Year 4 Debussy project

Our Year 4 children are currently working with Mrs Woolfenden on a project around an orchestral piece - Prélude à l’après midi d’un Faune - written by the French composer Claude Debussy in 1894. 

Debussy liked to compose with modes and exotic scales, and often played with the beat in some of his music, so that the music feels more like it is 'wandering'.  He attended the Paris conservatoire to study music aged only 10 years old, and he already began to challenge the rules. Some composers have said that Prélude à l’après midi d’un Faune was the first really modern piece of classical music written in the West. 

Watch the London Symphony Orchestra playing the piece in the video above. Can you see and hear the flute playing music like the faun is breathing? Can you make up what the faun might be dreaming about as he sleeps under a tree? Perhaps you can dance or make up a drama to go with the music. Can you listen to and enjoy the silence in the hall when the orchestra finishes playing this long piece? Try to show someone in your family who might never have listened to this piece of music. Do they like it? Why/why not? You can also interactive videos and interviews with players at LSO PLAY

We are lucky enough to have players from the London Symphony Orchestra visiting our classes to help us compose music this year. Ruby Class has already met some of them.

Watch this space!