Four posters that turn “make it sound sad” into something students can actually do
Ask a class to write something tense and you get shrugs. Ask them to slow the tempo, break up the pulse and swap the ukulele for a distorted bass, and you get music.
These four A3 posters put that vocabulary on the wall. One poster per musical element:
Every poster shows what each of these does to that element.
A student who is stuck glances up, finds the lever they need and gets back to work. No worksheet, no hunting back through their notes.
A guide, not a rule. Use your ears and break it on purpose.
That line sits at the bottom of all four posters. The point is to give students a starting place, not a formula. Some of the best classroom moments come from a student deliberately doing the opposite of what the chart says.
Print note: the posters are supplied at proper A3 and 300dpi. Print at 100% or “actual size” rather than “fit to page”, or your printer will add its own margin.
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Where they lead
The units behind the posters
The posters come out of our Emotion In Sound unit, where students learn to shape emotion using tempo, rhythm, harmony and timbre. Two units pick up from there and use exactly the same vocabulary.
Movie Music
Same levers, aimed at someone else’s picture.
Students spot a scene against timestamps, write a leitmotif and transform it as a character changes, then shape tension and release across a whole scene instead of a single loop. It also adds the one thing Emotion In Sound doesn’t cover: sound effects, Foley and ambience.
Game Music
Same levers, plus a player.
Now the music has to loop without getting annoying, react to what someone does, layer up when a fight starts and branch to a new section at the right musical moment. Same emotional toolkit, completely different problem to solve.
Both units expect students to have worked through Emotion In Sound first. These four posters are the reference all three point back to, which is why they belong on the wall rather than in a folder.
Take the posters. They’re yours to keep and print as often as you like.
When you want the units behind them, Emotion In Sound, Movie Music and Game Music all live inside a Musical Futures International subscription, along with everything else we make.
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