Music Study for Halloween - In The Hall of the Mountain King

Do you know who this is? It is Edvard Grieg, a Norweigan composer from the 1800s. He has written one of the most famous "Halloween" pieces of all time. 

Now is the time of year when my background as an Elementary School Music Specialist kicks into overdrive! There are so many wonderful pieces of music that we can tie into various holidays. I love Halloween.... I do not believe in celebrating the evil aspect of Halloween or doing anything scary with my children, but I love the creativity that goes into costumes, pumpkin carving, and just the air of excitement leading up to October 31.

I plan to do this music lesson with my children this week - all of the resources you need are online, so if you want to add some music enrichment to your homeschool this week - go for it!

In The Hall of the Mountain King
(from The Peer Gynt Suite)
by Edvard Grieg

• Visit the Classics for Kids website to see the information about Edvard Grieg. There is a fabulous activity sheet (on the left sidebar of the page I linked you to) that will download as a PDF to your computer! It is a cute listening map for the piece, which always cements the details of music into a child's brain.
• If you have a pianist in your homeschool, click here for the free downloadable sheet music for the piece
• There is a very nice printable biography of Edvard Grieg here
• I always enjoyed having my students illustrate the music while listening.... it was interesting to have them illustrated WITHOUT knowing the story behind the piece, then to see if their drawings were at all similar to the story of Peer Gynt.
• If you want a cute version of the piece, check out this Lego video from YouTube.... I know this will speak to my son!

This is one of those "mainstream" pieces of music that lots of people have heard, but few know the background of the piece. I hope you can use this in the days leading up to Halloween. If you do, please leave me a comment and let me know what your students thought!