July Music and Musicians Thread

[Wafflenose]

Welcome to wet July (well it's wet here) and a new thread. This is the place where we can talk about all things musical, like music lessons, exams, practice and new instruments. I am a music teacher (woodwind) and have two daughters. Goo is 10 and her first instrument is recorder, although on paper, flute has now caught up. She plays flute in NCO Under 11s, has just received the difficult bits she's meant to work on, so is finally cracking on with sorting out her piccolo. She started piano lessons at Easter and is going fast, currently playing Grade 3 pieces, and working through the Grade 2 sight reading and Dozen a Day books. Rara is 8 and far less keen - we are still currently trying to figure out what she really enjoys so that we can encourage her. But for now, she's learning the recorder and cello, and is between Grade 2 and 3 on both.

Goo did her flute exam on June 23rd, and now won't have any until at least March, or next June if I can push for that. Rara will probably do Grade 3 Recorder at Christmas. I have had a quiet exam term for my pupils - 7 altogether. 4 are already safely through (3 merits and a distinction), we are awaiting results for a Grade 6 Theory, and I have a couple of clarinettists still to go on Monday.

Great Loose and mini!

Well done to miniLoose and miniMistri-she is so talented!

We are enjoying the summer with quite a bit of practice going on from my middle one on the cello. We changed to 1/2 size cello and I had to do couple of trips to the music shop (we hire) to get new strings, sound (how knew there is such a thing as a Wolf note!) etc sorted.
DS2 and DS3 (and me :0) enjoyed their summer music (cello and violin) camp. My violin practice has taken off as well, need to keep up with my 5 year old now..
My 5 year old (DS3) keeps going around the house "playing" his violin very fast-mostly in tune but not always.
All summer exams (three! for poor DS1; and one piano for DS2) went well with good results. Although this lack of planning on my part will not happen again! It was hard for all.
Hope you are all enjoying the summer so far

Music your DCs sound lovely - especially your 5 year old playing very fast! I do know how you feel about multi exams! We had three this summer and it's too stressful for me!
I think ds1 is doing bass guitar and theory exams next term but ds2 will be having a break from them for some time! I think both DCs have spent more time playing around with an acoustic guitar this summer than on their "real" instruments!

I should add that I think both DCs are developing a "real" interest in guitar but I am holding back completely to see what happens! They can let me know if they want lessons. At the moment if they want to learn s tune, DH can show them how to play and then they disappear for a bit with his guitar to learn it!

Musicathome: I am so longing to a day I can send mine to a summer music camp, great that the cello has grown to 1/2
Loose: oooo a new instrument oo!! An electric guitar is VERY cool!
There hasnt been much practice these days, only on etudes and dictations, we start missing learning pieces. She actually asked today that mommy are we not doing any exam? I'd like to learn a new piece properly. Well, girl, you asked for it, dont blame me in the future! On a good note(however non musical related or a distraction from music) I have someone who insist to read and learn to read in our mother tongue language with me every night. We speak our native language at home however I never got too far away with her being able to read(well) and write. She has only been starting for 3 weeks since her holiday and she can read quite well. (I am trying to find excuses for lacking of practising and motivation to practise in this household)

Hello, just popped on to offer a suggestion for anyone with pre grade 5 Aural strugglers or shirkers

We bought Simon, you know the old 70's game, but in cube form.
Have recently found it and remembered we bought it for dd several years ago as an aid for Aural.
It's great at encouraging remembering the notes, order etc. Only a small part but it really helps them to improve. it helped in other ways but can't remember.
just thought I'd share as I'd found it

gillybeanz Brilliant suggestion, thank you so much!
Green I actually think these different ways of using the brain all link up in the end and language skills help music and vice versa. So in fact it all interconnects and benefits everything. dS1 is learning Japanese with a tutor who says all her students are like him - they love manga, computer games, computer science and music!
Totally unrelated but DS2 is loving the sailing course (on a lake in a London park so nothing too demanding!) so I am not saying anything about music practice this week to him as this has kept him occupied and out in the fresh air while I got on with some work!

Totally agree about the languages, my dd seems to be struggling in many subjects and has almost certainly got learning disabilities.
She is really good at Languages though. Maybe it's because music is a language too

Interesting what you say Gillybeanz. My DD is very similar to yours, but two years older.
We found out she has dyslexia partway through year 6 at her old school. She really struggles with a lot of subjects when it comes to exams but is doing really well in languages too.

Gillybeaz: will google about Simon tonight, thank you.
Loose: we love water too, we have been doing few rowing near where we live and swimming almost everyday. I set up a pool with a heater on top of our decking so the girls are in their swim suit all day these days. Good luck with Japanese too.
Regarding to language, to be honest, its easy for her because since birth I have a rule that we only speak our mother toungue language at home and to each other, when I leave anyone a note, I write in my languague, many times I know she cant really understand many of it. We are not good at languague to be honest, she has been learning French at school, doing extra French club, we go France very often even just a short weekend, I even hired a French private tutor who came for 3 months and she can speak very little...to be fair compare with a proper musical kid, we are only lurkers( but I like the theory that everything can be learnt as long as we have a right attitude and give it enough respectation)

Do any of you have experience of the grade 5 practical musicianship exam? Ds is 9, taking grade 5 violin at Christmas and isn't very committed to the theory side of things. He's excellent at aural and has achieved full marks in his previous exams and I wondered if that would help with the musicianship? I thought we could try this first and attempt theory later.

Pizzza

Not direct experience no. However, i have read posts from teachers on the forum that say it is heavily weighted in Aural.
If you go on the website I'm sure it states what is involved and how marks are awarded. I can remember downloading and printing several sheets if this helps.

Truffle
It really interests me, particularly because both me and dd used to get so fed up with people commenting that she must be good at Maths.
Yes, it's a huge struggle for her and without intervention she only got 10% in end of year Maths exam. School have time tabled regular sessions for her this year and she is part way through assessment.
French and German results were in the mid 70's and 80's.

Thank you gilly - it sounds like ur could be ideal for Ds then.

I know plenty of mathematicians who have no interest at all in playing musical instrument. It does get annoying sometimes when people make assumptions like that all the time.

We are doing grade 3 theory at home. DS has a tendency to be quite, er, creative, with the bit where you had to write a 4-bar rhythm.... He promises to be more conventional if he had to write an exam...

PizzzaTheHutt don't have experience but we were thinking about Practical musicianship too, also based on a good aural skills. However piano teacher said dd still have to know her theory well to do it, violin teacher said she already knows enough through the lessons and he could just prepare her for practical musicianship... but at the moment it feels that theory is just a quicker option and easier to control....plus two teachers are involved.... so I am still thinking.....

Greenleave I am always amazed by your and your dd's enthusiasm and energy to try different things.... Keep posting-it greatly motivates me too :)

DD did poorly in end of year 9 maths with 27% but is has done well (70s) in both French and Spanish.

She was in denial about the dyslexia initially, has only really come to terms with it over the last six months. She does get very stressed about the exams generally which doesn't help.

With maths, she is an absolute whizz with times tables and pure arithmetic but once we get to the " Fred sets out in a south westerly direction five minutes earlier each day except for the third Friday in every other month...."

She also has Meares Irlen and finds purple glasses help but she doesn't like to wear different so will only wear them for sight reading in music exams.

That was supposed to say "appear different".

Very interesting about different abilities.... I suppose dd is the classical-maths-music relationship, advanced at maths from an early age, though she is quite good at languages too - but it is more memorising rather than actual talking and expressing her thoughts but a very early reader. Isn't it interesting to look at them and see how it all works and connects?

The main issue we have is that dd appears to be very much on adhd side and this is on her way to succeed in anything. Therefore no orchestras, music camps or whatever at the moment...We are trying to deal with it but it takes ages to see specialists in this country....

Agree re: maths- languages- music thing. Miniprada (10) sat her GCSE Spanish this year. We are not bilingual and I am at the 'dos cervecas por favor' level. Her father speaks no Spanish. She does however pick languages up really easily which we found out by accident. She won't get a A* but she is likely to pass overall which is amazing given that she started in y3 with no knowledge at all!

Truffle

I had to laugh, shouldn't really but dd SENCO said she had complained that the notes were wobbling on her sheet music and she was playing permanant vibrato.
They tried different colours, I can't remember what she said worked, but they just give her coloured sheets to put over the music.
It may be an option if your dd prefers this to coloured glasses.

I'm not sure if school will suggest practical musicianship for dd, they usually have to do the theory but she is struggling and it is holding her back.
She is attempting pieces used for the Diploma and has consolidated much of the grade 8 syllabus now.

This is the jazz piece she is working on and it's driving me mad. She started off slowly and now can almost do it to speed. She wants to play it on one of dh gigs this thursday he may agree if pestered enough.
There's free time during the interval and the audiences are great at this regular event, so should be ok.

DD was ok with the theory, in fact she amazed me as she did it in the summer of year 6 having only done grade 3 at Easter.

Mind you, she was taught by her extremely determined piano teacher. DD had got her place at music school to start in year 7 and then promptly broke her wrist at the beginning of the summer term. As she was unable to play violin or clarinet and only RH piano her teacher said they might as well do the theory. DD was only a couple of marks off a distinction which was great. I'm glad we got it out of the way then.

Mind you, she has found the grade 6 a lot harder, but should be taking it next term.

Too many mind yous there, apologies!

We did try with coloured sheets but DD needs such a deep shade of purple that the overlays don't work for her.

Thanks anyway.