New Year Music and Musicians Thread

Next week we have concerts, school's Festival concert, DS2s Chorister instrumental concert, and DS1 has an orchestra concert.

Grade 8s approaching fast the week after for 2 oldest!

Hope exams going well for people. Well done for getting all your pupils through Waffle.

Our Festival finished tonight . DS2 added another 2nd place with school in open choirs, not placed in another one. On Friday night DS1 and DD played in the school dance band, and won the Concert Band class, with an Outstanding, all 3 DC play in the Music Service band and came joint second.

Final class this morning was the Chorister solo. DS2 won with a Distinction, bringing his total to 5 firsts, 5 seconds from 11 classes.

The icing on the cake has been the award of a scholarship for most promising young singer. Which stunned us all!

trout when DD started playing guitar, aged 11, she played up to 8 hours a day. I'm not kidding! It actually shouldn't be possible to play guitar that much (I play too and my fingers would wear away). At weekends she can still play up to 3-4 hours a day, though not continuously - she messes around learning or writing new songs. She is recording for her radio show tomorrow so she will most likely do at least 2-3 hours.

She never actually "practices" though (as in playing the pieces she plays in her guitar class) and she's not nearly as good as she could be (for the amount of time she spends) because she rarely plays anything technically challenging.

Good luck with the exams everyone!

Yes, I'd say its doable especially if the person/child has a right attitude and willing to work(hard) for it. The thing is, there are some important techniques do need more time to absorb though, especially with piano. We had a very long grade 1-2, must be too over prepared so it was slightly easier for g3.

My daughter also passed her swimming test this morning, she has 2 more classes before running out of amateur classes for children to learn, cant believe 3 years ago she was so scared of water and now she loves it. She could now jump into the water and swim for 100m nonstop for all styles. I am thinking of hiring a private tutor after running out of classes, someone to supervise her for about 30mins lesson each week

Fleur: all the best!!! The fun/easy songs sounds ver appealing!!!

We need to upgrade our very old yamaha especially after the little sister made a little damage to it(long story). I cant really get one now as there is no guarantee she will leave it alone(baby stays with the nanny in the house during weekdays) even though we know it impacts technique and also the sound is bad

Glad to hear all went as expected Green! Future plan sounds good, especially the playing for fun pieces. DD already has a list of "fun pieces" lined up for after the exam.

Looking forward to hear more exam result in the coming week/weeks from everyone especially who took one this week!

We had ours done today, not as scary as it was thought, no slipped fingers with scales, sight reading was easy(thanks so the theory exam practice), pieces are ok. Given only prepared for 3 months with couple of weeks holiday I am now only dreaming of a pass! No exam planned for at least a month, for piano we will play some easy songs for fun for few weeks. Violin will be serious again from next monday lesson. And will carry on with theory although no plan for exam yet!

Good luck everyone for any exam coming, especially little Fleur for grade 3 piano also the coming week

Green I have a similar plan, ease off the music if she is choosing the 11+ route, however she will probably auditon for music places also so I'll try to give academics and music a similar place in her priorities.

Good luck to the DCs waiting for results and to those still to take exams. 1 week till the exam for DD now.

We got the result in 10 days time last year. I suspect it will take longer this time for us as it is just before Easter.

trout I don't think there is such thing as too much practice. How long does she practice for?

Thank you - may hear before Easter holidays then :)

She thinks she's passed and thinks it might be a merit but isn't too bothered I don't think

Yes its quicker than that, I think it was about two weeks for us last year.

Hello - have read this thread before but don't think I've posted. DD did her grade 1 flute earlier this week and thinks it was ok. Roughly how long does it take to get the results? It was associated board. I'm sure when I did exams years ago it took about 6 weeks and wondered if it was any quicker now

Does anyone ever worry that their Dc practices/ plays too much? As in a bit obsessively?

I've almost posted this before then deleted thinking no I'm being silly .. But I've thought it quite a bit recently and again yesterday evening.
No one else in the family ( her sibling, dh and I) are musical so I don't know if this is what happens if they are just really into it and they reach a certain level and it's just me not 'getting' it
But to me, it seems too much
Anyone?

That's good news, she was also pleasantly surprised to find our she didn't have to play all her scales!

Exam over here, dd says she made a couple of mistakes in normally her best piece because the piano was going to fast and messed up the aural but all else went well. Does she have to "pass" the aural section to pass the exam? We have had the chat about it doesn't matter if she fails, she won't have to do it again and can just move on etc but I'm not sure she is buying it!

Fleur, I am thinking of 11+ too and similar to you london sw is a heavily 11+ focused area. I think around Spring year 5, 11+ should be prioritised, you still have 1 year for music. Then after that she will be less worrying about any big exam for at least Gcse(or thats what I am trying to tell myself).

Mistiri: ha ha ha, she is so funny!!! She could def get away with anything if I was her mom hahaha

LOL ... Just had the improvised jazz vocal solo version ... Think young Amy Winehouse

Misti she is in emotional pain and therefore more creative

green children are at school a minimum of 6 hours a day, if that's not enough there is something wrong ...

I think extracurricular activities teach a whole range of skills that bright kids don't necessarily learn at school, like focus and persistence and the idea that practice really does make perfect.

Anyway, funny DD anecdote. She was in BIG trouble yesterday and her phone has been confiscated. She got home from school late tonight, and she's just gone and fetched her guitar and she is now serenading me with an improvised song describing how much she regrets being naughty and asking if I will give her her phone back. I have no idea how she can improvise like that - the "song" is complete with verse, chorus, middle eight and coda, and the lyrics even rhyme. Yet she assures me she is making it all up as she goes along!

No idea how she does it but she is still not getting her phone back yet .

Wow there are some amazing results! well done all :)

Impressed with the daily 30-45 mins practice mom17. We get that maybe 3x week or so even now, I keep telling dd2 ( tongue in cheek) she could be good if she'd only practice!

Good luck 2nd I am sure your DD will be fine!

Green this is the reason we are not able do introduce a second instrument, I don't see where the time to practice it will come from without taking away from piano or academic work. We live in an area of 11+ also so we need to start thinking about secondary school admission soon as DD is year 4 (summer born- August). Still in two minds about a musical route or academic route. Currently piano and academic seem to be keeping up but without a second instrument I can't hope too much on the musical route.

2nd: best of luck, we did grade 1 violin last Nov when my daughter was nearly 8 after only 4 months of practising(1 year at school group lesson however so slow and didnt progress much). I could never say she is talented although she loves learning(anything). Before the exam I thought she might not pass, she had a merit for it. I'd say try not to be panic(I know its hard especially when they are so young and its the first one) and arrive early. Best of luck!

All, thank you for sharing, so we are not very far off comparing to everone else.

To be honest to us academic is still number 1, I am worried she focuses too much more on her extra curri these days and might have her academic learning slipped. A year ago I had her read to me everynight, we have maths quizzes, she writes diary, short stories etc. These days it has all been on music(and we are not even doing it properly or good enough) I have the feeling if we invest more on all extra curri then her academic might suffer(there are also (although much less time consuming)French lesson, drawing, swimming. I have a rule of trying not to study/learn at weekends however it seems like to keep up with the quality for everything she needs to do some practice on weekends too. Tough decision!

Oh all the best of luck 2ndsopranosrule Dd1. Sometimes better if you don't have too much time to worry about the date.