New Year Music and Musicians Thread

Have just seen, she is starting Monday.
Wish her good luck from me and dd, and I'll tell dd to keep a look out for her.
Are you all set?
If you are unsure of anything I might know feel free to pm, I'll help if I can.
Not very knowledgeable on specific chorister stuff though.

Rapidly

My dd may be joining yours if she is starting Monday, not sure why or even if she has the story right.
Something was mentioned before xmas, but dd believes it's only temporary for a few weeks.
Good luck to her, she'll love it.
Hard work and she'll be shattered though

haha! I can imagine!

We're in Sweden so the differences are present but not huge.

New folk welcome?

DD (8yo in a few days) is a chorister, and playing violin and piano. We're not UK based so not doing grades.

She's likely to go to vocational school from grade 4 (18 months) with the choir.

helenluvsrob I get the feeling ABRSM is quite flexible on dates in the summer. Our music Centre books two days in May each year and brings in an examiner but DS2's piano teacher manages to get dates in July so you can definitely aim for quite late in the school year! Piano teacher teaches both for the music centre and privately and basically enters everyone privately in the summer just to give them a bit more time.
Back to music centre groups this morning and lessons next week. DS1 is planning to do only grades 6 and 8 in bass and drums so can safely put that off for a bit and focus on getting G5 percussion out of the way. We need to get him on a theory course as well - I doubt he knows as much as he thinks he does!

Here we go again. I'm getting so exam jaded it's not fair on dd really but I like to think maybe it helps lessen her stress..
Grade 7 recorder in Feb. School work seems so time pressured and choir too that I think she wants to do this to prove she still can do a recorder exam. She'd better get the aural right this time !

Anyone know when the summer dates might be ? I'm wondering if she could for a grade 8 in then. Otherwise realistically she won't get 3 done in year 13. Of course she doesn't have to, but I think she could do and for her having the bits of paper helps her self esteem .

Green DD is using the grade 1 theory by Lina Ng not the abrsm one as her teacher thinks it is more fun. Not sure if it is on a par though, that is why I want to buy previous tests and see how she's doing to understand her level.

I know that is a bit off topic, but not so much, has anybody seen the Amy Winehouse movie tonight? What a huge amount of talent and so quickly wasted. I found it so sad...

Uhtred

Your nn is hard for dyslexics

Your dc have done really well and sounds like lots of hard work, good luck to dd with gr6.
Exams aren't the be all, dd doesn't seem to be working towards any for the foreseeable future, even Piano though she's around grade 3 now.
It's so good to hear what others are up to.
My dd has a local concert next week, I'm really looking forward to it, she's singing 3 pieces and I haven't heard her sing for so long now.
I am hopefully going to record it.

While I'm here does anybody know anything about The children's choir GB or whatever it is.
Dd is asking about it, no idea how she found it and I've been avoiding it for years. I know that's bad but if anyone can remember my previous life of all the running about, they'd understand.
I know we can't afford it as well.
How does it work? Is it worth it?

DD2 got a merit for her grade 6 recorder (and also for her grade 4 ballet) so that's a relief. We were somewhat concerned because she was in significant pain that week with a dance related injury. This term she will definitely do grade 6 singing (held over from last term because of her tonsils/adenoids operation) and maybe grade 3 piano. Not sure about that though. Grade 6 flute in the summer. She will probably do a few singing classes in the music festival - she isn't going to play though, neither is DD1 which I think is a bit of a shame but there you go - she needs to concentrate on her A levels (her RCM requirement may be EE but she is aiming for A*s nonetheless). She has grade 8 theory this term though. DD2 also has the dance festival and half term so yet another packed term for her (good thing really, keep her busy and fill the void left by the panto). DS has refused point blank to do grade 7 sax. I don't blame him - he has enough to contend with with his GCSEs. But on the other hand it seems a shame not to when he is easily that standard and he's finally made the effort to pass grade 5 theory (although as he points out, that was designed to support his music GCSE endeavours not to put more exams back on the agenda).

@newlife: hahaha, I think for boys its much harder especially the not so exceptional one.

I think its a very long game, its important they play alittle later on too rather than get to g8 then never play again.

We started going to few concert, near Xmas we went to couple one is very big and one is only a church(but paid). I will start doing more: making going to museum and concerts and theatre now as a scheduled plan. If anyone knows anything good for kids this year in London pls shout.

Fleur: follow your step, just bought the g1 abrsm theory books with couple of past papers, will let you know how it goes

I can remember many years ago trying everything to keep our older dc interested in music.
During their primary years we must have had most instruments throughout the house and we encouraged, praised, paid for lessons etc.
Now ds2 sees the life that dd has and asks why we didn't make him practice and keep it up.
Believe me, apart from beating him with a stick there was nothing else left

Then came dd and she has known what she wants from being about 2.5, she is relentless, ambitious, determined and motivated.
Her instruments have been her toys when she was younger and music is now her life, including social life.
The best way I can describe it is freakish, but in a nice way as it brings her such pleasure.
Only like minded people seem to relate to her and her to them.
I don't know what we'd have done without her school, it fits like a glove musically and socially.
Sometimes I would like normal, just for a day.

So the key for success here is self motivated, cant agree more, then they dont feel they are working hard rather than know their aim and working toward it(without the feeling we are nudging them). The issue is when will they reach to that stage is very much dependent on each child. My daughter for the last 2 months has been better. Before that it was...really hard. We had super slow and lazy 2.5yrs. To be honest now looking back I dont think I could do more as I was exhausted everyday after work and she went to bed just after 7 so we never had time. Now she goes to bed later which helps and also she is less tired(then there is the little sister who is still a baby)

Wow, your kids are all doing amazing, I agree that grade 5 whilst still at primary is brilliant.

Loose Well done, you are truly an inspiration, it isn't easy either when you have other musicians in the family.

I am still managing to fit in a few mins here and there, but not counting my chickens.
I am playing pieces which I dated when I last thought I'd have a go again. They were October 2010
Maybe this time is the time I won't stop again

Hi Greenleave and fleurdelise thanks for the kind messages! Yes she is a bright little thing, weirdly good at languages (we found this out by accident neither her father and I speak any other language beyond je m'appelle Pradaqueen'! ) so that does make the theory much, much easier (she's also doing Her Spanish GCSE in May) she also doesn't get stressed and isn't upset if she doesn't succeed at the first attempt (she tried for NCO for the first time this year but didn't get in) so that does make life easier. No, we're not musical although between her father and I as children, we played the violin, piano and clarinet between us but we both hated music lessons! I could't play a note now despite reaching grade 6 piano.... Her interest is self driven and she does practice every day without fail so she is quietly determined I'd say ( she's not a show-off sort of kid) my job I see as helping her use her time wisely and encouraging her to do a little bit of theory a couple of times a week. I am very proud of her, but I must say full credit must go to her teachers who are extremely encouraging and it does help that they know each other too (her piano teacher is her violin teacher's official accompanist etc) so it feels much easier and neither teacher is pulling her in 'their' direction. I've always said though, that if she wants to stop she can, but at the moment she has the but between her teeth! As we have older (non musical ) kids too I know to embrace any period of enthusiasm before they hit their teens.....!

Oh my god, Prada, your daughter did so well given her circumstances, it must be a very stressful time for you. Your daughter is so advanced also, is yours a musical family(I am finding excuses for mine). We hope to be in your shoes(g5) by end of primary(also end the theory test if possible), fingers crossed

Welcome to the new posters!

Superbag that's an impressive amount of instruments and lessons, I couldn't deal with so many

Pradaqueen those are great results, and grade 5 at the age of 9 is impressive, at least by my books.

Once the exam is out of the way I think the plan is DD to skip grade 4 also but not doing grade 5 next year but take longer (maybe two years) of playing lots of pieces at grade 3/4/5 just without entering the grade 4 exam if that makes sense and give her a chance to play various pieces, various styles and enjoy it really.

At least that was the plan discussed last time with her teacher.

Hello everyone, can I join in again this term? As I said on the Autumn term thread, DD (9) has had a disaster with Grade 3... but I am learning loads on this curve we find ourselves on.....firstly she broke her finger playing netball last term so we had to move her piano exam to the special visit at her Violin's teacher's. What I didn't realise was although a great idea in theory, the piano wasn't really of a suitable standard and she only had one run through on it the night before. A bit tricky for the dreaded 'Stormy Coast' Then.... she ended up with a reaction to the flu jab at school and was running a temp on the morning of the exams with an extremely bunged up nose... so we ended up with a pass (two marks off a merit) - unsurprisingly the aural was the worst score. She sat Grade 3 piano and Grade 3 Violin back-to-back (with a tea break in between) and got a really good merit for the Violin (again aural score the worst) - really pleased for her as I have said in previous threads she has gone from Gd 1 in Violin/Piano and Theory to Grade 3 in a term after changing teachers from 15mins at school to an hour on each outside of school... She also got a merit in Grade 3 theory which she was chuffed with. She is now working through the Grade 4 Eric Taylor Book with her piano teacher. She is working towards her Grade 5 in both Violin and Piano. We are also doing our second music festival which is exciting! Although she is confident in both instruments as a pp said, she also is a terrible sight reader because she too memorises everything. Great for learning theory and vocab, terrible for scoring well in sight reading! Oh well, we can't all be great at everything ...and I am extremely proud of her for working so hard in the past 5 months. Will keep in touch if she enters anything but likely to be a special visit Gd5 Violin exam in April I reckon, too much work required for Piano and she has such tiny hands, choosing suitable pieces is a nightmare! Good luck to everyone for this term!