GarageBand

VisibleMusic delivers a wide range of activities and training around the Apple app GarageBand - which is free on iPads, iPhones and Mac computers. GarageBand is an amazing, engaging and immersive music production platform which is perfect for young beginners and for those with a little more experience. It's packed with features and sounds and tools which can get anyone making music within minutes.​

Many people have heard of GarageBand, but not so many realise the power, potential and variety it offers - and it can be hard knowing where to start. With a little guidance, pupils and teachers can rapidly explore a truly modern, cross curricular creative learning platform, with a range of uses that go way beyond music.

CURRICULUM FOR WALES

GarageBand is perfect for cross-curricular work in Curriculum for Wales, ideal for approaching oracy, literacy and the Four Purposes in new creative ways. Also great for diving into the Creative Habits of Mind:

• Collaboration

• Imagination

• Inquisitiveness

• Persistence

• Discipline

Activities can cover anything from the very basics of music-making, through to sophisticated collaborative whole-class projects featuring drama, spoken word, interviewing, sound effects, radio programmes and podcasting.

The activities are fully tailorable to Primary, Secondary and FE levels, and do not have to be music specific - there is so much more you can do with GarageBand.

When set a GarageBand task, learners quickly begin to learn (while playing) about a range of exciting and relevant concepts, e.g. modern digital editing and production, the essentials of music composition, and collaboratively creating spoken-word content.

VisibleMusic is an official Arts Award Centre and can deliver Arts Awards, so learners aged 25 and under can get recognised accreditation for their arts-based learning.

Arts Award is a range of unique, flexible and inspiring qualifications which support and challenge learners in any creative learning journey.

Arts Awards can optionally accompany any VisibleMusic activity, and a whole group of learners could earn their Arts Award certificates as they work through a GarageBand project.

Since 2022, VisibleMusic has been delivering GarageBand training and tuition in a variety of formats, including:​

• leading whole day GarageBand workshops for Year 3s and their teacher (Operasonic)

• creative GarageBand sessions for Year 7s; providing teacher training and resources (Lead Creative Schools Scheme)

• delivering Arts Awards in learning GarageBand for vision-impaired young people (UCAN Productions)

• delivering regular GarageBand workshops across 25 primary schools in Merthyr Tydfil

• beginning new GarageBand workshop delivery in RCT primary schools

• training staff at Gwent Music in use of GarageBand

GETTING CREATIVE & DELVING DEEPER

• Developing imaginative sound projects and working in new and exciting ways

• Collaborative music making

• More sophisticated music recording and performance

• Soundscapes

• Creating music/spoken word to fit a given image or video

• Creating a class radio broadcast or podcast - assigning different team roles

• Creating a radio advert for an invented product

• Interviewing teachers, and each other

• Finding new ways to work with sound and voice on any subject or project

ARTS AWARDS

• Using Loops for quick creative music-making - no experience necessary

• Creating, editing and structuring music on a timeline

• Simple music to picture - create a soundtrack for a short animation

• Record your own melodies, chords, drumbeats - GarageBand has a range of tools to make this easy for beginners

• Record your voice - make simple stories or talk about your interests

• Sound collecting (perhaps on a given theme - sounds of Autumn?)

• Writing simple rhymes and raps on a chosen topic

LEARNING THE TOOLS AND GETTING STARTED

Get in touch to find out more about how GarageBand can bring modern creative learning methods to your school!