The New Gate School music program offers a wide variety of musical experience at every level to develop each student’s knowledge and skill for their own musical creativity.

In the Early Childhood Division, music is woven seamlessly into daily activities. Music and movement exercises are given to develop fine and gross motor skills.

From the elementary level forward, students are taught theory, reading the musical staff in multiple clefs, learning and practicing fundamental concepts of melody, harmony and rhythm through singing and playing.

Music history is taught through the introduction of key historical composers within their own genre and in the context of their period in history. Students practice listening, and are taught to identify the main characteristics of composers and performers.

During each class, students practice vocalization techniques with exercises that allow greater facility in sound production. Aural training is an important part of music instruction, and students are taught the relevance of intonation and pitch quality with each lesson. They practice choral and ensemble work for school festivals and the annual opera.

Students are encouraged to create their own music in exercises that, using criteria for pitches and rhythms, further add to the sense of their own creative instincts. In addition, they are exposed to the world of new music, electronic composition, software recording and notation, audio visualization and other key concepts of the modern musical world.