December Music Thread

[Wafflenose]

Have a new thread for December!

This is an ongoing chat group for musicians, parents of musicians and anyone interested in music. We talk about practice, scales, theory, instrument hire and purchase, concerts, exams, auditions and loads more. Newcomers and beginners are extra specially welcome - yes, a lot of us now have children who are getting quite advanced, but we all had beginners once. I started the conversation when my eldest was 6 and working towards Grade 1, and we now have learners of all ages and standards on here.

I am a teacher of woodwind, and have two daughters. Goo is 12 and in Year 7. She loves her new school, and has grown up fast since she started. The first few weeks were overwhelming and confusing. She loved the challenge of new subjects, new faces, lots of different sports, etc. Unfortunately, she is a poster child for complacency, is now finding it all very easy, and doing the bare minimum again, sigh. She extends this approach to music too, putting in a bit of effort at the last minute, and often making an eleventh hour bid to change piece for important performances. She is gregarious, intense and obsessed with her phone. Oops, I forgot to say, she plays the flute and piano. Grade 8 flute is pencilled in for some time next year (teacher is campaigning to wait until train tracks come off) and she hasn't performed on the piano or taken any exams yet.

Rara is 9, and a completely different kettle of fish. She likes music, but she likes reading, art and making things even more. She's talkative, eccentric and highly creative. I have no idea how her mind works. She is in Year 5 at the village primary, and couldn't really care less about academics. She plays the cello (working at an early Grade 4 level) and clarinet. Some of her clarinet pieces are Grade 4, but she is having some technical problems at the moment, mainly due to her size and incorrect placement of her fingers. So the next exam she does will probably be Grade 3.

Both girls are members of South West Music School (Rara starting next month) and both auditioned for the NCO. Goo was very pleased with herself, but Rara had an absolute disaster. She bounced back within a day though.

Oh no loose I think it's that post-mocks effect. Hope he recovers soon xx

to Loose's boy. Poor him...

DS has also developed cold-like symptoms over the last few days (it always has to be auditions/concerts time!). Tonsillitis is around at school... I'm praying he won't get one. Lots families/friends events are planned during the holiday and we are having family friends coming from Spain staying with us from this Friday. Can't have a sick child....!

DS is having his time though, while suffering from serious runny nose. He had great response for his violin performance the other day, then on the following day he played a fab piano piece at his school talent show and came 1st. He got sweets, mini toys and teacher's sticker for the reward that made him the happiest teddy bear. It's the last day of the school so kids are just having fun with panto and party.

First jump on this thread, though I’ve popped in a few times over the months to read and mostly just be impressed by all the successes.

I have 11.5 year old DS who has just finished grade 5 here in Australia. He plays cello, and has decided that for high school he should go to VCA. Which is lovely but there are 20 places and applicants world wide and he’s no where near as good as he thinks he is. About grade 5 level, which is enough for applying to private school music scholarships but without a lot of work I’m not convinced that’ll be more than a good experience. The primary school has good singing and very mediocre instrumental programs. Y will switch across to violin for that next year to improve his treble clef reading and increase his offerings to high schools.

K is 9. He’s my flautist. This year has been frustrating because some technical things that became issues when he finally stopped needing the bent head slowed him down and he’s about half way through book 2 Suzuki. He’s coasting through life in many ways, which makes him sometimes seem the easiest of my lot.

N just turned 8. She is being dragged kicking and screaming, sometimes literally, through Suzuki book 1. She’s autistic which much of the time looks like just bad behaviour and I’ve not got a teacher for next year.

T is about to be 6. We intended him to start violin this year. He staged a revolt and joyfully has no practice ever to do. He did announce a desire to learn clarinet as he thinks with 2 strings players it would be best if there were also 2 woodwind. But he’s small, I can’t find a teacher locally willing to take one that age and I’m cringing at the thought of trying to find time to practice with him.

That’s the complicating factor. Neurological condition means I’ve been sick all year, am now permanently wheelchair dependent and my capacity to manage extra-curricular is at an all time low.

I suppose I’d rather like to join others who can celebrate when children succeed even in minor ways and maybe to be given support managing Y’s journey through the music scholarship process and application to the one state music school available. He’s hugely ambitious except when he’d prefer to do anything but the practice he’s been asked to do. And he’s rather pleased with himself at winning a small scholarship for music excellence and refuses to see that this will not necessarily improve chances of getting further awards or opportunities.

Does your son go to a prep school Kutik, both of mine finishe rheir school/nursery tomorrow which suit me just fine. The thing I love most with state schools is shorter holiday, for working parents meaninf cheaper childcare.
Love Drummers time table and 4hrs music practice a day !?!
My aim for this Christmas is doing a little of vocab, I might learn couple to improve my English along with her too. We are off to Regent Street after school today.

Morning all. Drummers, 4 hours a day!!😵. Incredible.

Could anyone help me devise a practice time table for ds please. He needs to be doing around an hour a day on violin. He doesn't do grades but he works on concertos and the lie and obv scales and arpeggios. He also needs to be doing theory every day. He's just started the grade 4 book. He needs it broken down into chunks with small breaks. I'm struggling to work out the best way and his violin teacher is out of action at the mo due to ill health so don't want to bother her.

Thanks

Disorganised rather than a practice timetable, I use checklists. We add everything the teacher has said to do to the list, and then I assign a range of tasks each day. I can post my template if you like. That way DD is focussed on what she has to do rather than time, which seems to work better for her, and it also can be broken into chunks x

I love the checklist idea folkmama! I remember when mine did G5 theory we also broke down to items/checklist and read and focus on the ones we need more.

Folkmama that would be great thanks. I'm despairing at the mo. He is getting to the point where is orchestra friends are catching up with him wrt to standard, not that it's a race at all but he needs to refine things with bowing and so if he wants to audition for Guildhall.

Here you go!! It's just a very basic word table so can be amended to suit your own purposes. I try and be quite specific - e.g. 'Dancla No.8, bars 1-12,' 'G major, 3 octaves, sperate and slurred', or 'upside down bow exercise - remember IN TO HAND'.... Theory usually gets just one line and then I use different coloured pens to mark each day's exercises in the actual book, then put a star in the corresponding colour on the sheet so she knows which colour has been set for that day. It used to take ages, but now I can knock this out in about 15 mins post-lesson. It's taken a lot of pressure off both me and Noo as I am also trying to develop more independence in her practice, so by doing this it's very clear what she needs to do. She then often chooses to leave certain bits until I am around. Works for us anyway xx

Alex, to you. Wish you a speedy recovery!

Green, DS goes to a state primary. You complained about the size of the school orchestra but come to ours then you'll probably appreciate yours as we have no orchestra nor chamber/band, but just a small violin group and a dying school choir only!

folk, you have all my admiration!! Very organised!!

Recently DS started giving me pronunciation lessons and he's already helped me corrected a couple of my weakest letter sounds. He becomes my little professor Higgins! Not sure if I can keep authority once we started our comprehension boot camp!

Ha! Not sure about being organised, but it's taken lots of tears, tantrums, various incarnations of reward charts, bribes and threats to find a system that actually works for us, lol!!

Folk that's amazing and I definitely think it would be worth a try disorganised .
Hi to all the newcomers
Hope all that are ill recover soon and enjoy a restful holiday and Christmas

Thanks for the good wishes! The young master has rallied enough to eat something.
Wishing a speedy recovery to Alex and The Boy and all those afflicted with seasonal bugs!

Oh so it seems there really is a bug around. Hope it leaves minialex soon. Mahler sounds so good.

Green and disorganised 4 to 5 hours is his holiday average. As a percussionist, it's amazing how much time he needs. For example he can do two hours on drums, one and a half hours on marimba, half an hour snare exercises and studies, then if you add one hour on piano... And then he practises timpani at school. Also remember he's older than your lot!

loose when is first GCSE composition due for miniloose1? DS' is due on the first day back.

green good luck in Regent street. Take your Wonderwoman shield and boots to face the crowds.

alex I missed you're not well either...get everyone to care for you.

drummers not sure about the real deadlines for gcse music compositions! He had draft ones. I think there may be a lot of catching up to do in January!

Inspired by all the talk of boot camp have suggested this to ds1 who has a slightly more laid back approach to practice than his sister. Hoping that her result today ( distinction for grade 2 piano, can't boast anywhere else!) Will encourage him to work for his grade 3 next, in the spring. We aren't going away so plenty time for relaxation and practice!
We also had a lovely joint high school and cluster primary schools orchestra and choir carol service/ concert in which DD did her first oboe concert and loved it. Hope everyone managed to stay healthy till the end of term. Only one more assembly, one church nativity and one church carol service to go!

Wishing all the poorly people a speedy recovery for the festive season. Fingers crossed we manage to avoid it here.

One more day at work for me, although it's likely that I will be doing bits on and off over the next couple of weeks. Oh joy! Was hoping to get a day to get sorted on Friday as both dc were doing two day music courses,, but unfortunately DD2's guitar course has been cancelled.

And welcome to Emerence. Sounds like a busy household!

Congratulations to horseymum's DD - that's a lovely result to get just before Christmas!

Hope everyone's recovering from whatever lurgy is ailing them and hello to those joining!

It's Day 2 of Bootcamp here and I am actually pleasantly surprised at how well it's gone. After DS's histrionics yesterday, I was preparing for an ongoing struggle today but a proper night's sleep and a bit of a lie-in this morning seems to have done him the world of good.

So, both the DCs have done an hour of practice today, had a 45-min piano lesson each and have done a theory past paper each. DS is making progress in his piece C (his nemesis) and thankfully I think he is actually seeing in front of his eyes that the practice is working. Although, drummersmum - I was telling DS about your DS's 4 hours of practice a day - his eyes were like saucers!

We are out on a trip tomorrow so it will be more of a struggle to fit everything in but am hoping they can each do 30 mins of practice before we go and then another 30 mins and a theory paper each when we get home.

Boot camp started here tonight. Rara did 30 mins of clarinet and really is improving dramatically. I would say she's close to grade 4, but I do want to fill in some gaps and have her take the grade 3 next term. She has been warned about theory too. Gooh did 15 minutes of piano and then threw a strop!

Goo not Gooh! Good reminds me of Winnie the Pooh. Or we could go posh with Rahrah and Gooh.

horsey congrats on that fab result. And to minikutik on his first prize!
Also very nice to hear that music bootcamp is in full swing in the japanese and waffle households.
Here we're all working hard in our respective duties and I've just managed to really catch up with the thread. We have scheduled a run in the park in the morning. Hope the weather's kind to us.

waffle

Emerence I have no advice for four playing children, I had all on trying to get one to play regularly and focus on what he'd been told to do rather than what he fancied playing.