#techtiptuesday YuStudio Sampler - An Activity for the End of Elementary Music Class

Hi everyone! I'm Amy M Burns, the elementary music consultant at Music First, and I'm excited to share a fun and creative activity for your elementary music classes using the new sampler feature in YuStudio. This is perfect for celebrating student birthdays or any special occasion while reinforcing music technology skills. Let’s dive in!

What is Music First Elementary?

Before we jump into the activity, let me give a quick shout-out to Music First Elementary (https://www.musicfirstelementary.com/). It’s an amazing K-5 music curriculum with a spiral structure, featuring authentic songs from around the world, Orff and Kodály-inspired activities, and a variety of supplementary materials for recorder, ukulele, and boomwhackers. Plus, it includes seven creative tools — one of which is YuStudio.

What is YuStudio?

YuStudio is a web-based Digital Audio Workstation (DAW) that allows students to compose, edit, and even score movies. Recently, a sampler was added to YuStudio. A sampler is an electronic musical instrument that records and plays back short snippets of sound, called samples. These samples can be anything from rhythms, melodies, speech, sound effects, or even longer musical passages.

Birthday or special day Sampler Activity

Here’s a simple, engaging way to use the YuStudio sampler for student birthdays or other special days:

Step 1: Set the Beat

• Open YuStudio and create three tracks:

  • Sampler Track

  • Sound Bank Track

  • Drum Track

• Lay down a light drum beat as the background.

Step 2: Introduce the Sampler

• Show the students the sampler tool and explain the three options available:

  • Pitched: Plays a sound at higher and lower pitches.

  • One Shot: Combine different one-shot samples in a kit.

  • Slice: Chops up a loop into smaller parts.

• Choose the Pitched option for this activity.

Step 3: Record the Student’s Sound

• Invite the birthday or “special day” student (or the special guest) to record the first letter of their name in a funny voice.

• Click Record and capture their sound.

• Trim any extra silence by adjusting the sample’s start and end points.

Step 4: Add Effects

• Head over to Effects and add a bit of reverb to give their voice a cool, echoing effect.

Step 5: Create the Melody

• Use the sampler’s keyboard to play the student's sound at different pitches.

• Record the melody — it doesn’t have to be perfect! You can easily trim or split notes to fix timing.

Step 6: Personalize the Project

• Rename the track with the student’s name.

• Slow down or speed up the tempo as needed.

Final Touch: Play and Celebrate!

• Play the final creation for the class.

• Let the birthday/special day student take a bow as their personalized soundscape plays!

Why Use This Activity?

• Engaging and Fun: Students love hearing their own voices transformed into music.

• Hands-On Tech: Introduces basic audio editing and digital composition.

• Inclusive: Easy to customize for any student, not just for birthdays.

So, the next time you’re looking for a quick, creative wrap-up activity, try this YuStudio sampler project. It’s a fantastic way to blend technology with music-making in a way your students will remember.

Happy sampling, and see you next #TechTipTuesday!