November Music Thread

[Wafflenose]

Welcome to all musicians/ parents of musicians, young and 'mature', beginners and advanced, plus everything in between. This is one of the nicest corners of Mumsnet and the music threads were started for my older daughter towards the beginning of her musical journey, 7 years ago. Everybody on the thread was a beginner once!

I have recently seen "we're not a musical family", "I'm not musical" on here quite a lot, and would like to gently challenge that... perhaps you may not have found the right instrument/ teacher yet, or have no desire to play, but I think that everyone is musical. It's not a special something that is limited to certain individuals, although of course everyone's aptitude and natural ceiling varies. I have had the pleasure of teaching almost 1000 people to read and play music now, ranging in age from 3 to 96 and incorporating a range of additional needs, and I think they all got something positive from their lessons! What our young musicians most need from us - whether we play ourselves or not - is lots of encouragement, time and space to practise, and of course the constant taxi service and financial support we give to their lessons and ensembles!

I have two DDs, Goo The Energy Conserver (flute and piano, lapsed recorder and picc player) who is pretty lazy and complacent at the moment and just wants to enjoy her life, and Rara The Awkward (clarinet, cello, recorder) who tries hard... when it suits her! We have nothing special lined up this term, but possibly piano and clarinet exams for next term. Goo claims she wants to dust off her recorders and theory books to get another couple of Grade 8s before she leaves school. I'll believe that when it happens.

Over to you.

cantkeepaway, don't despair - he only needs one full offer. When I did music college auditions, I did Guildhall, RCM, RAM and RNCM. For reasons I can't even remember, I set my heart on the RCM, but got offered a reserve place there and definite offers from the other 3. Lots of people get a mixture of reserves and firm offers, so a reserve offer at this stage doesn't mean it's all over by any means, especially if it wasn't his playing in question.

Everything crossed and double crossed for his first choice.

Waffle I don't have any useful advice but wanted to sympathise as it must be so hard for both of you. Obviously I hope she does decide to carry on, even if it means changing teachers - not an easy decision, I'm sure.

Can'tkeepawayforever I just want to echo what Floot said. The first audition is going to be the hardest because it is unfamiliar. He's been there, done that now and he knows that his performance was fine. It is a nerve wracking time for them (and us) but it will be for everyone else too.

Without saying too much, we can't just go privately to this teacher, because we need full funding. It's a 2.5 hour round trip to her anyway!!

Thank you all for your kind words!

Mood in the Nosebleed household is probably best described as 'cautiously optimistic but nervous'.

This first audition shows that he is not a long way off the required standard, otherwise he would simply have been rejected. That is reason for optimism, as certainly I haven't been confident of that up till now.

However, nor is it the endorsement that an offer would have been, and especially with his preferred institution's audition coming up, all nerves are jangling.

It also starts to feel a bit more real and not an impossible dream, so nervousness (for us as parents) about the long term implications of choosing jazz performance as a post-18 option are more to the fore!

Sorry to hear that you are having a hard time waffle, I hope all comes good in the end.

Dd was just 8 when she started a Bb clarinet but was quite tall for her age then.

Voluntarily doing extra clarinet practice here this weekend. Such a turn around from a few months ago. It's been ignore a bit as bassoon concert last week and in two weeks time.

Thinking of you, Waffle.

For us, a door closing in one area - DS was a very promising junior footballer, fairly brutally deselected from the professional club junior setup - in fact opened what turned out to be a much better door in another area.

At the time, it was really difficult, but it does now feature in the first line of NBB's UCAS conservatoire personal statement as a positive turning point in his life!

Waffle, I have found my ds2 to be very rigid in wanting to stay with the same music teacher and really not wanting to entertain the idea of a different one. I think it is fear of the unknown. But in fact, I think a change of teacher can be like a breath of fresh air sometimes. So while it might feel like the end to her now, once she has reconsidered, a new teacher might actually turn out to be a good thing.

Is anyone's DCs continuing to work on theory post Grade 5? I seem to remember at least one DC from the thread - is it raspberry's mini? And Goo?

DD is keen to continue as she seems to enjoy theory. We don't know how she has got on with Grade 5 yet of course so waiting to see there. I have been having a look through some of the Grade 6 material - think my poor grey cells and memory are going to put to the test .

I'm tempted to keep DS going with theory, Melting, as I think it would be useful for GCSE music. Don't think he'll be so keen, though...

In a different subject, just spotted this advertised on a FB teachers group:

www.nycb.co.uk/?fbclid=IwAR1zfb6-DBJSvkLrW1-rkrGi7nP3NNpzLRexJXvCP5il-1rb3Yt0C-1fpkU

Goo will definitely do more theory, but I would rather she were a bit older. Grade 6 is more like grade 10! As well as being completely and utterly different.

My dd has been told to hold off any more theory exams for a while.
grade 6 is a huge step up according to her teacher.
She is studying it, but I don't think she's likely to take another theory exam until grade 8.
If they are taking GCSE and A level it isn't necessary, but of course the UCAS points are handy if they are going to study at an institution that counts the points.

Ah, maybe it was your DS I was thinking of druid - I remember reading about a mini on the thread doing Grade 6 theory. I think we'll take a look at some of the books and take it very slowly.

Probably. She's not challeged anywhere really, and is very lazy and complacent.

Waffle . Sorry it is so tough.

Melting you did remember correctly, Ds2 did Grade 6 theory last year. He enjoyed it and I think will come back to it again in the future.

Thank you for the sympathy over the GCSE mocks. I think the actial GCSEs feel slightly less brutal as though there are more exams they aren't squashed into two and a half weeks!

DS2's report just before half term said his submitted GCSE music solo performance and his ensemble performance were nearly full marks and full marks were within range. In real life the teacher has apparently not actually marked them yet which is annoying.

Waffle . This parenting thing is tough.

DS went onto the school field with 3 other boarders this morning. He played the Last Post & they observed the 2 minutes silence. I'm proud of them all.

That’s amazing littleladsdad.
Ds went on a trip to the battlefields and cemeteries in France and Belgium the other week . It’s really made him think - he was insistent that he wore his poppy for the NCO concert this evening. It’s great when you realise that even as young teenagers they can step beyond their own worlds and engage and reflect

Well done, Littlelad - wonderful.

My Dad's doing the battlefields trip next summer, Trumpet. It hope it affects her in the same way.

Well done to remembrancers... My dd1 went to her local service with the Girl Guides - it was moving, but I also wondered what the men who went off to war over 100 years ago would have made of the girls at church that day. South London has changed so much since then and the role of the church too. Good that the girls named and remembered them.

In more musicy questions - can some flute people help? Dd2 (9) takes her Grade 3 next month. She's not a very big nine - in fact her teacher keeps remarking on how small she is - as if it will help her to grow. She's not quite got the lung capacity to do the two octave scales on one breath - when should she breathe? She can do the chromatic in one, and the arpeggios. Is that OK?

Also, on the arpeggios that go to a twelfth (I think) there are two of the same note together at the top (sorry, I'm not very technical). If she is slurring the arpeggio, does she tongue between the top two notes to separate them? She doesn't seem to know and won't see her teacher til next week.

In more musical news, my 70 year old Dad passed his Grade 1 piano (Trinity) with Merit last week. We're all very proud, especially my little brother, who taught him. He said that out of the three candidates waiting with them, two were retired. I'm wondering if it's part of a trend. He was TERRIFIED! Makes me realise what we put the children through. No pressure for DD1s grade three violin on Weds now....

DS2 sang in the remembrance service yesterday. It was wonderful. So moving, and to a full chapel. They sang Howells and Parry. They had to sing two anthems, one in the usual evensong and the other during the formal act of remembrance. It makes me sad to think of young men of the age of the students in the choir dying in such numbers, only 100 years ago.

The choir have had a rough ride recently with one thing and another, and it was nice to see that they did so well when it really counted.