DS winging it in year 8 - wwyd?

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DS is in year 8 as a music scholar in a selective indie.
He's pretty able - not genius or a super high flyer, but more than capable of getting good and very good marks in all subjects.
Since September, we've left him to his own devices much more, with regards to homework and revision. It's recently become obvious that he is winging it quite often - leaving homework to the last minute, barely doing any revision for tests etc. In most areas, he's getting away with it, getting good marks for homework and doing ok in most tests, but he's not doing well in things like Latin and Spanish tests.
More concerning is that he has now started to lie about his failings, even though he knows we can easily uncover his lies by going into his school online portal. For example, he had a Latin vocab test on Monday which we were aware of, so made sure he revised for it. We asked him how it went, but he replied that he'd got his days mixed up and it was actually the next day; the reality is that it WAS on Monday, he failed it and had to retake it on Tuesday. What he'd actually failed on was very conjugations, which he'd told us he didn't need to know when we'd asked him during revision - the fact that he was able to pass the test with nearly full marks the next day shows that he's just not putting the effort in initially.

We're struggling to know how to address this issue. One of the factors that seems to be at play is that he feels he gets very little free time. His.music commitments and the location of the school mean he's out of the house 11 hours a day, sometimes more. On top of academic demands, he also has to fit in practice on 2 instruments. That said, he's wasting a lot of time trying to avoid doing the things he has to do and generally managing his time poorly. We've said that life would be much easier if he got the chores out of the way before going on the PS4, but he's not buying that because, on the occasions we've made him work first he's faffed around so much that there's little or no time left for anything enjoyable afterwards.

So, what's the best way of tackling this, and is it fairly par for the course with 13 year old boys?

I do think some posters are exaggerating how overworked this boy is. He does not have an 11 hour work day. he has a 9-4 "work" day including lunch and breaks. This is not an unusual day for a private school. Oftentimes, the lunch break is longer than a state school to allow for sports practice and clubs and not uncommonly 90 minutes.

Going to school and back and the days he is at school for the extra hour are down times where he is probably hanging out with mates or on his phone doing the usual teenage things.

This is not a boy without any downtime!

My DS has a similar school day and whilst we live a mile and a half away from school (a very easy 20 minute scooter ride), he chooses to take 2 busses which take him 40 minutes because he meets up with friends and it is a social time for him. Whilst he does not have any musical commitments, he has sports commitments which take up similar amount of time - probably more. In year 8 he had morning swim sessions twice a week (at school at 6:20am) and 2 hour swim sessions after school on 3 days. Like the OP, this was his choice. I know for certain that his schedule was not unique to selective private schools as the majority of children swimming at his club with him were in the state sector and they were there with him.

My DS also is a winging type whose natural intelligence allowed him to get away with it. It did catch up with him in Year 8 and 9 when work increased as well as expectations. Things are much better in year 10 because, whilst I remained in the sidelines and would try and guide him on better study skills and timetabling, I did not actively get involved so he learned that not getting organised and doing work consistently was equivalent to shooting himself in the foot. TBH, it was having more limited time which re-inforced this because he was surrounded by other children with the same timetable and saw that those who were more organised were having better results.

The calendar idea is one which I implemented and that helped a bit. I would also contact his tutor as the school might have resources to teach study skills to those who require a brush up on those who need it. The tutor could also keep a closer ear out for a pattern of poor results and missed preps which s/he could guide your son through. Not an easy problem, but it really is a common one at this age which does often get better as the GCSE years loom closer.

Phew! Thank you, Mominatrix - I'm glad to hear from someone who has been in a similar position.
In fact, my nephew is in a swimming club and trains like your son - he's now in year 11 ( state school) and competes at weekends too.
My DS is at a cathedral school, with girl and boy choristers who rehearse before school and sing at even song and at weekends throughout the year. The majority play at least one other instrument too. I know state school children who play 2 or 3 sports seriously, with 2 hour training sessions at a time plus travelling to matches etc. In fact, it is more rare to find a secondary school child who doesn't do any extra curricular activities.

DS has a great relationship with us, so we can talk about all of these things. He knows he doesn't have to work in the same way as, say, DD does - he is blessed with a good memory, so can get ok results with minimal effort. However, that seems to have turned into no effort in languages. It's not that I'm bothered about his results in Spanish or Latin, but I AM bothered that he doesn't start to adopt that mindset for other subjects get doesn't care about. And I'm bothered about finding a way for him to get a balance of everything - not too much academic work, not too much music, not too much downtime.
I can't imagine many parents of young teens leave them to decide how much downtime they want - I don't believe many 12 year old boys have the self regulatory skills to realise that playing Fortnite from 6pm to 10pm isn't the best idea...which is what DS would do if the choice was left to him!

I'd like to think there's compromise to be struck, as a number of posts here have suggested there is.

The thing with languages is that you can't really wing it can you. You've got to put the time in.

Even with a good memory you still have to learn the vocabulary etc. I was a bright kid who did everything at the last minute and realised this only just in time to rescue my language GCSE's.

Now you've said that I think maybe let him feel the pain of flunking a few Spanish/Latin tests

Then take him to Spain with his instruments in the summer