April Music Thread

[Wafflenose]

We've managed to fill up the March thread, so I give you April's, around 10 hours early. Don't use it all up at once!

The music threads are for learners of ALL ages and stages, including beginners and adult learners.

My kids Goo (11) and Rara (8) break up from school today, thank goodness. Rara is off sick at the moment, in any case, but they both need a break. They did their music exams this week. Goo got a distinction for her Grade 7 Flute, and we are awaiting the results of Rara's Grade 1 Clarinet, plus a couple of my pupils. They will probably come on my birthday - the ABRSM ones often do.

Next term, we have a big community concert at the local high school - all the feeder schools take part. Goo could do Grade 7 Recorder and/ or Grade 4 Piano, but I don't think she wants to. Rara is doing Grade 3 Cello. My Year 6 Recorders have been asked to play in the local Festival gala concert, and I'm sure there will be primary school leavers' performances too.

So you know those writing a rhythm for some words part of ABRSM theory? Why can't some people (ie DS1) just do a 4/4 rhythm? Why does he HAVE TO write something silly like 6/4? Why? >

Drummers first prize! Wow! He is indeed very good!

I do leave it to the teacher generally but dd has this habit where she decides to something "should" sound in a way, practises that way and then no amount of teacher input will get her to correct it. She ends up playing a rhythm error for example the same way and we're stuck on a wheel of teacher asking her each lesson to correct it and dd not doing it. So from time to time when I see this happening I need to intervene and remind her.

Great results, drummers and Miranda!

I have calmed down from last night's excitement, and have a newbie question please.

Ds said he definitely messed up on C piece, he jumped to the wrong key and played the part of it in total wrong notes.
Luckily, he managed to carry on as I passed on the advice I got here and not to stop playing.
He got 24 for that piece. I am sure the examiner must have been quite generous since it's only grade 1, but wondered how they grade these performances. So do you get better results if you carry on even you made a mistake, rather than stop and start over and play perfectly?

Irvine from my understanding you get better marks if you continue past the mistake and keep going correcting as you go than if you stop to correct the initial mistake. So imagine there is a performance at the Royal Albert Hall and the pianist makes a mistake but keeps going past it keeping up the rhythm and reverting to the correct notes as soon as possible you wouldn't even notice compared to the pianist stopping completely, pausing, finding his way and starting again. This is what the dc need to aim for in an exam too.

Obviously the example above is a huge stretch of imagination, I am yet to go to a professional concert and hear mistakes being made.

On the other hand, making a mistake in the middle of the piece and not recovering, playing the wrong notes all the way to the end would not be preferable, in the situation when they cannot recover from the mistake it is better to stop and pick it up again from where they stopped. At least that is what our teacher told us.

There's a handy how we mark our exams section on ABRSM if that's the board your son took. I didn't obsessively look over it waiting for the results, oh no.

I had one fudged bar in each of my pieces but didn't stop and got 24/26/26 for my pieces at grade 2. I'm sure they do get a bit stricter as the grades get higher but not too bad, I'm sure they are more on our side than they were when I first took exams about a million years ago.

Thank you, Fleurdelise and MrSlant.

Fleurdelise, it does make total sense. I think one thing my ds learned this time is to keep calm, and carry on. One big thing I am so grateful about this site is , before, he used to lose it if he made a mistakes, may have got into total meltdown if it was at the exam!

And now I will forget all about it, and just enjoy the result. Thank you!

I am yet to go to a professional concert and hear mistakes being made

Apparently they all make a mistake but we don't really notice - it's part of the skills belongs to professional performers. I bet some mistakes they make is such a tiny thing, it may even not be counted as a mistake for us normal people though.

In fact, a mistake free performance is a rare thing! DH hears them all, DS is now starting to match his dad. I hear them NOT
Who wants perfection anyway, right? I heard a child play a perfect Minute Waltz the other day, note perfect, but with little musicality and spirit...
Irvine yes, carrying on is the most important thing, also in sight-reading. DS was given a specially hard sight-reading task in a jd audition. He made up half of it but said it sounded very nice

drummers, I am guessing the JD who gave your DS a hard sight-reading is JD2? My DS said their's was much harder than JD1 and much much harder than NCO's. Luckily sight-reading is one of his strength so it was OK. But I was surprised such a difference in the level given between the JDs since both are equally respectable institutions.

Yes, JD2 Kutik. He said he'd never seen such hard sight-reading. I think they may have been testing resilience and how they react to a challenging task? Like I said, he invented half of it on the spot which I guess showed improvisation skills!

How cool! Improvisation is what DS is dying to learn alongside composition. We were told he would have access to the lesson once he passed g6 theory. He is motivated!

Violinists and pianists had to go through two rounds of auditions due to the high volume of the application. He was given the same sight-reading material at the second round. DS told the audition panel that he did this already at the first round,. They apologised and handed him another hard piece... Imagine, if DS hadn't told them and just played the same one, he would have played much much better as it was not his first time to have a go at it. He was too honest so suffered!!!

I am sure they appreciated the courage.!

Kutik

My dd loves her impro lesson and also does Jazz harmony.
It's totally different to classical and you need to learn scales in a completely different way, it's like starting again.
Then you learn the chords, their structure, and what fits with each scale when playing over changes.
Then you get to play transcriptions, which is great as you feel like you are actually playing jazz. The solo's are already there though, so it's not being inventive yet.
You are quite advanced before you begin to work out your own solo's.
Sometimes, it's better to use the existing solo that the artist used rather than trying to reinvent the wheel.
Improvised solo's are usually used for newer or original compositions where the audience isn't familiar with the solo.
I'm not an authority, have just listened to dh over the years, but will help anyone who has basic questions on Jazz.

Hello loose no, no plans for diploma, I don't even think that has crossed his mind... However, he may surprise us. I will not mention it!! Orchestral percussion (tuned, timpani, snare) will be at jd as of September. Drums will continue with present teacher, he took g8 last autumn and now they just work on getting better, probably considering a national level drums competition next year for the fun of it. Piano he's taking g8 in two months and will continue with present teacher with free pieces. Jazz piano also continues with present teacher for the love of it, no exams. Composition he's involved in an international project between two schools which I hope he can work on in the holidays mainly. So that's what the near future is looking like, exam free! I just wrote that then remembered jd will make him sit theory g6. Blimey.

Wow many DC involve lots of music activity. I cannot image how they can manage. My DD does everything slowly and slowly. She only has JD & NCO, but we think she has been very busy and cannot do any more. Today she is 9, hope she can manage her academic and music better and better.

Yes that's what I meant regarding professional performances, I meant I am yet to see a professional performer stopping and starting again in the middle of a performance. I do know they make mistakes but my amateur ears will not hear it due to their capability to keep going and even improvising till they find their place again.

Happy birthday to your dd violinandpiano!

I'm not sure if this is of interest to any of you.
There seems quite a bit going on to, if you look through the site.
We aren't going as dd not that into Piano and does much of this anyway.
I can thoroughly vouch for the experience though as some of dd friends have done it.
www.pianosummerschool.com/

Meant to say, sorry.
If you click on courses, there's one for impro

Happy 25th birthday green!

Dd's violin teacher misspelt her (quite straightforward Celtic ) surname wrong on her application as the certificate had appeared with a misspelt surname. Dd is fuming. Can this be changed? Is it worth it - we have g 4 early October

This thread moves so fast congratulations to drummers, Irvine and anyone else I've missed !!

We paid for the exams so now the game is on. It still seemed like we could postpone it till now but now that's that. The teacher said she's not worried at all, the pieces and scales are where they should be now, sight reading is good (can get better), aural no worries at all she's done a test today and she was impressed apparently. Clarinet tomorrow so there will be some pressure there also to get the third piece finished but I am not worried with that.

Drummers phew! I am tired just reading that but I'm sure it will all go well as he is so dedicated. I think the grade 6 theory will be really interesting for him. However, I now see the reluctance to mention a diploma!
It all sounds good for the exam, Fleur!