Summer Term Music and Music Exams Thread

[Wafflenose]

A new thread for a new term!

If you're a music parent, or music teacher, please introduce yourselves here. It was getting hard to keep track on the old thread.

I am a music teacher (woodwind, 90% recorders these days) and I have:

DD1 (aged 8) who is taking Grade 5 Recorder this term, currently working towards Grade 4 Flute, and also sings, plays the piano and one tune on the ukulele (no lessons on these three). She has completed a video audition for the South West Music School, but we won't hear yet, and quite honestly, I don't think she'll get in this year.

DD2 (aged 5) who is taking Initial Grade Recorder this term, started the cello a month ago, and can play a few tiny, baby tunes on the piano and ukulele (again, no lessons on these).

I only have one pupil doing an exam this term, other than my girls - a Grade 2 Recorder player. I'm doing 11 Music Medals though.

Wafflenose I remember having a word with mine before his first exam (7), telling him that the examiner did not want to be hearing about his guinea pigs, Pokemon or his holidays. He was a talker and I had some concerns that the examiner would struggle to get a word in edgeways. When we got to the centre the examiner was having a cup of tea and came over to talk to us then carried his instrument across to the exam room for him. (We'd not thought about the logistics of small child + big instrument) He did not have a care in the world, he had a lovely afternoon off school and when we came out an ice cream van was parked outside which made for a perfect day.

I hope your daughter has a similar first exam experience on Monday, no worries just a different sort of a day.

Will anybody else be glad to see the back of Melodie? gr4 violin.
I hate the screechy piece, even played well its awful.

There are some lovely pieces in this syllabus, but I hate that one.
Her other choices are Bridegroom and Bride, and Musette which sound great.

Just got DD2's grade 4 flute result Very pleased for her - she was a bit concerned because she felt she messed up one of the pieces and went into the exam low on confidence having been sick the week before but it all turned out nicely in the end. Next up grade 5 singing and grade 1 piano in July.

Just found this thread and happy to find somewhere to ask questions! I'm not particularly musical - sang in the school choir, but never did any exams and only learnt very basic violin - so am still finding my way through this world.

My DD (14) is resitting her ABRSM G3 piano in July (no date yet), having failed it in April (she got 93 with a pass mark of 100 - not miles off, but not great). She failed basically because she wasn't ready, because she didn't practise. I'm now concerned that the same thing will happen again .

She is full of good intentions, says she is going to practise, but then starts doing something else, forgets and runs out of time (organisation is not her strong point). If I remind her she's likely to get cross about being nagged, dig her heels in and refuse to do it - so that's counter-productive. She's not massively talented (though seems to play reasonably well), but insists that she wants to carry on learning, and that she enjoys it - it's just not high enough up her priority list for her to put the work in, unfortunately.

Anyone got any suggestions?

Somewhere on the ABRSM website the marking criteria area listed. I've been sharing these (that is, the distinction criteria! ;-) ) with all my students, even the 8yos. It may help if your DD can see how she will be marked, especially at her age, and if she can record her playing and then mark it against the criteria?

That might be worth a try, thank you; I think we've seen something like that in the "preparing for you exams" booklet, too.

Doesn't help if she never gets her act together to actually practise, though!

Well, I'd better pass mine as I'm the one paying for them!!! ;-)

Oneofthegiants as I see it you've got two issues, one covering the period to July and then the longer term. I have a resident 14 year old and I know first hand the "later, later, too late now" approach. Here homework/scales are always planned for later/tomorrow and to his surprise often seem to get squeezed out by more interesting things. I have a set speech on priorities and time management and I don't know why I bother with it because it's clearly not having any effect.

What worked for me in the run up to exams was agreeing together a practise schedule - from now to the exam it's (say) fifteen minutes every school night/twenty minutes three times a week/whatever. I found mine would happily agree to a short practise because it's nothing is it? If you can get regular practise sessions it's a small step to getting longer sessions. Let her choose when is convenient for her looking at her other commitments. I found that once he'd agreed that there was a need to practise and decided what nights he was going to do it then I'd just remind him when he got in from school and he'd get on with it.

There's enough time between now and July for this to become a habit. With a bit of luck (or you could tip off her teacher) she'll get some praise in her lesson for the noticeable progress she's making and she'll see that the work she's putting in is having a result. If after that she still isn't practising then good intentions are all very well but she's wasting her time and your money. In her other school work she'll be used to a taught lesson reinforced with homework - why should music be any different?

(Your basic violin trumps my school chime bar, I dropped out before making it as far as recorder.)

Great advice Oneothegiants. Exam pressure getting hold of us right now. Daughter (10) is sitting G4 piano later this month. Has been learning from Jan 14 and we have been at 'over-cooked' stage for a while, even to the point of taking 2 weeks off all syllabus work where she learned a popular piece to detract.

Now the scales are so bad, we are all in pain each morning (including the neighbours!), it's as if she is purposely making errors to make me react. As already mentioned, she would NEVER be disrespectful to a school teacher if they had asked her to learn something, so why does she treat her piano learning this way? I would be fine if I knew she had reached her limit, but every exam so far in both piano and violin has resulted in distinctions, and she is very competitive.

I asked her this morning is it a) she just can't do scales or b) she can't be bothered. I did get an honest answer that it was the latter. I personally (even though I was not musical) think that scales should be valued the same as pieces and tire of the teachers complaining about her focus on pieces alone.

Resulted in a sad morning today with me sending her going to school contemplating dropping the piano if she can't pull her attitude together but typically she was very upset at the thought. I also think I should let her learn to 'fail' this time as not reaching her usual standard will give her a wake up call? Or am I being too tough - I know I too have a high bar!! I fund a lot of extra curricular activities, all of her choosing but am finding myself resentful if she cannot value the support and give it her best, or conversely make a decision (with my support) to drop if there is too much to cope with.

Exam stress here too. But counting down in double digits now to the exams. I made a 'horse race' type thing for scales for miss 10 as she couldn't find any fun in them. Today her double stop scale in sixths won! They went through being 'donkeys', to old nags, horses to racehorses. And helped her through scales practise immensely. I think the switch to both melodic and harmonic is mentally tough - especially when young.

I'm ready to do a more elaborate affair for her grade 8 and her little sister's grade 5. We might even print out pictures and have a family sweepstake!

I think those people who say they are a particular grade - but have never put themself through the stress of scales, aurals and sight reading should be forced to take at least one exam. Pieces are relatively easy. It's all the other stuff...

Great tactics Shakyisles! ok, I think it's time for me to get this - she'd definitely buy this type of incentive! Thank you.

Thanks for the advice, Ishouldbeweaving - yes, I agree that there are really two issues here. I've already told her that if she fails again, she will have to give up, as it obviously isn't that important to her. Oh, and she's had to pay the exam fee for the resit out of her savings (I'm still paying for lessons, though).

I really don't want her to fail again, though - it seems a shame to put a year's work into learning the pieces and not come out with anything at the end of it, and I don't like the idea of giving up on something because of failure (the try, try again principle). I'd be quite happy for her to pass this exam and then decide that she's had enough of piano, or for her to decide that maybe it's worth working for and carry on, but at the moment she's feeling a bit like it's not worth practising because she'll only fail anyway - I have pointed out to her that that's a self-fulfilling prophecy.

I've tried agreeing a schedule with her; it hasn't been entirely successful so far, so perhaps we need to revisit it. I could try negotiating shorter practice times (but her teacher says an hour a day).

Ealingwest I feel your pain on scales - she only does them as an afterthought - and as for sight-reading, I don't think she ever touches that (she failed sight-reading on both G1 and G2 exams).

Double digits? That should have read single digits. Exams are next week!
Piano isn't my main instrument and I never practised it as much as flute. Funny - as I accompany and there isn't a single day when I don't play piano now - whereas I just don't get chance to play the flute very much.

Whether you like it or not, piano is a very useful instrument to be able to play.

An hour a day for grade 3 piano sounds a bit ambitious (based on my admittedly limited experience of listening to brass to G8 and piano to G7). My husband is probably putting that much time in now, but that's because he's in panic mode - his G7 piano is in two weeks and the wheels have fallen off one of the pieces. My 14 year old would rebel at that, it would cut into his gaming time too much.

If she does give up now it's not as if she'll necessarily be giving it up forever. My husband left school with G2 piano and started playing again when he was just short of 50. He hated it at school but now he's enjoying it now because it's something he wants to do.

My son hates scales with a passion, the moaning and grumbling we have over them you would not believe (or maybe you would).

Likewise Ishouldbeweaving, thanks for your insight (just getting the hang of how these threads work, who said what :)

Getting to work on an incentive board…who said trying to start up one's own business whilst spending more time with kids was productive?!

Oneofthegiantsisme - I know each child is different but a suggestion on practise time is no. of minutes = grade, so a G3 should be circa 30 mins a day. I know this is generic and doesn't equate to quality each time, but it was a metric my daughter 'got', even though schedule sometimes didn't always accommodate…

It's habit. My kids know that if they skip a day, it takes them over a day to get back to where they were. So if they don't feel like practising, they just do a few scales - usually 15 minutes.

If they skip two or three days, it takes them over a week to wrestle their fingers back into submission - not a nice experience.

Don't get me wrong. They take holidays, they have days off - but they're well timed and not on the run up to concerts, exams or important dates!

The other thing to remember as they progress to higher grades, is that it takes longer to do everything. More technique. Longer pieces with more practise needed to nail the style. More scales. More understanding needed. The whole process takes longer.

Dd10 is swapping from one decent practise to a morning practise and an afternoon practise in order to fit everything in. Fortunately, she is starting to set her own goals now and practising because SHE really wants to get better.

When all else fails - chocolate.

Habit is the issue, I think, Shakyisles - her current habit is to practise at the end of the day, just before bedtime - which means she gets engrossed in playing on her tablet/reading/dancing round her bedroom, doesn't notice the time, then realises it's bedtime and she can't practise! I'm trying to get her to do it straight after dinner instead - which she did yesterday, under protest - so we might get there.

Chocolate could work - she's still got chocolate coins from Christmas to eat, not to mention an Easter egg - so perhaps if I tell her she can have some after she's practised, we would kill two birds with one stone .

Maybe I'll promise her a book she's after if she passes, too.

Ealingwest I like the idea of your practice metrics, but I'm not sure I can convince my daughter when she's been told otherwise by her teacher. I might have a go, though - 30 minutes done has to be better than 1 hour not done!

Ealingwest and the other parents despairing about exam stuff etc my 2p with a very old "been there done that x3" (my eldest is nearly 21) head on....

Exams aren't compulsory, they are only an indicator of progress and progress is made ( may be made faster even) without them. Don't stop lessons because your child doesn't want to participate in exams. TAlk together about what they and you think learning and instrument does for them and what they want from it.

Our best teacher cares not one fig for exams. The kids almost have to beg him to do the odd one.That doesn't mean they aren't playing at post grade 8 standard!

It is more difficult to go " off piste" and just learn to play and love your instrument with a school based teacher but it's possible. THey like the "bean counting" of X pupils took grades this term etc

The only time it's been sort of helpful to have the grades is when applying for music service places but they'll auditon on teachers recommendation too

Timing is key for my kids. Miss 10 has to eat then play. She's useless if she plays just before lunch or too late in the day. Practise comes before tv or iPad. Mind you, it's taken years to get to the stage where we have worked this out.

I am a big believer in little and often. Ten minutes of great practise every day is better than a begrudging 30 minutes once or twice a week IMO.

I agree Theas18 that exams aren't the be-all and end-all of learning an instrument - the point is to take pleasure in playing - but having been entered, I want her to do well (i.e. not fail again!). She's keen to do the exams, just not quite so keen on the work involved .

Unfortunately, I think her teacher is a quite keen on pushing through exams as fast as possible; it doesn't really bother me at all how many months/years it takes her (she takes forever to get through a dance grade!), but having started piano a bit late, I get the impression that she's being pushed a bit otherwise she won't get to grade 8 by the time she leaves school. That might just be my impression, though - it's not something I've discussed with her teacher. This time she was offered the choice of taking G3 in spring or summer, and chose to do it in spring - her teacher warned that it would take a lot of hard work - which she didn't do - hence the resit!

Good to hear from the other end Theas18. I agree wholeheartedly with your comments - the unofficial teacher mine is most inspired by is our neighbour who plays violin with her off piste, totally against the exam structure and gets angry with the 'system'. This supplementary hour was fought hard by the school due to conflicting styles and beliefs (I argued if it were me or a hypothetical older sister playing with her, would there be such resistance?) but the resigning factor is a child loses out on orchestral/quartet/festival submission add ons if not following the school protocol.

She is also up for musical scholarships for Y7 entry and though schools state G6 or equivalent (the one she is aiming for), the forms require 'what was the last grade AND mark achieved'. Of course applications are supported by a teacher's report, but schools also favours the traditional approach. The scholarship is a long shot, reduced by the fact that she does not play an unusual instrument (according to school) but she is up for trying, which I support.

So, we just need to get through to early July for recording purposes before applications and then definitely going free format for both instruments from Autumn…it'll be good for her.

In summary, I have a daughter that is displaying a little arrogance (and boredom, fatigue etc) for the practice right now, but likes the medal collecting and kudos exam results bring….a trait that I know has contradictions that need managing!

ealingwest yup I agree contradictory traits indeed! An so young to have to be fighting her way through them.

Grade 6 by scholarship entry (which must I guess be at 10.5 or just 11yrs ) is a big ask. Good luck to her. What is her instrument?

oneofthegiants dusting self off after a failure and doing it again must be tough. Hope you offspring gets their act together and does it ( and learns from the experience to practice better!) next time.

It killed piano for me (Grade 5 fail 98 marks. sod of an examiner). In retrospect I was a bit rubbish though!

It's ambitious, you're right Theas18. Will present on violin only with G6 being sat this July. Applications do not need to be in until Nov 14 with auditions Jan 15, subject to academic hurdles being passed.

Gives us time therefore still to back out if needed in Autumn term - I agree it's a lot of pressure for an 11 year old by then, who may not have matured on the full musicality needed for these awards, let alone understand the responsibility that will come for awarded scholars…music will need to come high against other interests like sport! One time I am advocating it's the taking part that counts vs the winning :)

WAAHH! 12 hours to go!!

DD1 will be fine. She is very experienced, won't get unduly distracted by little slips, and will get on with her exam in a very businesslike way. She will be perfectly happy with a pass, as it's such a big exam and we both know she's playing right at her current technical limit.

DD2 is SO laid back... for the last few days it's been, "I'll practise later!" We did some tonight and she has improved, but lacks fluency at times, and has struggled to correct a few ingrained wrong notes. I hope it all goes well, because I reckons she's right on the line. The right side of the line, granted, but that doesn't give her much wriggle room.

She is also very short - way shorter than anyone I've ever entered for an exam tomorrow. I think the examiner might get a surprise tomorrow when this tiny little tot walks in. It's only Initial Grade, and she's older than she looks, but she's going to seem so tiny!