Spring 23 music thread

[thirdfiddle]

I saw some sunshine today so it's officially spring! Here's a new thread for all things musical.

With a nod to those who started the series, well before my young folk picked up an instrument or I braved the vipers of MN. This little corner is for support only, and bragging about your young folk's musical achievements is positively encouraged.

How are things looking for new year? Anyone new want to join us for a chat? Any lurkers want to delurk? All welcome from pre beginners to music college and beyond.

Without a teacher, it took me a lot of persistent experimentation to reliably get a note out of a fife. Teachers add a lot with this sort of thing. They can look and explain what angle to adjust, no instruction book can do that. Even recorder DD needed me to look, see what finger wasn't quite in place and feed back to her.

Sounds like what you may want is a proper try an instrument event. Again something our music centre do around once a year to try to encourage new starters, alongside an ensembles open day. With piano you can kind of have a go picking out a tune by yourself, most instruments you need an expert to tell you how to start, not just the instructions but the bit more this way / now try that feedback. Woodwind resp. brass tutors often teach several instruments themselves and can set kids up to try a few.

Grade 7 piano exam done. She came out pretty happy with how it went, said all the different sections of the exam were good and her pieces went well so will just have to wait for the results now. She has worked so hard for this so am hoping it's all good! She's really relieved it's all done too- plus the new local venue meant she was at school by 10:30 so it was way better than going to the Barbican to sit exams!

ooh @northerngoldilocks fingers crossed for a distinction :) my DD is also woking on Grade 7 piano - she's finding the aural tricky atm. What pieces did your DD do?
We also applied for viola on the school endangered instrument scheme - DD likes the idea of playing in an orchrestra

Whilst a distinction would be lovely, she'll be thrilled with a pass (though not sure her teacher will be). She was doing the previous syllabus (21/22) in the overlap year as we bought it for a particular piece (Pink Minor - its a jazz piece she loved), not thinking she would actually sit the exam, but then did end up doing it for the exam. Aural is tricky at this level. We initially got the ABRSM app but honestly didn't even know what was being asked, never mind how you worked it out on things like cadences. Thankfully her music school did aural lessons as an add on and they've made a massive difference. Its not something they naturally know how to do after about grade 3/4 so they do need teaching.

Viola is a great option - less squeaky than violin when they start and more opportunities. DD might give one a go at some point - though my violinist friend says she should grow more before she picks it up so sticking with violin for now.

@northerngoldilocks well done to your DD! Hopefully her hard work will be rewarded with a nice result! How long does it take to get the result?

DS will do a Initial grade in piano in September. He already play the pieces fairly well. He played one of them at the teacher's concert. Teacher is still giving new pieces so he doesn't get bored! I'm not sure about the aural part though. He seems to be great at pitching but not so good at timing/clapping to the beats. He plays pieces with good rhythm. It's hearing and recognising the beat that he finds difficult. Could that be something that can be trained?

Thanks - I think results are a bit slower at the moment because its a busy time for ABRSM. Sometimes they come back in a couple of days but this is via a music centre so will go to them first and then be sent on to candidates after. Maybe a week or so (doesn't stop me obsessively clicking refresh on the dashboard despite knowing its futile though!).

On Aural for initial grade i saw somewhere else where people were saying it was difficult for kids to hear the difference and identify the beat - someone suggested getting them to listen to it and march up and down - if they could it was in 2 and if marching didn't fit well it was 3. Might be worth a go?

Good luck for the result - I can totally relate to the constant refreshing

Thank you, I'll let him try the marching technique.

For Initial Grade aural they don't have to say if it's in 2 or 3 just clap the beat. Model this to help and if they miss some beats just ask if they can clap faster, that seems to help. If you model clapping louder on the strong beat that helps too.

It's a relief to know they only need to clap. Thanks for the advice. I'll definitely try it out!

Good luck for all those waiting for exam results.

Term is finished for us although dd has two performances left of her dance show.

She has two new piano pieces to get her teeth stuck into over the summer. She's a bit disappointed though as they're both still g7 level pieces and so my very self critical dd thinks that her teacher doesn't believe she's making progress despite the teacher saying that these pieces are to help her develop her stamina before g8 (they're longer than her previous pieces have been). Still. They're pieces she likes (Mozart and Chopin) so she's making strides on them already.

The most exciting thing for dd was an invitation to join the school's Chamber Orchestra next school year on her cello. It's a smaller string orchestra than the main school one and is composed of the higher level players. Places are by invitation only so dd was very chuffed.

Well done to her@QueenMabby - that sounds like a real vote of confidence (the chamber stuff). On piano, stamina on length of pieces is so important so it sounds sensible that she does those of summer - why do our children beat themselves up so much about these things?

Waiting with a LOT of trepidation for DD's flute result here.

She came out sobbing from the exam, messed up several scales after a panic on the first one, and says she wasn't happy with how the second half of her third piece went either. And then of course because she was panicking the aural went badly.

She was so well prepared this time too that I'm really sad for her. Never mind. Grade eight is a lot of pressure at 13.

Onwards and upwards. It's all change for her next term when she moves to specialist school, so she has last lessons with both of her main teachers tomorrow. I'm not quite sure how we thank these people who have completely changed the course of her life - a card really doesn't seem to cut it!

Neither teacher is going out gently either, we've had to buy two new flute books for the summer, and her bassoon teacher set for this week 'Grade 8 scales and arpeggios. All', plus three more brand new grade eight pieces. Must confess she's not quite got through it all (!)

DD did G2 viola this morning. There has been a month of angst, stress, yoga breathing and rescue remedy, helpers roped in because I can't help her practise, and she reckons it went well. Got distinction in G4 singing at Easter and has never been nearly as wound up for an exam as she was for this one!

She's also, like lots of others, been doing so much other stuff; 3 different MT shows, one of which has two performances today (good job it was an early exam), a dance show and school have been testing them to destruction. After today, we can breathe! And wait for results...

My Dd is on her way to her G1 piano exam now. I am more nervous than she is. I suspect it will either go very well or really dreadfully!

It must be a day for exams! DD (10) had her grade 2 piano today. Nose slightly put out of joint by a girl no more than a couple of years older than her doing her grade 8!

Still, comparison is the thief of joy and DD said it went well.

Lots of exam result waiting on this thread. Thought ours was over this morning, but turns out the ABRSM system has had a meltdown and notified everyone about any exam over the past few months where it has clearly not been sending out the notifications, so ours related to grade 5 theory. We actually got the result long enough ago to have the certificate and have framed it! Back to waiting for us too!

@minisnowballs hopefully the reaction was just stress / relief and it will all be fine.

@Bearyinlove its hard waiting for them to do it - especially at first, but it gets easier. Grade 1 is usually pretty gently, I'm sure they'll be encouraging. I think that sometimes its helpful to look at the mark scheme as it becomes very clear that even to get higher marks it doesn't have to be note perfect.

@QueenMabby in my experience teachers don't really give them too much stuff that will be a stretch over the holidays, so maybe the grade 7 stuff is meant to be more achievable on her own? DD has Chopin's minute waltz to carry on working on as it took a bit of a back seat during exam prep and is also playing Uwe Korn's Caballos Espanoles for fun over the summer (the first because her teacher set it and the second because she heard it at a concert and loved it).

There's almost an unwritten rule on piano exams that no matter how old you are there will be someone who is significantly younger and a significantly better player. Just one of those things!

One of the kids in my daughter's piano trio is a school year younger but already working on his grade 8 pieces and she tries so hard (and fails) not to be offended by this. Especially hard if you're the best in your school or amongst your friends and then you suddenly realise that in the wider world there are insanely good small children!

@northerngoldilocks - that is so true. Dd is good at music (g7 level piano, g6 cello and g4 voice) at 14 but then we go to a concert or competition and there are 8 year olds who are so much better!

Although dd was thrilled to get the invite to chamber orchestra it was slightly spoiled by the fact that one of the cellists in the main string orchestra who has only just joined the school at year 7 was invited straight away! It's one of the reasons why music is so good though - it teaches you lots of life lessons early!

Apparently the g1 piano exam went ok. Her last piece went pretty wrong early on and then made loads of slips and errors due to being nervous afterwards which is so unfortunate but at least it was her last piece that went wrong. She did all the practical skills first which apparently went well, though obviously hard to tell how sight reading went. Her first piece was amazing apparently and her middle was fine with a few slips. So stressful! I hope they release results soon.

Out of interest, how long are ABRSM taking at the moment to release results?

We have had less than 24 hrs for a performance exam and 2 days for in-person recently.

I think they really vary. Also when you sit via music schools it seems to take longer as they get the results and then have to send out. Usually less than a week for f2f though if you enter directly.

Thanks both. We entered directly but the exam was sat late on Friday afternoon, and I doubt they send results over the weekend.

They do send results at the weekend but if it was only sat on Friday it might be a bit soon. DD sat hers on Tues morning and nothing yet

Little happiness here.
Dd has just passed her grade 8 trumpet. Last one before she heads off to uni in September.

She didn't have a brilliant exam because, despite for almost the first time really working hard at her scales, she messed up in an early one, panicked and then got upset so her transposition and sightreading (which she's normally very good at) also went badly.

But she's passed, mostly due to the pieces, which did go well, and that's what matters.

I was surprised how quickly they came back. She did the exam on Monday and her teacher had the result by Friday. The ABRSM website hasn't updated yet though.

That's brilliant @MargaretThursday. I think that unless the teacher does something to release to candidates they are released 7 days after the teacher receives them.