DD and her violin exams - any music teachers here please?

[R202020]

Hello ladies,

 DD (11) has just had her grade3 result (ABRSM). She has AGAIN only passed. This has happened 3 years in a row :( 

Last year (Grade2), she got 110/150. She was determined and worked harder on grade 3. She loves violin and she might want to pursue it professionally. She plays at 2 orchestras. I attend all the lessons with her and the teacher seems good. At all her lessons, her teacher said she was doing really well. DD practiced A LOT through out and before the exam. She ended up with 110/150 AGAIN!! She is soo disappointed, and has started thinking about leaving the instrument. She said "mum, if it takes all that effort for me to just pass, may be its not for me"

What does it take to get a merit or a distinction? She is willing to put in all the effort she needs to, to become a musician. Whats going wrong?

Hello OP - also not a teacher, but have 11yr old DD who plays violin at an advanced level and also play myself. Lots of good advice here already in terms of where she can pick up extra marks. Also, have you looked at the ABRSM marking criteria? This will give her/you some idea of what they are looking for at distinction level:

us.abrsm.org/en/our-exams/information-and-regulations/graded-music-exam-marking-criteria/

(yes, I know this is from the US site, but the page on the UK site has disappeared and this is essentially the same...)

Without wanting to cast aspersions, quality of teaching is such an important thing. Have you seen any of their other pupils play in festivals etc. or do you know how others have done in exams? That may give you a steer on whether its a teaching issue, or something specific with your DD (like nerves affecting performance, or not taking home key learning points in lessons). Do you sit in on lessons? It has been shown to be highly beneficial to have a parent involved in lessons / practice, whether they are musical or not. You will be surprised how much you will be able to help!

Of course, passes are completely acceptable!! And especially at lower grades. But if DD is disappointed then it's understandable you want to help her to improve her marks. Although as others have said, exams and marks are totally irrelevant in the grand scheme of things - my DD hasn't done one since Grade 3 and is not likely to now. I understand your DD wanting to do them (it's nice to have goals and to be able to measure ones progress) but it may be healthier in the long run to try and coax her out of this mindset, especially if she wants to do this seriously.

That's all from me! good luck :-)

You have already received lots of great advice on the exam front so I would like to add something else, especially since your DD is looking at pursuing a music career in (assuming) performance.

If she really is serious about it, ditch exams, ditch any teacher who is exam focused (not saying yours is though). You would need to find a teacher who is aware of her seriousness and is capable to guide her onto the right path. Perhaps you may want to contact jds or even music schools to see if you can arrange any lesson with their teachers. She may not get regular lessons but may get an one-off lesson which would be great, and it may open up to another teachers (that's what my friend did for her DC and now he is at a specialist school studying music full time after studying under the teachers the specialist school introduced). I am not saying you need a teacher from those institutions but it's just so hard to find a teacher your DD needs for her purpose especially if you have no clue how the system works so it's just an easy indication that they must be at least good enough...

Maybe you like to watch a couple of her Youtube channel with your DD?

Hopefully her videos for young musicians will give your DD (and you) some ideas of what she really needs to care about. Nothing is wrong with exams, but your DD may realise there is simply no time for caring about them if she really is serious. Most of them have to be learnt while she is still young enough...

By the way, those who are suggesting parents helping children's practice at home... OP's dd is 11 not 6 or 7. While I understand the positiveness of parent's involvements for younger ones, many of children at OP's dd's age wouldn't particularly welcome that sort of invention from the parents so it needs a different approach I guess. Mine didn't appreciate anything more than listening to him from the kitchen by 9... OP can help her dd find a good teacher, ferry her around if needed, get her necessary materials,etc, but DD needs to learn how to practise rightly from the teacher directly, not via mum who doesn't play the instrument...?

^but mum being able to say 'I notice you don't practice your scales' is surely helpful. The teacher cannot be in attendance at every practice. The parent can help with that

My children's father is a music teacher and I have grade 8 violin.
I wouldn't worry about "just passing". It's fine. Just keep going with the grades adn enuoy the violin. My 3 sons all won music scholarhips. Even my son with 3 grade 8s (and grade 7 piano) who got his fair share of distinctions had the occasional pass.

We did tend to sit down with each of the children and listen to practice most days. I also accompanied them at the piano right up to grade 8 often every day although my the latter stages when they were really good it was an absolute privilege to play with them every day so not the chore it might be when you have a smaller child.

Perhaps try some music theory exams. I really enjoyed those and could sometimes get almost full marks even at grade 8 and I suspect if you have that kind of mind it is easier to get very high marks in theory which might encourage her even more.

OK it depends on a child. Some may appreciate parents' help more than others. But quite often it's the parent who are not ready to let the child go when actually the child is quite capable. Gentle ones may keep letting their parents in and even let the parents lead the practice but more usual ones would make the practice time awfully painful as understandably they are telling you to back off in teenagers' language. So..., you may want to try to see the line they are drawing...

In our case, DS didn't really appreciate me as a practice partner (a wise choose as I'm not a musician...) but welcomed me as an audience, driver, pa (as in contacting the teacher to arrange a lesson and getting required materials). He also needed me to remind him he was supposed to practise when he got distracted too much. And now at 11, he doesn't need me at all apart from as an occasional driver.

Being able to accompany your children like xenia would be lovely though. Would love to do that one day.

My 3 dc are Suzuki trained and for us it has been fantastic.
They usually get distinctions in exams and I think this is because their pieces almost always get above 28, giving them a good start.
We listen to the ABRSM recordings daily and watch other people playing them on YouTube too. Anything to get the feel of the piece!
We do also practise scales and sight-Reading daily too.

I agree to a certain extent Neleus, but I think it does also depend on the child. Dd did grade 7 at age 11 and got 144 - after that I left her to practise alone! Ds is now 11 and preparing for grade 7 - I'm still sitting with him - calling out the scales or asking to him redo parts that need working on. I will definitely relax a bit after this exam, but think he's likely to need me a bit longer than his sister, to help him stay on track 😬

Yes I agree with you, musikata. It depends on the child, as I pointed in my previous post.

110 is hardly a borderline pass 😂 Keep encouraging her - the violin is a really tricky instrument to master. If she wanted an easier ride she maybe should have picked the flute 🙈

I agree. 110 is fine. You could try doing loads of aural tests at home starting fvor grade 4 even now- just do a few a day so that she is really good at them by the time she does grade 4 violin. That can be a relatively easy way to pick up some marks.

Also although some children don't like exams others do like them and it can motivate them and give them an external assessment of how they are doing. One reason I put the twins in for grade 1 theory, grade 2 the next term, grade 3 the next was so they could get practice at exams, which are a huge part of children's life as they get older anyway.

Neleu, accompany them in the early stages can be a bit painful particularly with some instruments. When they get to higher grades it was fun however although grade 8 trumpet - my 5th child, last exam, was definitely a case of his grade 8 being better than mine on the piano but he still preferred me to accompany him in the exams as he and I were used to each other. To be fair to me the piano parts were very hard based on orginal orchestral parts.

DS has just (2 days ago) taken Grade 1 guitar. His teacher has really been emphasising the importance of fluent scales and dynamics.

Chill! Let her play for fun, go to school/Saturday orchestra/courses ... 30 mins a day is a lot of time to be giving up. And a career for a violinist is incredibly difficult even for the most talented.

I agree with everyone saying “chill” and a pass is great and play for fun and all the rest. But the OP’s daughter is feeling discouraged by working really hard, getting good feedback and still not doing as well as she hoped. So it seems perfectly reasonable to offer suggestions. And I really think that scales is a section where it’s easy to pick up or lose marks. My children’s teachers always aimed at getting as close to perfect in the scales as possible because things can go unexpectedly wrong in the pieces, and the extra marks give you a “cushion”.

My lazy lot often aimed for a fail on the scales as they were boring and hoped to pick up marks on the pieces (I do not recommend that plan however).

Just to second other posters emphasising the value and importance of scales and arpeggios. These are the building blocks of Western classical music and if you have these under your belt nothing is out of reach. They are also easy marks to get in an exam; there are no problems of interpretation or expression. Preparing for an exam, in 30 minutes practise I would suggest 10 minutes on scales and arpeggios at the start of practising. It is the shortest of short cuts to becoming an accomplished player.
And also to confirm that just playing a piece through many times is not real practise: the trick is to to identify the challenging bars: take them to pieces slowly, maybe just a few notes at a time and build up so that no one listening would know that that is the most difficult section.

@GrannyHaddick - I love that advice. DS took his first grade earlier this week (guitar) and is keen to carry on. I will hang in to this advice; I’m pretty sure it’s whst my music teacher told me more than 30 years ago!

I expect music teachers were telling pupils the same thing 300 years ago!

I tell my pupils that the tricky bits in the pieces need taking out of the piece and working on at the 'workbench'. This may involve taking things apart and then putting it back together note by note. When that bit is fixed, it can be put back into the piece. Sometimes, their goal for the week is to mend a few bars at home (after being shown how to practise it in the lesson), then we put it back into the piece during the next lesson. This is an analogy most pupils can understand, and it stops them just playing through pieces, making the same mistakes every time.

oh, and scales should be known by muscle memory.

DD off to the NYOinspire day today in London, anyone else going? 🙂

Oops wrong thread sorry!