In Early Years and Key Stage 1, the pupils are taught to:

• use their voices expressively and creatively by singing songs and speaking chants and rhymes
• explore and play tunes and untuned instruments musically
• listen with concentration and understanding to a range of high quality and recorded music
• experiment with, create and select and combine sounds using the inter-related dimensions of music.

In Key Stage 2, the pupils are taught to sing and play musically with increasing confidence and control. They should develop an understanding of musical composition, organising and manipulating structures and reproducing sounds from aural memory.

Pupils are taught to:

• play and perform solo and ensemble contexts, using their voices and playing musical instruments with increasing accuracy, fluency, control and expression
• improvise and compose music for a range of purposes
• listen with attention to detail and recall sounds with increasing aural memory
• use and understand staff and other musical notations
• appreciate and understand a wide range of high quality live and recorded music drawn from different traditions and from great composers and musicians
• develop an understanding of the history of music