Spring 23 music thread

fingers crossed for him @Siriusmuggle !

Mine has his end of first year recital tomorrow, he has to do well because he's failed a module and so needs to impress in other ways. Hopefully he'll be allowed to resit it over the summer.

Thank you @minisnowballs for sharing your experience. How interesting each child develops at their own speed...
I've been deliberately not teaching DS math in case he finds school even more boring.
We'r not native English's speakers so he has to learn reading from school. That was what made school so interesting and pleasing for him.
Now he's free reading I feel like he's frustrated because school doesn't provide that challenge any more.
I think I'll leave it as is and see if he complains more then see what I can do. It could be that when he goes to year 2 suddenly there'll be whole new level for him he'll love it again 😍.
I'll just fill him with music in the mean time so that he challenges his brain - that' what his piano teacher says why he needs to learn music anyway.

lots of maths challenges they can do online @chickentikkasalad - perhaps something like this? https://parallel.org.uk if school maths is dull. Or the Murderous Maths series of books is fun?

My dd2 never used to complain when things were easy - she's not really that driven. However, she suddenly started reading fluently at 3 and we only noticed because she was correcting her older sister (neglected second child!). She spent most of reception falling asleep in the book corner because she is a late summer born and found school really tiring. The time spent role playing and digging sand pits was definitely the bit of reception she needed to do -they didn't really make her do the phonics, she had spellings instead. She still learned loads and loved school

Move on a few years and I'd say her sister, who read at a perfectly normal age, is the more analytical and intuitive reader in terms of literary understanding. DD2 is very 'quick' - it's the word most applied to her by teachers of all types, including with music - but DD1 goes much deeper with her analysis. Teaching DD2 to slow down and really think deeply is the hard bit for her.

So yes, lots of reading, bit of language learning, and music (though much later than your DS) gave her something to think about.. nowadays she's just so busy that being 'quick' barely gets her through ...

Thank you for the ideas. His teacher let him choose whatever book he wants to read from the school library so I think he's quite happy in that. He's more frustrated with how boring the math is. He showed how they were working out 4x6 using arrays where he already knows his times tables 🤣. I feel sorry for him!
But he did another hour of grade 2 theory after school for some brain exercise. He said he'd save the rest for tomorrow 😂.
Sorry for hijacking the thread I'll keep it to music 👍

@chickentikkasalad - just do the bare minimum on the school readers and just provide lots of reading materials - fiction and non-fiction - for your ds to read for fun. Your local library is your friend here!!

DS had taught himself to read fairly fluently before he started school, so he too was bored rigid by phonics and Biff and Chip. His first school refused to give him anything else to read, but after reception he moved, and I think the teacher used him 'to help'...

@QueenMabby, thank you -pleased to know the app can work in long term and take you through it. Not sure how long he'll stay obsessed with it but nice to know someone has gone through it as an example :). Like your DD, DS is very much challenge driven. He complained school math is boring and too easy yesterday so I guess his mind just needs the challenge, not just he likes it he actually needs it to feed his brain!

Also he's year 1 and already almost free reading. I don't know what to do to satisfy his brain because I don't know what to do about the school stuff - I guess they have to make sure everyone reaches a certain level at a certain point so they're not going do anything to him. His teacher did say both his math and reading are way ahead of everyone else but didn't tell me what to do about that.

I just have to let him learn music as a challenge!
Slightly off the music topic but how does everyone else deal with a bright child in terms of school? I gathered quite a few if not most of the kids here are bright and dedicated kids.

Best of luck for your DD's audition @minisnowballs - I'm sure her natural talent will still shine over zoom!

@chickentikkasalad - glad your ds is getting on so well with the theory app. My dd is also motivated by challenges like that - she flew through them!

@Teapotkitten great that he's having the opportunities to perform. Nice to see someone so natural and enjoying it so much!

@minisnowballs hope the audition goes well. Just one more week to go with GCSE then everyone can breath. I have a friend her dd is doing gcse the whole family is feeling/sharing the stress!

On our side, I found an amazing teacher at our local music hub on Saturday. She will teacher DS music theory and invited him to join the junior windband that she conducts, playing percussions. Don't know how that'll go - DS is good at normal rythyms just can't count the long notes or long rests. Hopefully that'll help him. The teacher told him to do theory training using an app and show her when he's reached a milestone. DS has been working on it non stop since coming home and finished all the grade 1 by next morning. He'll now plead me to let him do grade 2 theory trading playing time/ YouTube time - I'm happy with that!

That's brilliant @Teapotkitten - he sounds so keen - particularly impressive he's worked out the Zelda piece.

We are in the middle of massive GCSE stress here. One more week to go. I'm afraid music takes a back seat in these weeks - DD2 is basically ready for grade eight and we're focused on getting DD1 over the line with her GCSES which seem to just go on forever. I've not looked at any latin literature for years but am being called upon to remember what the heck is going on with Petronius, Suetonius and Pliny on a daily basis.

DD2 has her (zoom) audition for her school musical for her new school today. She's learned a monologue from the Tempest and they've asked for a folk song as well, but it feels quite weird to be doing it on Zoom for a teacher who has never even seen her in the flesh. She's having to rush home from rehearsals from her current school musical in order to do it, too. Fingers crossed it goes ok - we've just no idea what the standard is like compared to her current school.

Guess he's done quite well in having a few informal opportunities recently then - he's played in a school assembly, at my Nan's care home and at messy church in the past few weeks... If there's a piano about, he's there!

That's so lovely that the piano teacher organises a recital. It's really helpful for pianists to have opportunities to perform as otherwise it's just exams really!

@northerngoldilocks the recital is just a little one his teacher organises for family to come to. He's going to be playing 3 pieces, two from an app they use and the other is a piece of music from a Zelda game which he worked out. He'll actually be performing twice because DH couldn't make the first date so his teacher suggested he play both!

The concert in the park was a visiting conservatoire, sort of a mini proms! Flag waving and all! We were just watching - DS really enjoyed seeing and hearing all the instruments, at one point he snuck right to the front to sit on the grass and watch because we were in a bit of an awkward place to see. (There were lots of kids running about by then so nobody would have minded).
From what the conductor said during it, I think they'd actually contacted the local council to organise it. I still haven't figured out what the county music service/hub actually do around here yet!

Sounds good @Teapotkitten - is this through your local music service? Nice that they do concerts that pianists can join in on. What's he playing?

Love hearing about all these instruments and musical events going on!

We've just had a lovely musical evening ourselves - I'd been hoping to take DS to see a live orchestral performance, but everything was a bit far away and on a bit late for primary age. Then last week I spotted that one was playing in a local park tonight, with free entry too! Finally, a bit of luck! Nice weather for it too... well, perhaps a little too warm for the players, but at least the rain held off!

DS will be doing his summer piano recital soon, so we have that to look forward to as well.

@minisnowballs congratulations and good luck for the music school! Sounds like she's very keen - excellent!

@Alakazam8 yes - she joins year 10 in September. She's wildly excited (although I'm sure nervous underneath) - I'm just sewing in a lot of name tags and thinking how much I'm going to miss her...

@minisnowballs is your dd going to music school. That’s very exciting for her!!

So much excitement over new shiny flute here - DD has just had her first lesson on it, though is obviously still working with the slight shift to embouchure needed etc. She is playing in a woodwind concert next week.

It will be her last one before new school, and head of woodwind has asked her to play on both instruments, but both pieces are really long. I'm afraid I asked whether people will just get sick of her, and the HoD looked appalled (!) so I'm hoping there isn't a sea of seething parents at the end of it (we've picked shortest pieces possible).

I think it's also good for children to understand that a piece doesn't need to be longer/ higher/ faster or flashy to be a challenge. There are grade 4/5 pieces that some professionals would record on an album or perform in a concert, they do them beautifully though.

Thank you everybody for sharing experiences. What a wonderful place this is! We learn from each other's experiences to so the best for our DC!
DS doesn't need to be motivated by the exams at all he's naturally motivated as long as he's playing something challenging. Therefore he would be bored polishing 3 pieces for months for an exam. That is exactly what the teacher said. She also noticed his sight reading gets worse when he's not playing new pieces. She's very experienced with younger children and I trust her totally. Just feels like we're never going to do an exam until grade 8 🤣. I think she's got a plan for him to pass grade 8 before secondary school. She says they'll be distracted by lots of things once in secondary school.

On the beavers side, I think we'll just use piano exams because the piano teacher is totally opposite. She plans for him to sit every exam. She initially thought about the prep test in the summer because DS only started piano in January but he's making really good progress she now agrees to do initial grade 🤣

For me, exams can slow them down and mean they miss out on lots of wider repertoire. Youngest has only done grade 5 and will likely do grade 7 this year but by the time she gets there, she'll have been playing grade 7/8 level pieces for several months but probably not chosen specific exam ones till closer. If your DC is still in the rapid progress phase, it might mean the teacher thinks that it would slow him down and make him bored. He can look for other things to mark progress like doing a recording and comparing it in a few weeks, playing at more festivals etc, writing his own music ( I sense he is quite musical do this might be fun for him). Especially at the earliest levels, mine played dozens of pieces at each 'level'. They still play way more than they are just using for an exam. They need to start to develop an internal motivation to play and improve, not just for a certificate; that can take longer for some than others. It's different for every child though, so maybe chat to the teacher to hear her reasons, she likely has many years experience.

DD has done grade 1 and 5 on piano and will do grade 7 hopefully in July. On violin she hasn't done any though might do grade 5 at Christmas. Her teacher is keen for her to do one before she hits advanced grades.

I think that grades really slow them down unless they're motivated by them or need for something else. That said, I wanted both of mine to do grade 1 piano when they started just so they knew what the process was. DD was 7 when she sat grade 1 (days after her birthday) so was old enough to understand and follow.