Music Exams - any websites to help with the aural, theory etc

[LIZS]

ds has a grade 3 exam on Monday and over the past week it has become apparent that knowledge of scales, aural etc is rather shaky. Any free resources which would help him memorise them please ?

anyone ? Have hofnote.com but you have to subscribe.

I subscribed ds to hofnote a while ago for grade 7 & he said it was quite good but he didn't use it/ask for it for grade 8, so I'm thinking it can't have been that brilliant. I'd also think it's probably something you'd want to use for a while before an exam rather than the day before.

For scales, write the name of each one on a card, put them all in a box and draw one at random. Play it until you manage it 3 times in a row correctly, then put it back in the first box unless you did it correctly the first 3 times, in which case it goes into a second box. Continue drawing cards from the first box until it's empty.

I like snorkie's idea for scales. I'm not sure how much could be achieved on aural stuff at home in so little time, though

Can I ask why these weaknesses have only become apparent at such a late stage? I'm a bit surprised your DS's teacher hasn't raised it as an issue before now to be honest .

So am I . He hasn't had an instrumental lesson for a couple of weeks as he'd had his quota for the year but the school also do aural sessions. Unfortunately he has only made a few this term due to clashes with other activities/trips so these weaknesses have just come to light. It seems his instrumental tacher hasn't really covered the theory this time, focussing more on pieces, perhaps assuming it was beign done elsewhere. He also has a defeatist attitude anyway and finds learning by heart 7 scales etc very daunting. Will try the box method, thanks

DD plays on this site www.mymusictheory.com/home.html which might be good. Would suggest www.amazon.co.uk/s/ref=nb_sb_noss?url=search-alias%3Daps&field-keywords=improve+your+aural&x=0&y=0th ese for next time.

Good luck for today.

Thnaks . I think he knew more than was first evident and has gone off today a bit more positive. Fingers crossed.

I've had my fingers crossed for your DS - how did it go?

Hope it went well too. Ds had his grade 8 piano last week & has heard he got a distinction - he's thrilled to bits.

Aww thanks for thinking of ds . He thinks it went ok although only got as far as reading first line of sight reading in the 30secs he had before playing it, so winged the second line. Pieces went well according to his accompanist and he thinks scales, terms etc were ok. He emailled his teacher afterwards, she sounded relieved and has her fingers crossed ! The aim now is Grade 4 by next summer.

and well done to your ds snorkie, how old is he ?

It sounds as though he'll have done OK LIZS, I'll keep my fingers crossed for him too. Ds is 16 - he had a slow start to piano (took over two years to grade 1), but then in about year 6/7 he started making rapid progress & hasn't looked back really. 16 is probably quite young for grade 8, but he's in a very musical yeargroup at school with several extremely musical friends, so it doesn't seem particularly so to him. This is only his second distinction for piano - he made a special effort for grade 8 I think, or maybe he just distracted himself from GCSE revision with piano playing.

What instrument does your ds play and how old is he?

I hope so. He's 12 and plays the tenor horn. Chose it because he is dyspraxic and finds coordination and muscle control difficult, but the fingering is relatively straightforward and it could offer group opportunities. I suspect he isn't naturally musical so can't just "hear" the scales iyswim, instead needs to learn each one.

Well done to both your dc Liz and Snorkie - you must be so pleased for them.

I always used to think ds wasn't naturally musical too, but I'm not so sure now. I actually wonder how much natural musicianship matters - I think the suzuki philosophy is that anyone can be musical which recognises that it's much more to do with perseverence than anything innate (we never did suzuki, but I did like the idea of that philosophy when I read about it). Ds has never been a great fan of scales either, but they are supposed to be important for some reason. If your ds really struggles with them then you might want to consider doing Trinity exams instead of ABRSM (I assume that's what he's done) as they then have an option to do fewer scales and some technical exercises instead. Group music is deffo a good idea - will your ds be able to join a band soon? I think that can help hugely with the enjoyment and motivation.

He does a brass group at school but moves next summer so should hopefully find other opportunities at senior school. Yes they do ABRSM exams. I think it would help if he'd practise his scales rather than leave it to the end and hope they come good!

DH is taking his first ever music exam (Grade 2) this Friday 9th July - aged 52! Until about 2 years ago he couldn't read or play a note.

Of course he is very nervous though I think he is ready. He says he finds the scales OK and interestingly his music teacher said she finds her older pupils usually take better to scales than the children because the children often don't practice them as much because they are boring!

I would second snorkie comment about a band - not only does it make it more enjoyable but I think it helps with counting and keepong time.

Re suzuki method: No experience of this but the lady who runs our bands and the junior string group that DD used to play in said that her beef with it was that beginners could often play quite a bit before they could actually read music, so they would come along to join junior strings and then were unable to read the parts she gave them.

You must be so relieved LIZS - lets hope the results live up to expectation . Might be worth having a chat with the teacher about how to ensure he covers all aspects of the exams a bit earlier next time round!

Congrats to your soon as well, snorkie. I did piano and cello and piano grade 8 was the only one I ever got a distinction for (just, but it still counted!) Although I was probably better technically on the piano I think I've got a lot more pleasure from the cello over the years getting out and playing in groups.

Re. groups, does your local area have any youth music groups? Your county music service should have a list of them if they exist. We had local area orchestras and groups that took people from about grade 1, and then you gradually progressed up through to county groups (or national or european if you were REALLY good). The Salvation Army have a lot of local brass bands as well and can be very welcoming to younger players.

I'm not so sure for brass, but for strings scales and arpeggios do come in handy - I find once I know what key I'm in then my left hand just knows where to extend to get the right notes, where I need to shift, how to make it work so the notes fall under my hand. They were tedious to learn, though, but I'm sure my teacher broke them up and gave me one or two to focus on each week - I think I tried leaving them till the end once and decided it really wasn't a good idea

good luck to your dh 5foot5 and hats off to him for giving it a go.

Ds plays cello as well tangle & his distinction was a 'just' too, but unlike you he has always tended to get better results in cello exams and he prefers piano (are musicians always contrary lke that?)! He's lucky in that he gets to play keyboard in a swing band and harpsichord in a baroque group so he uses his piano skills in group music as well as his cello ones.

Update: he passed , slightly better score than for grade 2 !!