Symphony of Toys

Image: http://www.hbf.lv/index.php?&366&view=concert&concert_id=94
Please click here to enjoy the music of Waldo de los Rios and his interpretation of the Toy Symphony! The link is on my blog and will open in a new window. You surely don’t want to miss out on his fantastic music!
Wow! This entry took me really hours to put together! But I really enjoyed it…I never do anything that I don’t enjoy…. but if it’s something I have to do and it’s not enjoyable…well, that’s a different case…as I always tell children, some people have to do the boring work too and if it’s you then it needs to be done! That’s life. Back to my entry! I LOVE  the Toy Symphony and as a child, I used to listen to a program on the radio, only for children, called “Jongspan Atteljee“…in English..”Children’s studio”… and the theme song for that program was….the Toy Symphony! — Meneutto— I sometimes turned the radio on for that program just to listen to it ..again… hehe… I spent literally hours on the Internet to find these audio files too! But lucky you, now you can listen to my favourite composition by….NOT Haydn…as I’ve thought too! but by Mozart’s dad! Leopold… and I’ve found websites where more people think the composer was Haydn.

 As a child I had a few toys which I really liked or should I say …enjoyed. One was a doll, she almost looked like the one from the museum on the image, but I wasn’t really a dolly-person when I was a child…there was so much to do on the farm…..only later with the Barbies! but my favourite toys were the little toy cars! I grew up on a farm and we used to have these huge acorn trees near the house, they were really old… when I was little, my mum told us they were more than 70 years old! We had an open space near these trees which was a bit sandy and where we could “build” some “roads” for our cars! wow…that was really great and I can recall an orange tractor too…Massey Ferguson… I used to drive a tractor myself on the farm when I was about 15. My sister’s boyfriend loved to take me on the tractor and the combine harvester! I loved it too…although the combine harvester was a bit tricky to drive…guess what..I was 12 when I drove on the dusty farm roads like I was an expert on driving! It’s easy on those roads as the traffic inspectors don’t go there! ..back to music! 

Little children need to be introduced to music at a very young age, as with books and art. There are many ways you can do that with music and one way is to get them to draw images or patterns if they listen to music. To compose their own music they can use a pattern structure. On one image you will see patterns drawn and coloured. That’s  my Y5 children that listened to different types of music and they’ve decided which patterns  and  colours to use to express the mood/type of the music.

Toy Symphony:

The composition, originally called in German “Kinder Sinfonie” (“Children’s Symphony”), and known in America under the title “Toy Symphony” goes back to the 18^thcentury.   It was created to entertain everyone on the stage and in the audience.  The score of this humoresque piece of music calls for two violins, bass, and a small battalion of toy instruments – cuckoo, nightingale, toy drum, toy trumpet, rattle, and triangle.

Please click HERE for the International music performance and educational project that empowers children and adults alike, giving realization of modes of musical creativity and expression through the use of new concepts and technologies.

Image: Sibeliusmusic.com

 

Mozart… image: Classicsonline.com
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (1756 – 1791)http://www.classicsonline.com/composerbio/Wolfgang_Amadeus_Mozart/

Leopold Mozart …Image: classicsonline.com
Leopold Mozart (1719 – 1787)
The father of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, Leopold Mozart, distinguished as a violin teacher, sacrificed his own career as a composer to foster that of his son. He was a man of wide interests, the son of an Augsburg bookseller, and left university to join the musical establishment of the Archbishop of Salzburg, a prelate in whose service he rose to become court composer and deputy Kapellmeister, a position he maintained, without further advancement, until his death in 1787. See more of his music on this link: http://www.classicsonline.com/composerbio/Leopold_Mozart/
 

 Please click HERE to listen or to order this cd.

Toy Symphony : Allegro

Toy Symphony : Menuetto–my favourite!!

Toy Symphony : Finale

Art…different moods according to different types/pieces of music…

Image: Liverpool museum…

Together with the piano, I played the recorder too when I was at school, but would really love to play the violin and flute!

Little chidren can listen to music and draw images of what they “see” while listening to the music.

I’ve only ordered this morning this cd of Waldo de los Rios. His music is just fantastic and the Toy Symphony is on this cd and…Haydn’s  Symphony No. 101 in D Major..”the Clock”…!!
Click here to listen to the music of Waldo de los Rios on classicfm. This youtube video is the Symphony of Haydn, but not the same as being played by Waldo de los Rios!!

Youtube video: Toy Symphony: Allegro…Menuetto…and then the Finale…enjoy!