Grade 5 Music Theory

[kittymum]

If it is the aural section your dad has dropped marks on (the aural counts for, I think 18 of the 150 marks if my memory serves me right) then do download the ABRSM aural app - tons of practice and your dd should easily be able to improve. We practice sight reading, scales and aural a lot at home in the lead up to exams!

I know High Wycombe Music Centre do sat morning courses in theory, might also be worth looking at Chiltern Music Academy (a break away centre headed by Andy Rogers who is the v inspirational ex head of HWMC)

[Peridot]

You are right about the 18 marks kittymum! And about the new aural app.

ABRSM exams are out of 150 with the pass mark at 100.

Three pieces each earn 30 marks (pass mark 20)
Sight reading and scales/arpeggios 21 marks each (pass mark 14)
Aural 18 marks (pass mark 12)

You can fail a section and still pass. Not that I recommend this to my pupils...

[KenR]

Thank you Peridot,

She does want to do the theory test and is intending to carry on with music certainly to GCSE. She is a good singer so the aural tests are OK for her, theory is definitely her weaker side at the moment though. She has always got top marks for her playing and would have got distinctions if her theory had not let her down. Her flute teacher ha been more minded towards the playing than the theory and I am not a musician myself so haven't really been able to help much.

It is the flute and she has asked if she can start to learn the piano too, so I think she may start that up soon. Goodness only knows how she will fit the practice in with homework etc. She seems to like the challenge. I just wish she would take more time out to pay (as in child's play not flute). I thought that an intensive course may be the way to go for her to learn the material (or at least get her going on it), she seems to learn fast and I think that type of learning environment suits her impatience to learn everything in one go. It does look as though the Reading school that another poster suggested would be good but I would have to find other students who want to participate. I might put a notice up in Aylesbury Music Centre to see if anyone else wants to sign up for a summer crash course.

A theory course in one of the Music Centres is probably the best route, usually about a 10 week weeks course.

If your daughter is really keen and good at Music and playing the flute, then I would seriously consider exploring moving outside the ABRSM exam curriculum and playing in ensembles or taking summer courses - far more interesting and they will probably get more out of music in the long term.

Might be worthwhile your daughter considering auditioning for the Bucks Wind orchestra :-

http://www.bmeh.org/Bucks_Youth_Wind_Orchestra

or joining an organisation such as Flutewise and going on one of their residential course to Abbotsholme or even a summer flute course in Croatia:

http://www.flutewise.com/events/flutewise-abbotsholme

http://www.flutewise.com/events/flutewise-croatia-2015

It was some years ago now, but my DD was a keen flute player and followed the ensemble route in Birmingham. She passed all of her ABRSM exams but found the ensembles much more interesting. In the end she was even promoted from the wind orchestra to the Birmingham Schools Symphony Orchestra and went with them on a tour to Barcelona. Goes down well with university applications

[Jules7]

[Edited by moderator because of forum rules on advertising.
Sorry - it might be an idea to convey this information by PM.]

[Eccentric]

I love this forum. Thank you all. There are some brilliant ideas and lots of fantastic advice. I will be following up on lots of it. Because I am not a musician myself I have no idea about the exams and how they work. I had just been told by my daughters old flute teacher that the ABRSM grade 5 has two parts the flute exam and a theory exam. It has been really helpful for me to get my head around the different options.

I have suggested to my daughter that she look at the Jazz exam and Trinity but she is adamant that she wants to continue with classical flute at the moment and that she wants to do the theory exam. I gather from her new teacher that she will be doing the flute exam next term. We have a problem with Saturday mornings because of a theatre school that my daughter goes to with her friends from primary school this prevents her from being able to participate in the County orchestra and do theory classes on a Saturday morning. She does perform in various other ways and is part of a flute ensemble. Unfortunately her school doesn't have an orchestra. Life is so busy that for us the ideal would be a crash summer course. I have lots of options now so Thank you. Jules 7 I would be really grateful if you could PM me the details that you had posted as I would like to investigate this.

[kittymum]

You are right about the 18 marks kittymum! And about the new aural app.

ABRSM exams are out of 150 with the pass mark at 100.

Three pieces each earn 30 marks (pass mark 20)
Sight reading and scales/arpeggios 21 marks each (pass mark 14)
Aural 18 marks (pass mark 12)

You can fail a section and still pass. Not that I recommend this to my pupils...

Got dd's mark sheet back today from her violin exam (she scraped a distinction) - can highly recommend the ABRSM App - she got 17 out of 18 for aural (lost a mark for some wobbly singing - she was v nervous)

Eccentric you can look up all the exam specifications and mark scheme on ABRSM website
I would really recommended doing this as you can see quite clearly what to do to move from a merit to a distinction etc - I feel it helped me help dd a lot with her musicality.

This is the Grade V syllabus http://us.abrsm.org/fileadmin/user_uplo ... te0514.pdf

Here's the mark scheme http://us.abrsm.org/fileadmin/user_uplo ... riaAll.pdf

[Guest55]

There used to be videos of people playing with the marking as well which I thought was helpful ...

[Jules7]

[Edited by moderator because of forum rules on advertising.
Sorry - it might be an idea to convey this information by PM.]

Sorry if I had contravened some advertising rules. People had previously mentioned other teaching places for grade 5 theory like the High Wycombe Centre, so I hadn't thought it was a problem. Eccentric, I will pm you the lady we used a couple of years ago who does the summer hols one-to-one crash course in Maidenhead. DD did pass first time btw (not by much though!) and she said it has been subsequently useful for her gcse music composition. DD is more interested in the practical side of singing (she does also play the flute) and got a distinction in her grade 6 singing. Her aural was the weakest so she can def look into the great suggestions others have made on this thread to work on that area for grade 7.

[Eccentric]

It turns out that the guy who repairs my daughters flute (incidentally he is brilliant - he charged me a tenner today. The B key needed a new pad, a few of the wires needed tightening and he went over to check everything else too), teaches theory so she will be starting with him in a couple of weeks. If anyone wants his detail for any woodwind instruments that need repairing or a refurb. then PM me. I think he sells secondhand quality instruments too.