Artists from the South Asian Fusion Arts company, BINDI BOSSES led an immersive incursion with Year 4 that authentically explored Tamil Folk Arts through singing, dancing and chanting. Students were able to experience rhythm through their hands, feet, voice and body, by exploring Parai Attam (dancing traditional steps to live Parai drum rhythms) and Konnakol (vocal rhythm recitation).
Students also explored some of the vocal elements of Tamil hit song ENJOY ENJAAMI as a provocation and then applied their learning to collectively record and produce a new version of the song. This was used as the soundtrack to accompany one of the traditional dances the students had learnt, which they performed to parents at the end of the day.
One of the goals of this incursion was to enhance our Music curriculum at IGS with the richness and depth of another culture while also helping students realise that (like in Australia) music across the world is taught through singing, moving, (dance), chanting (verbalisation/words spoken in rhythm) and repetition. And all these learning experiences can be linked to help us appreciate and understand the world and the many creative ways we can express ourselves in it.
Watch below how it all came together!