Music grades

Voyager2002

Cakeguts wrote: »

If you read through the entire thread you can see that people think that passing grades helps you to play in amateur orchestras, get a place at music college or university, are difficult to pass and also that the standard of playing required is very high. Grades do not help you to play in an amateur orchestra because they don't test the skills required for this. They don't help you to get into music college or university to study music because entry is by audition. They are not difficult to pass 10 year old children can pass grade 8 and the standard required to pass is elementary. Some young people pass grade 8 two years after starting an instrument so they are not difficult for everyone to pass. For university entrance where the minimum requirements are UCAS points then you can use the points towards your UCAS points to get a place. However if the entry requirements are based on A level grades then UCAS points from grades make no difference.

Adults find them very difficult to understand because as an adult you wouldn't work for several months at something take an exam and then get nothing for it apart from a certificate. An adult would expect something like this to qualify them for a promotion or more responsibility at work leading to a pay rise. Grades don't do that because they aren't qualifications in music so they don't lead onto anything except another grade. So many adults appear to try to make them into qualifications for something like getting into an amateur orchestra or part of an entry requirement to study music. The more difficult an adult finds passing a grade exam the more difficult they think they must be. So they find it difficult to accept that grade 8 only requires an elementary standard of playing to pass it compared to the level of skill possible on any instrument. Grade exams don't make sense to adults. However for a child who likes to collect certificates and badges they make perfect sense. They are like badges for brownies, guides, cubs and scouts and swimming badges. The child is happy with the certificate or badge because they don't have experience of an adult working life where you expect to get more than a piece of paper after working at something for several months and then taking an exam. These exams are designed to be taken by children at school. This is fine but these certificates are quite expansive to collect because as well as the entry fee you have to take into account the music for the exam and the cost of the lessons on the pieces and other parts of the exam. While someone is learning this music they are effectively not making any progress because they may have to play these pieces and studies etc for several months to make sure that they play them well enough to pass the exam when they are nervous.

The entry fees are not cheap. Families who are not well off might find them expensive and when you consider that all you get for the money is a certificate. If people who can afford to pay for these exams then there is nothing wrong with them using their money in this way. What is wrong is people putting pressure on parents who are not well off to pay for these exams by making out that their child will lose out if they don't take them. Their child will lose out on a certificate. That is all. You can get extra UCAS points from other sources you don't have to get them from music exams. There are plenty of universities that you can get into without having done any grades so if you want to study music at university not having passed grades will not mean that you can't.

What many people don't seem to realise is that there is a choice as to whether you take grades or not. They are not an essential part of learning a musical instrument. Although from some of the answers on this thread you would think that they were an essential part of learning an instrument.

Move along everyone, nothing new to see here.

GwylimT

Cakeguts wrote: »

How many people do you know who pay £100s for grading in a physics exam because I don't think I know anyone who has done this? However I know lots and lots of people who have paid for grade exams in music.

The standardised music playing is only a standard of music playing in grades. You can't use this standard for entry into music community groups or anything else apart from another grade although lots of people don't realise this. I often see something like "to join this orchestra you need to be grade 8 standard." Grade 8 isn't a standard in orchestras it is only a standard compared to another grade.

I just wanted people to be clear about what they are paying for when they pay for a child to take a grade or they take a grade as an adult themselves because it is clear that many people don't know what they are getting for their £100s.

I paid around £20k to be graded in physics, just like any other physics graduate.

Prinzessilein

I speak fluent German...I know that I speak it fluently, I can happily pick up a newspaper and read it, or watch a German film, or understand my German relatives....however, when I wanted to be able to prove it to other people, I paid to sit a nationally recognized qualification.(GCE O-Level...A-Level...foundation degree)

I am a more than competent mathematician....I COULD have simply got books from the library and studied them and decided that I was 'good' at maths and been content with that....however, I wanted a recognized qualification and to eventually share my passion for maths with others - as a teacher...so I paid for tuition in the subject - to post-graduate level

Equally, my younger sister I a rather talented musician....she has proven her ability to various organizations and associations by passing recognized examinations in her various instruments...and throughout the UK (and beyond) the numerical grading is understood and accepted...oh, and she had to sit theory exams after grade 5...as has previously been stated, grade 5 is equivalent to a GC(S)E O-level ...and grade 8 to an A-level.

peachyprice

Prinzessilein wrote: »

Equally, my younger sister I a rather talented musician....she has proven her ability to various organizations and associations by passing recognized examinations in her various instruments...and throughout the UK (and beyond) the numerical grading is understood and accepted...oh, and she had to sit theory exams after grade 5...as has previously been stated, grade 5 is equivalent to a GC(S)E O-level ...and grade 8 to an A-level.

Don't be silly Prinz, OP has already said that primary school children pass grade 8 with ease and the exams are a total waste of time and money. She's repeated it so many times, at such great length, it must be true.

Prinzessilein

peachyprice wrote: »

Don't be silly Prinz, OP has already said that primary school children pass grade 8 with ease and the exams are a total waste of time and money. She's repeated it so many times, at such great length, it must be true.

Yes....what WAS I thinking.....actually I have a Brownie Guide badge in Music for playing the recorder (for which I learned to read music too!)....presumably I can 'trade that in' for some form of music degree??????

DevilsAdvocate1

Cakeguts wrote: »

Grade 5 is not an equivalent of any school exams. You cannot use it as a GCSE to get a job so you couldn't get a job needing 5 GCSEs with 4 GCSEs and a grade 5. Universities will not accept grade 8 instead of an A level. You can get UCAS points for grade exams but many universities don't accept them whereas they all accept UCAS points from A levels.

That's not strictly true. My son passed grade 5 theory and piano and was allowed to do A Level music even though he had not taken the GCSE or BTEC diploma. The 6th form head said that what he had passed was at least as good as a GCSE and probably better. He got a grade B at A Level, so it hadn't held him back.

If he had not passed grade 5 theory and grade 5 piano he would not have been allowed to take the A Level.

Cakeguts

GwylimT wrote: »

I paid around £20k to be graded in physics, just like any other physics graduate.

Why? What difference did it make?

I assume that you wanted a degree in order to get a job or a qualification in physics.

You have demonstrated very nicely how adults do not understand grade exams. Grades are not qualifications in music they are only qualifications in grades. What they are like is if someone got a mark and certificate at school for knowing part of the periodic table in chemistry. Not how it was used but just what some of the symbols meant and in isolation from any other chemistry and then they could get another mark and certificate for learning a bit more of it and so on until they had learned 8 bits of it and got marks and certificates for learning the bits. Nothing else just the symbols, not how to use them or any information about the elements. Just learning by rote in total isolation from any other chemistry. This is what grade exams are in music learning notes in increasing numbers in each exam.

You do not need to know anything about the composer, how the composition was put together, what allowances the composer made for the historical instruments in use at the time, who influenced the composer, the historical context of the time or any other works by the same composer. All you need to be able to do is to attempt to copy how the music is played on a CD that you get with the music. For this attempt at copying you will be awarded a mark. That mark will only apply to the music that you attempted to copy for that exam. It doesn't apply to any other music that you might play. The mark cannot be transferred to any other music playing.

Cakeguts

DevilsAdvocate1 wrote: »

That's not strictly true. My son passed grade 5 theory and piano and was allowed to do A Level music even though he had not taken the GCSE or BTEC diploma. The 6th form head said that what he had passed was at least as good as a GCSE and probably better. He got a grade B at A Level, so it hadn't held him back.

If he had not passed grade 5 theory and grade 5 piano he would not have been allowed to take the A Level.

This might only apply to your son at your son's school. It might not apply to anyone else who wanted to do this.

However the point I was trying to make was that if your son was applying for a job that needed you to have 5 GCSEs he wouldn't be able to substitute one GCSE for a grade exam he also wouldn't be able to substitute a grade exam for a GCSE if he was required to have 5 GCSEs for a non music course at university. So although he could do it at school music grades are not generally interchangeable with GCSEs. Also you don't know if he would have got the same result if he had only taken grade 5 on the piano.

Cakeguts

Prinzessilein wrote: »

Yes....what WAS I thinking.....actually I have a Brownie Guide badge in Music for playing the recorder (for which I learned to read music too!)....presumably I can 'trade that in' for some form of music degree??????

You can't trade grade exams in for some sort of music degree either. Also you don't know but your playing could have been good enough to pass a grade exam. They aren't very difficult to pass. You think they are more difficult than they are. People often do. All it needed was for you to play the music set on a grade syllabus and then play it to an examiner. That is all a grade exam is. It is exactly like learning to play something for Brownies and then getting a certificate for it. The only difference is that for a grade exam you have to pay an entry fee. So for a grade exam think learning to play something for Brownies but paying upward of £38 for the playing and the badge.

Cakeguts

peachyprice wrote: »

Don't be silly Prinz, OP has already said that primary school children pass grade 8 with ease and the exams are a total waste of time and money. She's repeated it so many times, at such great length, it must be true.

What are you trying to dispute that children don't pass grade 8 at primary school? If you don't believe that they do why does the National Children's Orchestra use grade 8 as an example of what their under 10 orchestra players have done. It also says that you don't have to have taken any grade exams to join. Membership is by audition. I know that they pass it at primary school because someone did on a 3/4 violin that belongs to me and they got a distinction.

Children pass grade 8 at primary school it makes no difference to me if you don't believe that they do because you want to think that someone has to be talented to pass grade 8. You only think this because someone has told you. You are trying to shoot the messenger. It isn't my fault that you have been led to believe that these exams are more than they actually are it is just that you have been on the receiving end of some of the misinformation that is around about these exams.

The information that you need to know about these exams is all there to be found on the internet but people prefer to believe the Chinese whispers perpetrated by people who also haven't done any research.