Encouraging Your Child to Practice

Encouraging students to practice is challenging. To many youngsters practicing is a 'chore'. Parents often don't help the matter much by forcing their child to practice - making it seem like even more of a chore.

I myself didn't practice much when I was alot younger but when I saw the true benefits of practicing and the pure enjoyment that I got from playing, I started to practice more and more.

Tips to parents:
1. Don't force, encourage.
Try not to 'make' your child practice, this immediately takes away the enjoyment and makes it feel more like a chore. Instead encourage them to practice, "can you play that piece to me? I would really like to hear it!" and make your child see the benefit that practicing has "that is sounding loads better!"

2. Find ensembles for them to play in.
Try and enrol your child in a band or an orchestra, this will develop there playing in addition to traditional practice sessions. This will begin to make playing more and more enjoyable for your child.

3. Give your child a wide arrange of sheet music.
A wide arrange of music, away from exam syllabuses will make practicing a lot more enjoyable. Children love to be able to play there favourite film tunes or pop songs on their instrument.

4. Encourage your child to listen to other players.
Take your child to concerts (not ones that will be 'boring' to a child) and show your child what they could be like one day, if they practised. This is something which definitely helped me to reach my true potential. 

Ask your child's teacher to explain a practice routine to your child, things they should be doing every time they play, and how long for. Make sure your teacher tells your child what they want them to work on each week, if you have to supply them with a 'practice book' to write in.

Finally, don't force your child to play an instrument if they really aren't enjoying it. Music is never going to be fun if it is forced upon you.

How to Get Valve Oil Out of Paper

We've all been there, you have an important sheet of paper or music that doesn't belong to you, and you manage to spill valve oil on it.

I've found a solution to this problem!

You will need:

• Flour/Corn Flour
• A heavy book 

1. Take your flour and place some on the surface underneath the oil stain on the paper.

2. Completely cover the oil stain on top of the paper with a good amount of the flour.

3. Place a book/a heavy object on top of the flour.

4. Leave over night, to allow the oil to be soaked up.

You might need to leave the flour for longer depending on how bad the oil stain is.

Putting New Corks Onto a Mute

To repair your mute you will need:

• Corks
• Sandpaper/nail file
• Strong glue
• A Rubber band

I used Humes and Berg corks specifically for my mute. I bought these from amazon for around £4. I'm sure it is also possible to make your own corks from wine bottle corks or a cork board, if you want to save a little bit of money.

The glue I used was Bostik Glu and Fix all purpose extra strong glue. It worked very well.

Steps:

1. Make sure all of the old cork is taken off so that you have a clean and smooth surface to work this. I used sandpaper to take the remains of the cork off and this did not damage the mute.

2. Place a small amount of glue onto your cork.

3. Press the cork onto the mute firmly. Then place a rubber band around the corks to hold in place. Try to avoid moving the cork around too much once it is on the mute.

4. Place on a radiator to dry. Do not use the mute until the glue is thoroughly dry.

The glue I used did not take long to dry at all however I would recommend leaving overnight if possible before using the mute.

Your cork may also need filling down to ensure that it has the perfect fit inside your instrument.

Revising for GCSE/A-Level Music

1. Know your pieces. If you have set pieces, make sure you listen to then over and over again until you have a complete idea of the structure, any of the main features and characteristics - know exactly where they occur and what instruments etc. are playing where.

Tools: mind maps, cue cards with bar numbers on, Annotated scores (in colour) and power points.

If you need to learn a specific ABAC etc. structure, create colour coded cue cards with each section letter on. Listen to the music and hold up each card at the correct section in the music.
Create a table summarising each section of the music. Keep the notes short and use key bar numbers. Learn this table and then try to recreate it from memory.

2. Practise. Do all the practise papers that are available to you. If you have essays in your exam, ask your teacher to give you more questions to do and hand them in to be marked. Do them under timed conditions.

Look at example essays and compare with your own analysing what you could have done differently.

Good luck for exam period. Don't give up it will be over soon. Make sure you revise until you can revise no more.

Would anyone be interested in some A-level music resources if I was to upload them to my blog?

Studying A-Level Music

Without a doubt A-Level music is a very rewarding subject. It is however not easy. To get a high mark you have to be strong in every component of the course, which is uncommon in most cases.

OCR is the exam board that I am familiar with, but the others also have a similar structure. These are the components of the course:

• Performing: 

At AS you are required to perform for a maximum of 8 minutes on your main instrument.
You then have a 5 minute Viva Voce with the examiner who will ask you questions such as "what do you think was good about your performance?".
For section C of the performance module you can either perform for a maximum of 4 minutes on a second instrument, as an ensemble, performe your composition or improvise for 2 minutes with 10 minute preparation.

(Your pieces must be a minimum of grade 5)

At A2 you are required to perform for a maximum of 15 minutes on your main instrument. The pieces you choose to play must be related in some way, such as two movements from a concerto or two fugues. You will then, as at AS, have a Viva Voce with the examiner. You will be expected to have done preparatory listening for this discussion and will have produced a write up for the examiner to ask you questions from, relating the listening to the interpretation of your performance.
(Your pieces must be a minimum of grade 6)

• Composing:

AS part 1:
You have to produce a portfolio of 7 harmony exercises produced by your teacher.
Part 2:
Produce an original composition in any style.

A2 part 1:
You have to produce a portfolio of 7 harmony exercises produced by your teacher.
Part 2:
Produce a vocal, programme or TV/film clip composition.

• Exam

At AS you will study 3 orchestral works and 3 jazz works in detail. In the exam you will have a choice of two questions in section A based on music you haven't studied. Section B is made up of questions on 1 of the orchestral works and 1 jazz work. In section C you have to answer an essay question based on the set works. You have your own CD containing the music related to the questions in A and B.

At A2 you study vocal works composed between 1900 and 1945. There are no set works for this part so you will probably listen to a wide variety of different works in your lessons. For the second part there is a variety of choice, which will be chosen by your teacher. You will study programme music, popular music, music for the stage, music for the screen or music and belief. The exam is made up of two sections. Section A comprises of questions on an unheard piece of vocal music. One of the questions requires you to compare the music to another piece you have listened to. In section B you have to write two essays on works you have studied relating to the second part of the history module. Again you will have your own CD.