After grade 8 flute?

That sounds like a wonderful musical journey, thanks for explaining @GeneralMusings Best wishes to your dd.

@GeneralMusings your dd sounds impressive. How much did she practice her instrument on average? Did she have an outstanding private teacher throughout or did she learn at school with a flute teacher? How much did her teacher(s) focus on posture, embouchure etc? Asking as my dd loves the flute is musical but technique not great. She is 10 and practices about 10-15 min a day.

Can she join a youth conservatoire?

@GeneralMusings I do know what you mean - I cannot believe the cost of music (and DD2 still does not own her main instrument, as there is no way we can afford a bassoon). However you have given your DD a gift that will last her forever, and she will I'm sure pass on to your grandchildren. When I was 9 years old my parents randomly bought a piano and my Grandma paid for lessons for us all (we shared them between us!). From that, I 'only' ever gained Grade 5 in piano, but both my brother and sister ended up with Grade 8 - and years later my brother is now a piano teacher.

But even for me - the least musical one - it has been a huge gift - it gave me the confidence to sing in my college choir at Uni, and I used the skills I was taught to help my DDs when they were younger. Now they have far surpassed me, and DD2 looks set to do more music than any of us could ever have imagined. I always think of it as my grandma's multi-generational gift - financially very costly for her and my parents at the time, but what a difference it has made even now... You've made a huge investment in your DD's happiness - and whatever happens next she's reached a brilliant standard. Amazing!

I think your solutions for your DD's music sound great! She is going to continue to get loads of music in her life and also have time to focus on GCSEs with some down time too.

Another one here with DC with SPD and food issues, so feel your pain on that one too!

I feel for you there as the mum of a child with food sensory issues.

Can you see if there are any local funding streams. For example I am in Staffordshire and I fundraise to provide instrumental lessons for low income/disadvantaged youngsters and I know there is also another charity set up in memory of a child who died who does the same for all aspects of performing/sports. In the North East there is the Chloe & Liam charity who do something similar in memory of two Manchester Arena victims.

I know that one child I currently sponsor is looking at applying to something called Future Talent funding. https://www.futuretalent.org/

Well done to your daughter! I also have flute as my principal instrument and then took up oboe - although much later in life!

I would actually advise that your daughter stops weekly lessons and focuses on orchestra/ensembles, including in her practise time, and school exams.

I agree that fortnightly lessons work much better post grade 8, and if her current teacher doesn't offer them then another teacher who works with adults very likely will. But dropping the lessons for a while won't do any harm - she can come back to it at any point in the future when time allows. Doing the ARSM diploma after uni would be a great way for her to get back into it in a few years.

Plus, the oboe is addictive and beautiful, but needs a lot of stamina and practise to sound as good as it can, so realistically she's going to need extra time for that. And there's a limit to the hours in the week... It is one of the worst instruments to pick in terms of money though, everything with it is so expensive, especially trying to find those damn unicorn reeds! (But worth it).

My DD is still a way off grade 8 but I have never thought about it as a moment for then stopping lessons. Surely there is still lots of learn. Though moving to fortnightly lessons does sound like a good plan if it suits you both. Thinking back to my childhood, my brother carried on with lessons on violin and piano after grade 8. For one instrument I think he switched teacher after grade 7 and stayed on with her post-grade 8.

You can apply for bursaries to go to a junior conservatoire. My daughter loved Birmingham on the flute.

She should get started on playing for paid gigs. Flute might not be the most marketable (although look for weddings and suchlike as you never know) but her second instrument is probably pretty good and if it's piano she could clean up. This is the best part of being musical as a teenager.

Grade 8 is the beginning of the whole wide world of repertoire! She's done brilliantly to get into a competitive orchestra too. Have a look at NYO inspire, it's for state school kids grade 6-8 and does a couple of short courses, all free with amazing tutors. Sometimes there are other opportunities too, like a day or two as a visitor on actual NYO courses which is a fab opportunity. It's not auditioned, you just have to explain why you'd benefit. I would try to keep some kind of regular if lessons frequent lessons as it will help her prepare for orchestra etc as well as helping her choose repertoire to work on etc. music is a gift for life.

It's quite standard at higher performance levels to drop to an hour a fortnight.

My son is a musician - did a music degree. He had a lesson a fortnight after leaving school. His degree offered an advanced performance option which was also once a fortnight,

The presumption is that you can practice largely independently and the lesson is for new ways of playing /corrections etc.

I suppose the other thing is, if the teacher is talking about stopping, are they someone who likes to teach above G8? If not, they may not be the right person going forward I guess. I don't know - maybe everyone does on flute, but I certainly know teachers on other things who don't really know what to do above this level.

Could you cut to half an hour a week - or second that fortnightly would otherwise work, if the teacher is happy to hold a slot for that? DD2 is a similar age and working on her ARSM diploma thing on flute. She only has half an hour a week - it isn't enough for her teacher's liking, but with the ensembles as well she is still progressing. I get that it is all SO expensive. If that won't work, just keeping up the orchestra for GCSE year and then rethinking I'm sure would work too I reckon - she's done so well to get into that and will learn loads from it.