Grade 5 (Q2/L3/2016-2017) - Hip Hop

Part 1

Your job is to create a hip hop song with a partner. You need to do the following: 

• Work with a partner to agree on a topic. 
• You may pick any topic as long as it is appropriate. This means that your subject matter, language and topic is something you’d share at school. 
• List 20 things you can think of that make you think of this subject. 
• Try to list some rhyming ideas. 
• For instance, if you are writing about Sponge Bob – try to think of all of the different things you can talk about with the characters: 

Spongebob SquarePants & Patrick Star 

They take boating lessons, they don’t drive a car 

Squidward Tentacles is the king of sour 

Plankton thinks the crabby patty formula will give him power

Part 2

You should type your lyrics out in Google Doc. So now you need to put your ideas to music. The cool thing about Hip Hop is that there are very few rules [other than making something that sounds cool, getting some good rhythm patterns and finding a riff.] 

A riff is a simple repeated pattern that surfaces throughout a song. Rock songs have them. Country songs have them. Pop Songs have them. Most songs have riffs. Some people also call this part a ‘hook.’ This is a part you hope people will remember about your song. 

Many hip hop songs sample or ‘borrow’ a riff or hook from another pre-recorded song. I will allow you to do this…but you have to play the part on the xylophone or keyboard. If you can play it on the guitar and you can make your case, I will agree to that as well. This should be only 4-10 notes. Keep it short. You will use 4/4 time and you need to draw in the bar lines to end each measure of 4 beats.

Part 3

Now you need a rhythm pattern. You will use an online metronome of your choice or metronome. Pick a rhythm pattern using the metronome. Write down the rhythm setting and the tempo [beats per minute – bpm.] 

Go back and write down where the riff will be played. It should only appear in certain parts of the song. You don’t want TOO much of a good thing!

Assignment Submission : November 28th 2016