Spring /Summer 24 - Music thread

[northerngoldilocks]

The old thread was filling up, so here's a new one to talk about music activities. Come and talk about music lessons, choosing instruments, exams, auditions, specialist schools, orchestras or whatever other music activities are going on. Everyone is welcome, from those with total beginners to those whose children are studying music at advanced levels. Ask for advice or share successes or struggles. There's loads of experience across a wide variety of instruments too(though bassoon's are weirdly popular on here - you'd think that every second child plays one!).

In our experience Kodaly helped more in developing rhythm, DD doesn't have a perfect pitch and was struggling with intonation until she became a chorister, then it improved massively but is still far from perfect 😁

Oops - meant to post this elsewhere so editing

Thank you @Compsearch she's in Y6 and should be moving into secondary school. She was offered one around 15 miles from our home that meant she would need to catch a bus at 6.30am and change at the dodgy bus station at 7am. She has been offered a scholarship at a local independent, but the costs and short time she would be there don't make sense. It was our back up in case she didn't get into Chets at all.

@Ubertomusic - I do find London insane sometimes. 6 is a perfectly fine age to start the violin (have loads of info confirming this - ex-pro musician with many violinist friends) but it’s interesting how the different programmes seem to feel very differently about what is the “right” age with very little flexibility - I completely agree with you that it’s about maturity really, which obviously differs from child to child.

Annoyingly neither CYM or Guildhall Kings X offer Kodaly classes, so I think Colourstrings is the only option atm. I’m waiting to hear back from them about a place for Sept so 🤞🏻

@mustardrarebit ah I see - makes total sense. A gap year sounds very fun and exciting!

I also find london insane - and I live here! But all of this stuff with the tiny violinists feels like it takes place in another world (fee-paying schools and very certain postcodes). DD2 has taken a far more 'ambling' path with her music... so it's surprising to look back and see where she's come from. Suspect it will be even more weird by the time she gets to uni applications, whatever she chooses.

Meanwhile, in case anyone ever wonders what they do in the evening at specialist school, she sent me a picture last night of a bassoon she and a friend had made out of biscuits, for someone's birthday. Niche- but she seems to have been enjoying herself.

Hi @minisnowballs :) At Colourstrings, roughly 2/3 were from state schools as far as I remember - all started together in reception year. Middle class postcode but nothing posh.

Not sure starting early is a London thing though - we discussed with DD recently how Tchaikovsky's violin concerto was considered so difficult all star soloists he approached refused to play it, now its 2nd mov. is on ABRSM g8 syllabus. True, not the whole concerto, but still...

Starting early to get 11+ scholarships to top-10 schools IS a London thing though 😂

Ah yes, @Ubertomusic I kind of meant heading for fee-paying secondary (with those hard-won scholarships) - plenty go to state primary I think.

The colourstrings locations are Highgate, Muswell Hill, Islington and I think there’s maybe one in Kingston too? - I think you’d have to be very wealthy to afford a family house in those areas these days. Though I suppose there might be others trekking from Newham like us 🤣.

Did anyone else spend about 5 hours in the proms booking online waiting room today? We did eventually get the tickets we wanted!

Did anyone else spend about 5 hours in the proms booking online waiting room today? We did eventually get the tickets we wanted!

Glad you got the tickets you wanted @Compsearch - DH very nobly got up at very silly o clock to join the queue at RAH (was 6th) so we got everything we wanted too (and everything various others asked us to get). He was home before 10am too!

@Compsearch joined the Proms waiting room at 8:45. When it went live at 9 I was 52,553 in the queue. A mere 3 hrs and 33 minutes later I had my tickets!

My husband did the proms tickets - well a friend who was 8,000 places ahead got most of them but my son hadn't confirmed he was coming by then so he stayed in the queue - took 3.5 hours I think! So exciting though, can't wait.

I had to swap from laptop to phone so went from 14,000 in the queue to something like 27,000…it’s crazy! But actually brilliant to see that there is such demand.

I didn’t realise you could go in person to RAH @londonmummy1966 - might try that next year!

You can turn up in person (and the night tube makes it easy enough to get there). DH did leave the house at about 2.15 though so it was a long wait for 9am. He's usually more like 3.30. They had 7 desks open in the box office so he was in the first batch through usually he's second or third batch but never had a problem getting what we want. The first year we tried this he queued and I waited on the phone line and he was back home before my call had been taken!

The advantage of the box office is you can pick a particular seat eg an aisle, frontish stalls behind the pianist to watch his hands etc. If you're taking the whole family you can also book a whole box (and bribe the children to go as they deliver pizza to the box....)

Reading these posts makes me glad proms wasn't an option this year! On the bright side, we took our girls to our local concert season finale last night. They got to meet Sir Mark Elder and Sir Stephen Hough and thoroughly enjoyed the (ice cream filled) evening. This morning the eldest was trying to copy Stephen Hough technique on the piano. It's nice to see her so energised and motivated. She even chose to record herself playing a Bach piece - something completely unheard of. For her, anyway!

I forgot about getting Prime tickets until after 10.30am, by which time I was 38,000+ in the queue.
3 hours later, I managed to get pretty bad seats for the NYO prom DS is playing in. Disappointed, but at least we'll be there.

Prom

Well done all for getting Prom tickets. On that note, DD2 has just had an invite to do both the NYO Inspire orchestra in July, and the summer residential, including playing at that Prom.

RIGHT in the middle of our summer holiday.

What would you do in our situation, musical people? She could have done the orchestra but apparently you have to do both to do one.

Oh wow @minisnowballs that’s very exciting! Where is your holiday? I’m guessing there’s no possibility of her going for just part of it?

I’d probably let your DD choose - I don’t think there’s a wrong answer as it’s likely she will get into the orchestra in future years and family holidays are precious; on the other hand it’s an amazing opportunity!

I was in NYO and honestly had the best times of my life and made lifelong friends. Sorry - that’s probably not very helpful!

Amazing, minisnowballs!!
DS was asked to do the summer residential last year, and it clashed with a previous commitment (another orchestral course). He hesitated, but we knew it was a huge opportunity for him, as he was going to be auditioning for a place for the last time that Autumn.
He did it, had a fantastic time, we went to the Prom (which was INCREDIBLE!) and he successfully auditioned for this year.

Sounds amazing @Alwaysplayspicc - sadly I think the summer holiday is just too precious. I've emailed and pleaded and it is possible she'll just be able to do the July - depends on whether the next person can do both. Fingers crossed they find a solution that works for all.

DD2 has never auditioned, and to be honest it will be a stretch if she does this year, though her HoD is supportive of her doing so. She's only done Inspire but has enjoyed it.

It's brilliant that she's already on their radar, mini, so don't worry about turning it down.
I would encourage her to audition, regardless of whether you think she's ready - it's good experience AND keeps her in their mind.
DS's experience was that he was offered opportunities each time he auditiined, which gradually became more significant, and paved the way to him being offered a place.

Thanks @Alwaysplayspicc - I've just had confirmation that someone else can do the full lot of residentials so they'll take them instead of DD2 (fair enough). I just couldn't reorganise all of the summer hols - which also involve getting the foster daughter back to Ukraine- when it looked at it. Still, a boost for her that she was asked, and I have explained that she is keen but our family circumstances are a bit complex - I think it must be much easier to do this music stuff when you're not a sibling! Hopefully they won't take it as us not being keen.

I will try and make sure she puts an audition in, but obviously from far away I'm not much help at the encouraging and it will be down to her teacher, who doesn't seem to be a massive fan (and of course she's very much the worst/least experienced of his pupils which doesn't help!). So excited for all of yours who do get to play at the Prom though! What a huge deal for them and you must all be so proud.

Feeling guilty as I missed a woodwind concert last night, and then thought how weird it was that I though 'oh, she's only playing flute so it doesn't matter' - up until September that was her first instrument. At least she sent me a recording.

I think that people on this thread have lots of experience and knowledge about Conservatoires but wondering if people have words of wisdom about Uni Music degrees? Have visited quite a lot of places with DC and of course everywhere has pluses and minuses.

I went to uni to do a music degree joint with another subject. (An MA but in Scotland some unis do that instead of a BA) I really enjoyed the lectures. It was so long ago we listened to records in the library to study! However the department was a bit stressful in the admin so I dropped it for honours. I couldn't do performance modules in first two years but could have from 3rd year. You could also do a BMus which was more practical and got lessons paid for. There was lots of music going on for everyone. If you look at the music society social media you'll get an idea. I think there's a much wider range of modules nowadays so it's probably a case of looking at the choices and seeing whether a BA or Bmus is what you want. BA would usually allow you to do subjects from other courses, Bmus might be more prescriptive to start off.

@FrancisBottomhill DH did music at Cambridge if that’s any help? (As did loads of our friends).

It’s quite an academic course (as you would expect!) with a load of compulsory papers in the first year but you have much more freedom later, and can do a performance “paper” in third year. The performance opportunities at the university are unbelievable and loads of students go on to become professional musicians (including DH).