I am trying to develop a program for my sixth grade students.  They will be performing this in the spring of 2014.  I want to use the 80 Years of Jazz in about 80 Minutes program to get the students introduced to ragtime, swing, bebop, and fusion.  I have four sections of sixth grade students.  I'd like to have four choral pieces (one from each subgenre) and four instrumental pieces.  We have drum circle, orff instruments, and recorders in our program.  I only see the students for 45 minutes every 4 school days.  To make the work more accessible, I want all the sixth graders to learn all the choral pieces, but have each section perform a different instrumental piece.  This will create a program of eight pieces, while allowing each student to learn just five.

 

I'd love to have solo opportunities, and I want the music to really reinforce the important elements of each jazz era while keeping the students excited and engaged.  I have a lot of "jocks" in this particular grade who think singing is for girls, so counteracting this destructive thought pattern is another goal of the performance.

 

I have about 47 girls and 47 boys, and I see the students in mixed groups of about 24.  With these constraints, I'd like to keep the harmony as something along the lines of rounds or partner songs or unison, rather than homophonic harmony. 

 

Any ideas on repertoire?  I use the Spotlight on Music series, but we don't have sixth grade books.  (They were just added to our classes).  I also have over ten years of Music Express music and the last two years of Activate magazine.  I'm married to a composer/arranger, so I can also get some custom music if needed, but I'd want to stay in the public domain for that.

 

Any help will be greatly apprecaited!