and I never use them all for an ensemble set up.  So, here's how I used them another way....

This was a for a performance of "Bugz!".  Our amazing art teacher and her art club made the oversized food items and we attached them to the stands using duct and shipping tape.  If I had to do it over I would use a different method of attaching them to the stands because the tape residue is really hard to get rid of, even with Goo Gone.

These were great props and easy for the kids to move onto the stage at the appropriate time.  Even if your little ones had a hard time moving them, you could have older kids as stage managers move the items in at the appropriate time.