October Music Thread

Bold fail - I can't see the difference between the characters without bringing the screen up to my nose.

^LurkyMcLurker* DS took his first exam at seven, I've never taken one and it was pushing thirty years since my husband's last one. My advice would be to have a look on line at the syllabus and make sure that you are both familiar with the format of the exam. For Trinity you booked in with the clerk and they ask you whether you are doing the scales or exercises and do you want to do the scales before or after the pieces (or they did when DS last took an exam four years ago). If you know that someone will ask you this you can be ready with the answers rather than having to think about it there and then.

DH is the musical parent and I'm the driver/form filler/cheque writer. DS is 17 now and in a year the house will be much quieter.

Oh forgot to add that he has recently started playing cornet in his school brass club and loves it. He seems to be able to pick up instruments very quickly!!

Good morning everyone. I also lost track of the September thread. I am Mum to 2 ds’s. Ds2 is 9 but not terribly musical but ds1 is 11 and has also started Senior school but has stayed on at his current school as it goes up to 16. He has Aspergers and despite the school not being great for Music this was the best fit for him academically.

Ds plays violin and is grade 6,doing grade 7 work. He doesn’t do grades. He is in 2 local,borough orchestras and earlier in the year he got in to a county orchestra. He also plays in a String ensemble where he is lead violin. He attends our local Saturday music school but from January he will go to Centre For Young Musicians which is about an hour away from us.

Ds has perfect pitch and particularly gifted aurally. He auditioned for and got into his school A Capella group and is their only boy at the mo!!
He is loving his musical journey at the moment though we’re still struggling with doing enough practice and we’re trying to work on increasing his solo performance platform. It’s hard going as he doesn’t enjoy this as much as orchestra.

October already!
Yesterday i took dd1 (11) and dd2 (9) to the nearest city to hear the young talent concerts at the chamber music festival. Seems to have inspired practice 😊. Dd2 is also expressing an interest in a second instrument (flute is her first) - she wants to add double bass...... given i have to drive 90 minutes for dd1's violin lessons im not rating my chances of finding a double bass teacher......

It sounds like your dd is doing really well at the violin. Ds didn't learn by ear but made very rapid early progress and was hopeless at sight reading ( I think because he just didn't have the experience of lots of playing behind him and sight reading at early grades) so I did pretty much what you are doing lots of short bursts of sight reading practice- start much easier than grade 3 and work your way up to it she'll be fine

Hi, I would like to join. I'm mum to DD 7 who plays violin and has just started piano.. DD started violin at 4 with Suzuki method and has progressed well, she was learning the final piece in book 3. However, I am looking at the book 4 pieces with trepidation as they really do seem to need a level of maturity in playing and sound quality that I'm not sure she has yet. So after a chat with her teacher, we've decided to take a break from Suzuki and take grade 3 - now booked for the end of November.

She's finding the pieces easy and really loving them, scales are going fine too but we are struggling with the sight reading as she's used to learning by ear. But I keep doing 10 mins or so with her every day so hopefully she'll be okay. Very nervous though as she has always been one of the better players for her age in her Suzuki groups, hoping she does well in the exam as she sets herself high standards and gets downhearted if she doesn't reach them. Any tips for preparing her for the exam gratefully received!

Hi got a bit behind on the September thread so I'll try and keep up with this one . I'm mum to ds 12 who's in year 8 and plays trumpet and piano and did 9 who mostly loves to sing but also plays piano and has cornet lessons in school. She had been very reluctant to start the cornet which is the instrument offered for school lessons because she didn't want to follow in her brothers footsteps but it turns out that if she actually does some practise she's ok at it !! - so it could be a noisy year in this house. No exams for ds this year but he's auditioning for NCO again in a weeks time ( yikes that's come round quickly) and has just joined Aldeburgh Young Muscicians ( East Anglian answer to a JD ) so that's plenty to keep him busy. He also attends the local secondary school which has a fantastic music department and I think he seems to be getting less homework this year so hopefully that will give him lots of time for music ( plus playing on his computer and watching random videos on YouTube !!)

Waffle thanks for the new thread. I have a 9 year old dd who plays violin and clarinet. She also loves singing and sings in a couple of choirs. We have a violin exam too soon, playing appears to be going backwards

Waffle: another beginner recorder question, sorry. On my descant, f" seems almost a quarter-tone sharp; on my tenor f' seems flat (though less wrong). Why are fs so hard to play in tune? (I have Aulos recorders so I wouldn't expect the instruments to actually be wrong).

I'll make use of my time zone to get in early...

I sing in our local cathedral choir, which is kind of the only functional bit left of the cathedral other than the building itself. Lovely choir containing men who joined aged 5 and have been singing there for the last 50+ years, and women who can keep up (women were added in the 90s after the trebles were disbanded). Eg Howells Requiem on 2 hours of rehearsal coming up for All Souls! I also play violin badly (I ued to be a lot better but haven't practised properly for 20 years), piano badly (as per violin) and recorders very badly (picked them up this year after having learnt in class 35 years ago).

DS is 11 months and can blow raspberries into a recorder, beat time vaguely correctly sometimes, and sing a D to tell me how to tune my violin. So no NCO auditions just yet...