Review — The First Music

By Barbara Good, CPD Coordinator of Elementary Fine Arts
Clarke County School District , Las Vegas, Nevada — 12/7/2007

Description of Book/Plot: A series of accidents in the jungle proves that everyone has something special to add when it comes to making music.

Main Theme(s): No matter your abilities, everyone has something to add to the music-making process; Identification of jungle animals and the repetitive sounds they create; Retelling of an African story from Senegal and Ghana; Descriptive vocabulary to describe the rhythm of the story

Are the illustrations appropriate to the story? Explain why or why not.
Award winning illustrator creates oil paintings to represent contemporary images of jungle animals; Excellent use of color, shape and texture; Inside cover has “animal” tessilations

Are facts and descriptions accurate and consistent with the story and setting?
Retelling of a traditional folk story from Africa with explanation in Author’s note

Comments on how this book correlates to the CCSD curriculum.
Excellent correlations to Art: shape, color, texture, dimension to Music: Strong source for possible Orff arrangements to reproduce repetitive musical sounds to layer in as story is told; vocabulary; dramatization options with movement and instrumental accompaniment

First Choice Book

Title Details: The First Music
Author: Dylan Pritchett  
Illustrator: Erin Bennett Banks
Interest Level: GR PreK-3

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