Summer Term Music, Musicians and Music Exams thread

My dh pupils regularly get mid to high 40's. His best pupil ever got 149 for grade 8 saxophone.
This time his highest was 146 grade 8 sax, the girl is off to same school as dd

Long time lurker on this forum but once I had found waffle's inspirational advice re: small children and their achievements I realised that my DD wasn't motivated or pushed by her music lessons at school despite practising every day so.... I hired new teachers at home and she just gained 138 in her Grade 1 piano and 92 in her GD1 theory. She as practiced for the same amount as before so I am very pleased for her Piano teacher now suggests gd3 at Xmas and her violin teacher has moved her from gd1 to gd3 pieces and has entered her for gd3 in November. She is just going into year 5 so thanks to you waffle and to everyone for all for your inspirational stories and Rachel, congrats to your daughter for such an amazing result!!

That's good to know Lily, thanks. He is notoriously bad at extended writing tasks, ace report from school but with comment he needs to write more!

I didn't think he would be able to have a shot at Gold this year, neither did he, and next summer will probably be too late, so he is prepared to put the work in over the summer.

RLP, ds1's Gold award programme notes took less time than I thought they would - was 3 or 4 sessions of writing/editing for him, but I had worried it would take much longer! And the service plan didn't take long at all.

It was violin and she is 11! I have heard of results in the 40s, but dd had never gone higher than 134 before this! She got full marks in two pieces

Great results. Must be a relief. I'm still waiting for DD's violin results but DDs' piano results are in - two merits - 125 and 120.
I hadn't realised people actually did get above 140 in grades. Was this piano and how old was the student? Impressive.

And thank you everyone else!!

Thank you waffle.

I do not recommend taking an exam in the last week of the school year (especially for a yr 6 pupil) - it was a very busy, stressful time! I have eased up on the practise a since the exam, but dd does need to start working again to get ready for the next nco audition in september!

Thanks Waffle. I'm very impressed with your tuned percussion result too, and all the other adults taking exams.

We all broke up from school on Friday. DS2, after returning from band trip at 4 in the morning early Saturday, sang on Saturday, Evensong on Sunday then spent 2 hours at a final intensive singing session last night! I have allowed him today off, he is still in his PJs.

He is going to attempt his Gold RSCM award next term so over the holidays, amongst other things, he has to write 800-900 words of programme notes. There simply won't be time in September when eveything else starts again, it will probably mean Grade 6 theory gets put aside for now His clarinet and trombone teachers have told him to practice enough that he doesn't go backwards, but can start September ready to move on.

DDS alto sax has been brought out of its case and left on a stand for easy access, which bodes well. No sign of DS1 trombone or tuba though.

Dc go back seven weeks today, I go back six weeks on Thursday.

woolleybear - we used the usual ABRSM books. I had also bought Lina Ng's theory of music books G4&G5 just in case DD didn't pass; I was going to persuade her to keep working on it with different books during summer. They don't come with answers. Happy to send them to theory enthusiast, to the parents or to a keen music teacher on this board.

Wafflenose my son came back from a residential last year full of good intentions to practise. One of the tutors had said that he'd missed one day's practise in the last (many) years and that was only because his instrument was out of reach on a plane. I remind him of this every time he's spent three hours on a computer game but has "no time" to practise.

I have his personal statement in sight, when he sits down to write it DS will find that all the right things are there to write about.

It's still term time here, we don't break up until Thursday.

Been away and just catching up. Congrats to everyone and enjoy well deserved hols.
Back to practice today for DS. Most of his friends are just free all day. That's music for you..

Congratulations TheRachel (or rather TheRachel's dd). Well done Wafflenose too, I thought of you this week when I was listening to a percussionist letting rip on what sounded like a xylophone. S/he sounded as if they had at least four hands, it sounded very impressive. Congratulations too to Pavlova junior on his piano result.

I'm sorry if I've missed anyone, I have a teeny little window of free time this afternoon which is better than my usual excuse of being idle.

The music centre cellists don't bring their own stools, I watch them come out on a Saturday morning. The double bass carriers do - as if they didn't have enough to get in the car each week. I have seen bows marked with small pieces of yarn wrapped around one end, we had one Christmas concert stopped while they worked out who had X's bow. That was fun, they were all small string players and the identification started with "all hold up your bows". There was then a bit of a sidetrack as some of the cellists had violin bows and vice versa. The missing bow was identifiable by having red wool at one end.

Thank you! She worked hard, but I didn't expect such an amazing score!

The Rachel, well done to your DD

Thanks Loose.

Rapidly, we never labelled anything, (DDs own cello). Nor did DD ever have a special stool. Nor did any other cello player that we came across, but this was all city/county.

She did go through a phase at rehearsals of always accesorising her cello with a scarf or similar!

Just got dd's result - an incredible distinction with 144 for grade 7 violin! We are absolutely delighted!

Raspberry - big congrats to your DS, what a fantastic result! And Waffle, that was a great xylophone result - are you going to carry on with it now the challenge is over? Or do another challenge?!
Rapidly, embarrassingly, I don't know the answer to either of the cello questions. I now realise we haven't labelled the bow, nor do we have a special stool. dS2 just adjusts the spike! I have noticed very young cello players bringing stools to practice sessions, but not the older kids.

super results from everyone - practicals and theory, a good term once again!

DS2 piano teacher just phoned. He got 136 for his Grade 6 piano .

Really pleased for him.

Perfect marks for Aural and one of his pieces, 'Over the Rainbow' which he is totally fed up of. He has been playing that piece all year, he won a cup with it in March at our Festival, and also played it at a piano masterclass we went to just after.

He stopped playing it for a while, then brought it back for the exam, but definitely had enough of it now!

Wooleybear following a recommendation in here I tried the Trinity books, which are much nicer. The recommendation was to use them up to about Grade 4 and then switch to Grade 5 workbooks for ABRSM, but you could do Trinity theory anyway, ABRSM recognise it. We didn't actually use them as long as that though as DS2s teacher was definitely in the ABRSM camp.