Improve your skill with music-mystery-games

created by Julia Jensen Baxter

There are several ways the music-mystery-games, "ovals" sheet can be used to make learning games. Each of the ovals will represent one letter in the musical alphabet. The ovals with small "plus" signs in them represent sharped noted and those with minus signs can represent flatted notes. The blank ovals can be used as replacements or for adding extra challenges if desired. They can also be used for making "up" or "down" arrows to indicate notes of the same name but different octaves. However, before anymusic-mystery-games are played it will be necessary to copy the sheet several times. (We recommend 6-8 copies.) The copies should be firmly glued to posterboard and then cut into the rectangles shown on the sheet. They can then be stored in plastic sandwich bags until used. Finally, each shape within the ovals should be given the name of a letter in the music alphabet. (We decided not to name the ovals ourselves because you may want to name them differently each time you use them, thus increasing the challenge.) Here are some "mystery" games:

Name That Tune: A "treasure map" is created by giving each shape in the ovals a name. Then, the rectangles are laid out in the order of the notes of a familiar tune. The students write out the notes on a piece of manuscript paper. When they think they may know the name of the mystery tune they can verify it by playing it on the piano. If just one student is playing the game his/her parent or teacher can lay the rectangles out and the student can be timed as to how long it takes to name the tune, or, if there is a group of students playing they can beput in teams to challenge each other with how quickly they can call out the name.

Name the Key Signature: This game is similar to the "name that tune" game, but only the notes from one of the key signatures or scales are used. The cards don't have to be put in any particular order, it's the number of sharps or flats that will count! Again, the players can be timed. It will also work well as a competition.

Name the Interval: This is really a game of timing based on how quickly the student can name and write the interval indicated by the cards.

Composition Challenge: A group of cards is given to the students and they are challenged to make a tune using just those cards. The students in both groups can add rhythms if desired, or, if rhythms or lyrics are pre-chosen, it can be interesting to see how many different melodies can be created.

For PDF copy of the symbols for the Music Mystery Game, ckick here