Autumn / Winter 2025 Music

[northerngoldilocks]

Time for a new thread in time for the new school term!

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.

Hi does anyone know whether people have started to hear back about national children's choir auditions. I think there is a low chance my son will get in but I'm not very good at waiting . Thank you;)

This is a niche one, but I am hoping this group might be the one to help me! My son has this Play Hollywood flute book and has mislaid the piano part. He is meant to be playing Hedwig's Theme in a concert in about ten days and needs to start practising with the accompaniment. Does anyone have the piano part and, if so, could they DM photos of the Hedwig's Theme accompaniment?

If I need to I will buy a new copy but we have only just discovered that it is missing. I have a horrible feeling that it will turn up just as the new one arrives so want to give is a week or so of further hunting / checking with his teacher etc. But in the meantime he needs to practice.

Thanks!

That is the most commonly asked question on the local music instructors Facebook page! There's obviously a black hole somewhere where all the piano accompaniment books go. Sorry can't help but you are guaranteed to find it after you buy the new book!

It used to be that the piano part was the part with the cover and the instrument part was the sheet music making the piano part less likely to go walk about. The trend seems to have reversed and the kids seem to find it much harder to hang onto the piano part inserts. It drives me bananas that they all seem to be incapable of keeping their music together...

I can stand you all down from the hunt! After all that (turning our music room upside down, lecturing my 8 year old about taking better care of things etc 😂) it turns out we never had it. When it says it is for “flute and piano” what it actually means is that it’s one of those annoying editions where you have to go to the Faber website and download the piano part and print it… Problem solved

Phew! That's a relief.

Hi. Does anyone know about National children's choir timelines. I know that people in musical circles like you are often in the know about these things. ? It would just be great to know when we'll hear back even if the chances are very very slim.

Sorry @diddlydays-no info on NCC. Didn’t they say roughly when it would be?

for those of you who were looking at summer residentials Wells have now updated the page for summer 2026. There are 2 weeks for piano this year which is great for us as means DD won’t have to go directly from NCO and can have a week at home inbetween which will be better for her.

Just looking at National Children’s Choir- they’re still auditioning until the end of Nov in different locations so can’t imagine it would be until they’ve completed auditions?

Thanks for checking. I had a feeling it was mid November but if they are still auditioning then yes we wouldn't know. There must be thousands of applications. Our chances are very slim

Anyone in here know a lot about music A Level? DD2 has had her first lot of A-Level music tests for predicted grade and was stressing massively about the dictation. Looks like the test was out of 25 and 10 marks were on dictation – which seems to be where you hear an unknown bit of music and write it down.

She's in the top set for music at school (and it's a music specialist school) and doesn't have perfect pitch where most do - and most in her set did GCSE two years early too whereas she joined too late for that.

So she thinks she's rubbish compared with her form, because some people are just getting full marks on dictation with no effort, where she’s getting 6/10.

However, when I looked up the mark scheme for the actual A Level it looks like this is about 4% of the entire A-Level – so I don’t really know why all the tests are on this and none on essays etc. It’s really skewing her perception of what the A Level is about. And she's excellent at essays.

How much does dictation really matter? Anyone know – she will try to get better at it but I’m wondering really how much of her time needs to be spent on this.

It’s been a little while since I posted on here. Unfortunately, an immensely challenging few months with DS(15) following his Autism and ADHD diagnosis. His music has taken a massive hit as he’s so exhausted from masking in school and the increasing academic demands. We’ve had to cut down to alternate week instrumental lessons and he now barely practices at home. His autism also means that auditioning for high level ensembles is out of the question because they generally involve residentials which he finds difficult socially. Thankfully, he got his grade 8s out of the way in year 9 and 10. Despite these setbacks, he blew us away last night with his beautiful playing in a small ensemble in a school concert. A real ‘wow’ moment. He’s planning to study A-level music and his head of music is being hugely supportive and encouraging. Hopefully, once GCSEs are out of the way, he’ll find the time and mental energy to give to his music again.

changeofname I'm sure they won't suddenly have made a huge proportion of A level about dictation, it's pretty niche as skills go! DS isn't doing music for A level but has also just got his first set of year 12 predicted grades, his are also based on whatever random bits of syllabus they've studied and been tested on. Sure it will all even out by the end of y12.

Sorry to hear it's been hard for your DS @amr78 , as a parent of a young man with ASD I can totally sympathise. It'll take time for the whole family to re-adjust after the official diagnosis, even if you've known for years. For teenagers, it may be even harder as even without any conditions they are normally trying to figure out who they are and find their place in life. It'll come. I know of quite a few musicians on the spectrum (DS is not musical though), sometimes I feel like it's kind if normal to expect some ND when you see a talented young musician, even though it's not universal of course.

@amr78 - sending sympathy - GCSEs are brutal for SEN pupils. DD1 is ADHD (not diagnosed until conservatoire) dyspraxic and dyslexic and she found years 10 and 11 gruelling. Not least because she was only interested in music so was not going to drop it in favour of academics regardless of what her teachers thought. JD was the only thing that kept her sane.

My advice would be not to overload on the number of GCSEs taken - 8 or 9 is plenty and better to get 8/9 to the best of his ability without being totally burnt out at the other end.

@Ubertomusic @Londonmummy66 it’s such a tough time isn’t it even without neurodiversity thrown into the mix. DS is doing 9 GCSEs - he dropped his only foreign language in year 10 shortly after diagnosis so he could have sessions with the SEND lead. It’s hard as he’s fairly certain he doesn’t want to study music beyond A-level so needs to keep his academic options open. However, he also recognises music is his strength (plus he’s on a scholarship) so it’s hard finding the balance.

FWIW I've realised over the years that people with ND don't really have to follow the "standard pathway" and it's worth exploring other options that people rarely think about. DS had to drop Economics GCSE due to his dyspraxia, he basically couldn't write fast enough for the essay component. I was really stressed about that, but he actually did MFL GCSE as an independent candidate instead and it was surprisingly easy for him and not a huge problem to organise. He also found iGCSE much better structured if you can choose or do as an extra.

DS also sat American SATs when they were still available, it was also very easy for a high functioning ASD person. His SATs were actually accepted by Russell Group unis so he had unconditional offers from some of them even before A Level results.

Our friends with younger children with ASD have been homeschooling and their DC took GCSE at 14-15 with really good results, it's perfectly doable even for lab based subjects.

You know your DS's strengths and there may be options out there that would work better for him.

Does anyone else think “how do you think your performance went” is the most terrifying question a music teacher can ask their pupil?? Dd just dies a little each time. She did a vocal concert this week and her teacher asked her that question and then after dd stammered out her awkward non-answer said “I thought you sounded really tired. Are you tired?” Ouch! Poor dd.

In my entirely amateur (and biased!) opinion I thought she nailed it!

The most terrifying question for me is "why did you not practise your scales?" 😂🤦‍♀️

Dd also hates “have you tried using the suggested fingerings?” 🤣

"so what do you think went well?"

Killer...

Mine hated being asked any of those questions with the extra '... in more than three words'.

Glad it’s not just us! Dd was a bit deflated after her lesson. She’d been building up to singing “Think of Me” for ages. That top C at the end is tough - even without nerves clogging the throat! I was very proud of her anyway.

She’s gone into chamber choir this morning very aware that, as the choir director was in the concert audience, she can no longer complain about the top As in the anthem!

Would "I don't know" count as three or four words? 😂

Has anyone else had an email inviting their child on the NYO Inspire residential in February half term?