For two of my piano camps this month I decided to use Saint-Saens’ Carnival of the Animals as the theme. It’s been fun to research the work and become more familiar with it myself!
Here are some of the resources I’ve been using in my planning:
The Carnival of the Animals – This book is in the Get to Know Classical Masterpieces Series, published by Schott and distributed by Hal Leonard. Hans-Gunter Heumann has taken each piece of this suite and arranged it for piano (I’d say early intermediate level). The book is colorfully illustrated and a story told by Loriot is woven throughout the book. This book is a treasure!
This CD includes both Prokofiev’s Peter and the Wolf and Saint-Saens’ Carnival of the Animals. The narrator captures the imagination of the listener and points out the elements of each piece for which the listener should listen. He also offers brief comments and praise for the young performers employed for the recording of this performance. Highly recommended!
Lastly (for now!), I’ve spent hours putting together a coloring book that my piano camp students can color while we listen to the recording of each piece in the suite. I’m planning on using one coloring book for each piano camp group and having them work together to color the animal pictures. We’ll see how that goes! The 14-page coloring book is 11×17″ (although it will also print great on 8.5×11″ if you prefer a smaller size) and is designed so that you can put a binding on the left side to hold the pages together. It’s in a pdf file and is ready for printing. Click here or on the picture below to download a copy for your own use. Enjoy!
Lorey Hallada says
Hi! Thanks for the pics. I am doing a unit on program music with my first graders and we will be listening to much of “Carnival of Animals.” I am doing some other things with them, too. For the elephant we are singing words I wrote to the A section and swinging our trunks. For the cuckoo, we are playing tone bars. For aquarium, we are going to color fish and put them on popsicle sticks to “swim” while the music plays. There is also a great movement to that movement on a John Fierabend dvd. We will start by comparing Kangaroos and the Aviary to determine how the music can suggest an animal. If I feel flush, I may purchase scarves to swish during the swan. I also wrote a swan song- not to the same tune.
www.facebook.com says
Best Saint-Saens Carnival of the Animals Coloring Book and Other Resources | Music Matters Blog
My spouse and I stumbled over here by a different web address and thought
I should check things out. I like what I see so i am just following you.
Look forward to looking over your web page yet again.
Carol Goff says
Thank you. I am starting a music enrichment program in a new charter school and need all the help I can get:)
Heidi says
Do you allow the book to be used for classroom use as well?
natalie says
Sure, Heidi, that’s fine with me!
Sylvia Morris says
I wish I could download this. Adobe keeps saying something like, Expected a dict object….. 🙁
natalie says
Hi Sylvia~
It looks like the file is still working properly, so you might need to check the settings on your end. If you don’t already have it, you can download the free Adobe Reader to view this file. Hope this helps!