July Music Thread

[Wafflenose]

Hello, I have just realised it's time for a new thread! Feel free to discuss anything musical here - any level at all, from total beginners to advanced, and adult learners are welcome too!

I am a teacher of woodwind, currently limping towards the end of term (July 24th... can't wait!) and have two DDs. Goo is 12 and plays the flute and piano. At the moment, she's doing the bare minimum, but she has won the Y7 music attainment award at her enormous comprehensive secondary school, so we get to go to an awards ceremony next week. Her piano teacher is about to retire, so we're looking for a new one. Rara is 10 and I would say is now a joint first study cellist and clarinettist - it doesn't come easily and she's progressing at an average rate, but a good Grade 4 on both. She spends most of her time reading, drawing, doing origami and swimming for a club.

I have so far managed to get through 27 music medals this term (6 still to go) and 4 Trinity exams (1 ABRSM still to go) and about half of the concerts!

DS has just got back from a week long music course. Just about everyone else was residential but we live locally so DS could go as a day delegate. For anyone with brass players in the family there are a number of brass summer schools that run every summer, with child players someone would need to accompany them because they are not specifically aimed at children. The one DS was on had about seven children from a group of maybe fifty.

The highlight of my week was seeing an internationally recognised soloist doing a duet with a junior delegate on one of his grade five pieces.

Raspberry, I am sure it is, seems a pretty unique set up! The boys have to camp outside though which I imagine is trick with the Cumbria weather most years. I hope she likes it, a sixth former from their school is on her eighth year and my dd has two friends from her cathedral. No one at her cathedral had heard of it but they said don’t show them up!

Dd has scratched her (new) Violin somehow in orchestra this week or last. Do I need to take it to a luthier or can something else help?

We finally got round to buying a new piano stool today - the question of shiny or matt finish came up and my answer of 'matt, it doesnt show the fingermarks so much' caused much sniggering from the salesman

Knitting that sounds amazing! Yesterday we saw some of the cyclists in the RideLondon 100 race going through our neck of the woods and there was a local brass band playing, which sounded fantastic. (It was news to me that there was even a local brass band!)
Mending that would have been my concern, too!

Se - how annoying! I would take it in to an expert to be honest. Either a luthier or experienced teacher. They can check whether it is just a scratch or something more serious, like a crack. If it is just a scratch, it probably doesn’t matter too much. You can get it polished or leave it, depending on cost

I hope it isn't a crack she's only had it a month , but yes I will try and take it to a luthier at the weekend. She is on a course all week. Scared for the cost, the cat is having dental work on Friday- maybe an expensive week

Sympathies - these things always happen in batches . Hopefully anything significant for the violin will be covered by insurance (if you have it), or as the violin is new, by warranty.

Taggie the violin is insured. The cat is not. I had insisted with her half that a cheap second violin went to school instead of the proper one. I thought more care would be taken now, but maybe not .

Hope your dd has recovered from Pro Corda

se Glad to hear that the violin is insured. Bad luck about the vet bill though

DS2 has recovered pretty well from Pro Corda thanks, and is now counting down the days until NCO. He had a fantastic week, and got a lot out of it musically! One of the older players took him under his wing a bit, and helped him with his practice, even giving him tips about smoothing his bow changes, which is lovely, and what Pro Corda is all about really.

Noo's JD timetable arrived today - so exciting! We will have a 10am start which is great as it means we can leave at 7.30'instead of 6... phew!

It's felt like a very long few days since we dropped her off at county residential. Very much looking forward to having my girl home tomorrow.

"How much time to grade 8" is a tricky one indeed. Don't forget to factor in preparing the aural requirements. My eldest was supposed to be playing pieces instead of doing a grade 7 exam but there were problems of motivation and perhaps communication issues so she ended up practising a grade 7 programme (and not liking it IIRC). Eventually towards the end of the year there was agreement reached that she would start her grade 8 pieces. Over the summer I got stuck in with her such that when she went back in September her teacher went "oh, maybe we could do it this term". Which got it done and dusted albeit only with a pass. But we were trying to avoid complicating the summer term and she had exams to do in 2nd term that year so it may have been the best solution at that point.

My youngest sort-of started preparing 2 grade 8s last summer, but we didn't get very far with the scales and I think he had only really learned one piece on each instrument. The piano scales were practised at best half heartedly until third term, and list B and C were 2nd and 3rd term jobs respectively. His grade 8 theory that we'd got books for and talked about but not made time for earlier, was basically done in about 6 weeks! But for those 6 weeks his music exams were able to be top priority.

We are now properly preparing his grade 8 violin inasfar as he's practising the scales. I'm hoping he will be ready next term; but the piece he learned last term was well above grade 8 standard and his A piece is "in the bag". And of course having done one grade 8, the aural is much less of an issue.

His sister has had one term with a new singing teacher and there is talk of grade 8 next term I think - also GCSE year for her.

Mind you, my own experience of doing grade 8 violin (not ABRSM) was to start the scales from scratch about 3 months in advance, not having learned any violin scales previously :) And also, my sister and I were very much doing it from a more technically advanced standpoint rather than aspiring to it.

Trumpet, just a quick thought to share. If your DS is not planning to take abrsm after completing trinity you may want to find more suitable scale books other than abrsm g8 for him. I’m only saying this because I’m currently in a country where abrsm is not so known and teachers there are not particularly impressed with the selections listed in the g8 scale book. There are quite a few serious scale exercises available outside abrsm material for strings. I don’t know about trumpet but I assume it’s the same? As your DS is a serious musician who will go beyond exam system he may benefit from those serious materials rather than exam materials. Sorry if my thought is wrong.

Just realised I skipped quite many posts! Haven’t read all so sorry if my comment sounds out of date!!

Lovely to hear all about all the successful summer courses dd1 and dd2 have a string orchestra course next week (first group music for dd2 on bass). It's s relaxed course, not a residential, and the equipment list arrived yesterday - i must admit i sniggered a bit at the first 2 items being 'instrument' and 'bow'

Knitting that sounds great - which course was it ? I know of ones that take place at Wells and Framlingham College if it's one of those .
Patrick that's really interesting - I'll ask his teacher . Certainly lots of his exercises / studies are scale based anyway . Trinity also have scales - but his teacher doesn't like how they are set out - and the excerpts are a really useful thing to study (it's what you get asked for at auditions and there's lots of transposition which is always a good thing to practise !!)
Last week someone was asking about sight reading and NCO and I think I said last week it really is just about practise and ensemble playing - it will come. Ds was doing some sight transposition practise yesterday and the difference that a couple of years of ensemble playing has made is incredible . He said it was playing at AYM ( lots and lots of ensemble sight reading) that has now made it so easy - and aged 10 he really was truely awful at it

Soursprout totally sympathise with trying to avoid a clash with school exams - DS1 did his bass guitar grade 8 early for exactly that reason.
I've managed to keep the dcs on separate instruments for years thus avoiding sibling strife but now they are both learning guitar it's getting competitive and a bit needling! We also have the happy sound of them playing together - awww! And playing at the same time but different tunes - aaaargh!!!

Loving hearing about everyone's summer course experiences! Such a lot of choices out there. Loose, lol at the same time but different tunes! Fingers crossed for more playing together.
We're away sans instruments at the mo. See if anyone kicks into gear when we get back.

Hello sprout, DS did Trumpet G6 in May '17, G7 in Nov 17 & G8 in July 18 so they can be done relatively quickly. I did have the benefit of having him at home for a couple of months before the G8, which helped a great deal. We also learned the Grade 5 piano pieces in that time too - stress!!

Trumpet DS's teacher is also relaxed about scales but, like you, I do them with him and insist on them as part of his daily routine. Currently doing them double/triple tongued to kill 2 birds. DS did the orch exerpts in his exam - the Petrushka is fun!

Yes Ds has played that before - his teacher got him to play it when he was 11 ( he cried with frustration I seem to remember !!) Don't think he looked at it for long !!
Ds is struggling a bit this week after a very intense time with AYM luckily his teacher came round tonight - he's very good at fixing things . Ds observed once he's not teaching me to play pieces he's teaching me to play the trumpet - a very astute observation I think and as usual he knew what Ds needed to do ( mostly rest I think) . I think Ds needs a holiday really - nco first though !?!

se, DS scratched his violin during a holiday workshop last year. It was his first time to attend a workshop that parents were not allowed to stay so he had to look after his violin all day without my nagging nor reminding. So..., I wasn't too surprised by the accident.... JD auditions were approaching at the time so I was going to take his violin for a check-up anyway so I showed the luthier the scratch at the same time and asked their opinion. It turned out nothing serious other than cosmetic damage so technically speaking no repair was needed but they did some quick job just to make it invisible. They didn't charge me any penny for the job.

Hopefully yours has no serious damage neither, but it's good to have it checked just in case. Just to remind you insurance usually doesn't cover cosmetic repair but at least you can decide whether you want to have it done or not as it's not crucial to repair.

Patrick thanks very much - that is most reassuring. I was feeling my dd was the only child to make such careless mistakes with a valuable instrument. I will be taking it to the shop for inspection. Thanks for the comments about it not being covered by insurance- at least I go prepared.
I hope you and your ds are enjoying your holiday.