Autumn 22 music thread

[thirdfiddle]

Hi all - I thought it was a while since we've had a new thread so how about one for the new school year? Would be lovely to pick up some new families too, all welcome at any stage of music learning from out of tune singing 2 yr olds to music college aspirants.

@herbaceous how exciting on both fronts - BBC young chorister and Gavroche! Is he actually competing next week or is it the back story filming? Hope he enjoys it! Hope you do too!

Actual competing!

Tuesday mentoring with Aled Jones, no less, and rehearsal. And interviews with Kate Botley. Wednesday semi final, with five boys and five girls, then three of each go through to the final on Thursday.

Won't be shown until late November though.

So exciting @herbaceous. Sending all the positive vibes to your ds!

BBC young chorister is amazingly exciting @herbaceous - I hope that he kicks into action this week! Such an amazing opportunity.

In rather less 'prestigious' news, DD got through the audition for her school talent show and will be singing Dance Monkey and playing along on the Ukulele! She is however, absolutely thrilled, so I'm very pleased for her, and anything that gives her experience of performing in front of people has to be a good thing.

She's also talking about playing a piano solo at her Saturday music centre's Christmas show which is both surprising and amazing progress so not sure what witchcraft the new piano teacher has been working. She's planning to play Grieg's 'Wedding Day at Troldhaugen' which is one of the pieces she's been working on so its all good, but sensing will have to work at not getting her hands in a muddle in the 'crazy' sections. Still there are quite a few more weeks before that comes around so guess there's time.

@herbaceous how incredible! He's going to have a blast! Sounds like he is taking it all in his stride too and not getting stressed about it, which is great.

Yes, very good luck to your son @herbaceous - that is such exciting stuff! Gavroche is a great part too. They must be delighted to have a smaller strong singer.

Loving the idea of Dance Monkey. Dd once did a talent compBach piece or other, and they waved her through. However, she then segued straight into Baby Shark after the first two lines in the actual thing. And the children stood on their benches and sang all the words. It was bedlam. They never let her do it again.

However, she is getting to play at school next week in an informal concert. It will be the first time ever - she's year 9 so that's been two years of nothing at all.

Teacher initially said she would accompany but has baulked at the grade 8 piece - so she's going to have to do it alone. Fingers crossed it goes OK.

@minisnowballs love Your DDs style in the school talent competition! Sounds rather like my wedding, where the organist played our Vivaldi piece for signing the register and then segued smoothly into Elvis. Good luck to her next week up there on her own with no accompanist.

minisnowballs love the baby shark anecdote. Your DD must be a legend at school! No need to talent contest again after that, her reputation is made.
Go herbaceousDS! Guess you won't be able to tell us even anonymously how it went, but hope he has a great experience. What an opportunity.
Anyone else waiting on NCO/Projects auditions? I'm not sure when to expect to hear. Just projects as DD is still 10, but still would be nice to have dates in the calendar or not.

@thirdfiddle, I suppose we are- NCO application has been rather eclipsed by events here (she has NYO Inspire and other things so probably won't be doing it even if she gets it - she's costing far too much as it is right now! ) but we haven't heard anything yet.

She's older though - and only applied on her second instrument. Did enjoy projects last year. Meanwhile she has LSSO audition, apparently (I don't even know which instrument that's on, but her HoD has asked her to audition) and has to decide whether she auditions to two of the specialist music schools, both of whom saw her on informal visits recently and recommended she do so (she didn't like the third so hasn't played for them).

Big decisions - especially since I felt we were being presumptuous even looking...It's been a weird couple of weeks.

@thirdfiddle I decided not to audition DD in the end re NCO - wasn't sure that her violin playing was really at the right level and also it looked like it would clash with Sat music stuff or holiday orchestra (can't remember which) . Mainly though i think i was trying to avoid more expense at the time of the auditions! She's really improved since then though so might try her next year when she will be 10 so will be interested in feedback from the process.

Wow mini, exciting times, & big decisions for a young person. Good luck either way.
Northern, DD also really enjoyed Projects last year; as far as auditioning goes it's really simple now they're doing recorded auditions. Cost and time wise obviously needs balancing against other opportunities, they have a pretty good bursary system if you qualify. For DD was particularly worth it socially as she was young in quite an old cohort in her local groups. That's less the case this year, but she had a good time so wants to do it again if she gets in. What she didn't really engage with a huge amount was the online provision, there was a lot more she could have done if she wanted. The in person days are likely to clash with Saturday stuff, it did for us.

On NCO - DD2 has just been offered a place in the main orchestra - which is a bit of a surprise (we were expecting projects). Will be intrigued to see whether she wants it.

Wow @minisnowballs that's fantastic for your dd! Congratulations to her.

Congratulations @minisnowballs that's brilliant! Even if she doesn't want it, that's such a confidence boost and helps make all the practice seem worthwhile!

Congratulations to her mini. What a great confidence boost

Thanks! She didn't do a great audition, tbh, so I wonder if it was more of a case of them knowing what she could do (from projects last year, where the woodwind tutor was a bassoonist and of course there aren't many of them)... rather than them loving her audition.

She is a lot of fun and quite musical I guess, but quite a new bassoonist (started two and a half years ago) so it seemed a stretch.

Just seeing what the residentials clash with now!

Following on from @minisnowballs above and potential residential clashes. Scheduling and how the bloody hell..?

DD is primarily a musical theatre kid, she does two choirs and a weekly singing lesson, a weekly viola lesson. 2 dance classes a week and a musical theatre class once a week. If she's in a show there are rehearsals and she's currently in two so that's ramping up to three rehearsals a week. Now she's found an acting class she wants to do. She also wants to start a new, more advanced dance class when she's ready, but that clashes with rehearsals when she's in a show. Quite apart from the truly terrifying cost, where am I supposed to find the time for her to fit it all in? How do all of you do it and how do you do it with more than one child?!

There's quite a lot of stuff been vetoed by me, this is just what's got through the screening process!

My dd is an over scheduler. It's tough. Dd has three music lessons a week, plays in two orchestras and sings in two choirs. She also does piano duet and will start in a chamber groupe after half term. All this is through school though which helps. She then does dance and netball outside of school and is studying a gcse off timetable after school two days a week.

Luckily a lot of her music is before school (a 7.30 start one day a week!) which helps free up after school slots but she'll be starting a school production after Christmas and I've no clue how we'll fit that in too. We've had a lot of upset over not wanting to give things up. She genuinely loves it all which doesn't help.

Ds only has one or two hobbies and he's in L6 so can get himself to most things which does help.

Dd has had some periods when even after school has a timetable! It's not ideal and I don't know a better way to do it.

@QueenMabby before school slots sound amazing! That would really open things up. I can't see that happening here so I think I'm just going to have to find a couple of extra days a week 🤷‍♀️. Your Dd sounds like mine, and I love the enthusiasm for trying new things, but the unwillingness to let go of anything is also familiar.

We have the same problem! Dd2 came home from after school dance company, did her home work, went to musical theatre club and then did her music practices (well the ones she hadn’t done this morning).

The only saving grace is we live in London and she’s really good at getting herself about (and also school is very near home). Lots of homework is online so she can do it while she waits for buses. But it’s hard when they don’t want to give stuff up and keep adding more on.

I'm afraid we didn't manage it and sent dd to full time dance/MT school on a hefty bursary.

She also ended up giving up piano completely.

Today dd2 has gone in with a cello and a flute (cello to help out with a concert her sister is in). We do seem to have gone from 'no school music at all' to 'all the school music all the time'.

DD2 is having to do GCSE music after school and in lunchtime which really doesn't help as the sessions keep clashing with everything else. There's only so much she can just catch up on by being musical (she's not a pianist and they keep using keyboards) and she's missed two weeks out of six now.

Congrats to your DD @minisnowballs! My DS is also in NCO main on bassoon this year. I can't believe both the residential weeks are in Dorset again this year, same as for U13 last year. We are right up north and it's such a long way! I really hoped that we might get a different location for at least one this time, but no!

DS is also big on over scheduling and I had to draw the line at committing to driving him between a choir and one of his orchestras every Saturday so he could fit in most of each rehearsal even though they overlap. He's already in two school bands, two county and one regional orchestra (plus NCO) so this was one thing too many. When he starts GCSEs next year, the music classes will be 7:30am, so that's a bit of help.

Love it, the MN bassoon horde (what's the collective noun again?) start coinciding! Congrats all the NCO members. DD is into projects again, she's very pleased.
Can we have some of your spare in school music? Nothing going here.