Ask The Chief Examiner Options

[SaxFan]

The notes on a flute (for example) are a random collection of fingerings with some extra versions to be used in various circumstances. You cannot see the last note you played nor see the one you're aiming for.

surely not just 'a random collection' ? (IMG:style_emoticons/default/biggrin.gif)
the flute isn't just knocked together in a random way... there are certain finger patterns aren't there, though not as clear-cut as the piano?

You cannot see the last note you played nor see the one you're aiming for.

well you don't quite 'see' the notes to come, but you would certainly know how to finger them wouldn't you? Like knowing where to put your fingers on the piano keyboard, you know where to put your fingers on a flute's keys...

A pupil of mine (who is proficient at piano scales but cannot manage the higher grade flute scales) said that a good way to illustrate the problem to a non-woodwind player would be to take all the keys off your piano, add a bunch more to represent alternative fingerings and then put them back in random order. Do this while blindfolded and never look at the result and then try to memorise the random patterns that make up the scales your aiming for.

maybe your pupil is exaggerating just a teeny bit? (IMG:style_emoticons/default/biggrin.gif)

you don't hear the note until after you have played it.

don't wind players try to hear the note in their heads as they are playing?

things are not the same from piano to wind, definitely - and brass have it more difficult - but hardly a reason to slim down too much on scale requirements. It's not the scales that are a problem, more the technique for the particular instrument!

[sbhoa]

I've said before, that, as a flautist and a post-Grade 7 pianist (thereby having played scales in all keys on both instruments) and knowing my key signatures inside out I still couldn't play them on treble recorder. It took hours of slog before my Grade 8 - much longer than I spent on the pieces, and I got 17 for them in the exm (which was one mark more than I thought I deserved).

OK.

I'm probably too much of a woodwind novice to know.
So far on Clarinet I play scales by thinking the notes, hence my comment about it being partly a test of theory.

[anacrusis]

surely not just 'a random collection' ? (IMG:style_emoticons/default/biggrin.gif)
the flute isn't just knocked together in a random way... there are certain finger patterns aren't there, though not as clear-cut as the piano?

On the recorder they change after the octave, I would imagine that the same is likely to hold for the flute, given all that keywork.

well you don't quite 'see' the notes to come, but you would certainly know how to finger them wouldn't you? Like knowing where to put your fingers on the piano keyboard, you know where to put your fingers on a flute's keys...

It is a much more direct process on the piano - if I see a piano key, I know the note instantly. On the recorder, I have to think about it, especially as it depends whether I'm playing a C or an F recorder. I can sightread at speed, but my brain does not connect the dot to a note name before passing on to the fingering - I go straight to the fingering without thinking about it. Since that is what I need to be able to do to make music, it's rather more useful to me than learning a scale off by heart.

maybe your pupil is exaggerating just a teeny bit? (IMG:style_emoticons/default/biggrin.gif)

I don't think so - and you are starting to sound patronising.

It's not the scales that are a problem, more the technique for the particular instrument!

Scales are technical exercises for the instrument. They do not teach technique, there's a whole lot more to it than that.

Chief Examiner, I apologise. I appear to have risen to being baited. I was pleased to see that the scale requirements for the piano are being reviewed - I would like to see them being reviewed also for other instruments, and maybe having the need to memorise them re-considered.

[SaxFan]

- and you are starting to sound patronising.

Chief Examiner, I apologise. I appear to have risen to being baited. I was pleased to see that the scale requirements for the piano are being reviewed - I would like to see them being reviewed also for other instruments, and maybe having the need to memorise them re-considered.

Excuse me, anacrusis, there was absolutely no intention to be patronising ... (IMG:style_emoticons/default/blink.gif) I am not sure why you should feel that, and I am sorry if you did.
Equally there was no bait - I was taking up points made by Alicia Ocean. I think 'scales' is a very interesting topic, clearly it gives rise to strong feelings.

As to "take all the keys off your piano, add a bunch more to represent alternative fingerings and then put them back in random order. Do this while blindfolded and never look at the result and then try to memorise the random patterns that make up the scales your aiming for" well.... (IMG:style_emoticons/default/laugh.gif) seems a bit unfair on Boehm or Adolphe Saxe (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)

[SarahSax1986]

As to "take all the keys off your piano, add a bunch more to represent alternative fingerings and then put them back in random order. Do this while blindfolded and never look at the result and then try to memorise the random patterns that make up the scales your aiming for" well.... (IMG:style_emoticons/default/laugh.gif) seems a bit unfair on Boehm or Adolphe Saxe (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)

I think the point they were trying to make is that there is only one way to play a middle C. And in a scale there is only one way to play them. Yet on instruments such as saxophone and flute there are alternative fingerings, and they can get quite confusing when trying to remember them.

[andante_in_c]

As to "take all the keys off your piano, add a bunch more to represent alternative fingerings and then put them back in random order. Do this while blindfolded and never look at the result and then try to memorise the random patterns that make up the scales your aiming for" well.... (IMG:style_emoticons/default/laugh.gif) seems a bit unfair on Boehm or Adolphe Saxe (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)

I think the point they were trying to make is that there is only one way to play a middle C. And in a scale there is only one way to play them. Yet on instruments such as saxophone and flute there are alternative fingerings, and they can get quite confusing when trying to remember them.

No, that's not it at all. I think the defining issue is how hard it is to play a chromatic scale on a particular instrument. The harder the chromatic scale is to play, the harder the other scales will be. The chromatic scale is very tricky on a recorder, because of the forked fingerings. Once you add in the mind-bending puzzle of an F instrument, you get downright difficult. I was going to say impossible, but there's a certain recorder student of mine who is rather good at them. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/wink.gif)

[Allannah]

SCALES

I have no problem with the need to include the current list of scales in an exam but I'd like to understand the rationale for the need to play all of them from memory. I'd much prefer the requirement to be changed so that only some of the scales have to be played from memory and allow the remainder to be played from the music.

My reason for saying this is that the majority of my pupils (and myself) always play from music in brass bands, windbands, orchestras, etc. so they need to be able to spot the scale/arpeggio patterns and to be able to play them fluently. However, the current requirement, which places so much emphasis on memory, means that they have to stop using the music quite early in the learning process in order to memorise the fingering. For all but the brightest pupils this causes problems after the exam as no matter how much I remind them of key signatures when they're preparing for the exam, they find it difficult to recognise the scale patterns in a piece of music.

[SaxFan]

SCALES

I think that's a very good point andante.
Glad you didn't say "impossible" (IMG:style_emoticons/default/biggrin.gif) - I know a clarinettist who is understandably proud of his prowess at scales.

I think these things are debatable - just a little worrying when it seems change might be advocated on the grounds of the original task being difficult.
Actually, no one is compelled to take these exams anyway (IMG:style_emoticons/default/blink.gif)

[katyjay]

I don't think it is that scales are difficult per se. For me they are the nearest thing to a "money for old rope" bit of the exam.

BUT to get the decent marks on scales (and I got 20/21 at Grade 7 recorder) you need to be able to produce each scale or arpeggio asked for pretty much as a reflex reaction.
And to do that you need to have practised until each one, with each possible articulation of each one, is in your bones - a greater depth of knowledge than just knowing the theory and knowing which note is next in each stage.

And yes, articulation makes a difference. Some slurred scales, and even more so arpeggios, on recorder are fiendishly difficult because there are pairs of notes where the first is a harmonic of the second and unless you're careful you don't get the second at all, just a nasty squeak. So mastering that pair of notes for a slurred scale is a different challenge from a legato or staccato scale.

And mastering all those combinations of scales and articulations takes a great deal of time. A disproportionate amount of time for the 21 marks available compared with the time it takes to practise 90 marks' worth of pieces. I could easily spend three or four times as long getting scales right and automatic as I could practising all the pieces together.

That's why I think the volume is too great.

[Roseau]

SCALES
My reason for saying this is that the majority of my pupils (and myself) always play from music in brass bands, windbands, orchestras, etc. so they need to be able to spot the scale/arpeggio patterns and to be able to play them fluently. However, the current requirement, which places so much emphasis on memory, means that they have to stop using the music quite early in the learning process in order to memorise the fingering. For all but the brightest pupils this causes problems after the exam as no matter how much I remind them of key signatures when they're preparing for the exam, they find it difficult to recognise the scale patterns in a piece of music.

In France there is not the same emphasise on memorising scales. My oboe teacher insisted I buy a scale book and STOP playing from memory for the reasons you give above.

[Robodoc]

Please consider making the sight reading test nicer pieces. How often will a person have to attempt or want to attempt sightreading a piece which often appears as 'random notes' as someone earlier described them. In comparison at the ones I've looked at, the other two main exam boards seem to have more musical pieces.

To be honest, some reasonbaly well known music looks like random notes at first sight (and often second, third . . . one hundredth). It takes a lot to make some Debussy, Prokifiev etc sound like anything else. If a piece is written in one of these styles, that's what it will look like: Part of the test will be to work out how to make "apparently random notes" sound like music.

[chocolatedog]

Please can we have a reduced list of scales for grade 6............at least grades 7 & 8 have the choice of group 1 or group 2, but to have all 36 to do for grade 6 seems a little unfair........and as I think I've mentioned before, not everyone is able to learn patterns easily, so some struggle to retain all 36 in memory even after having worked through all the previous exam scale requirements.............

Edit: oops! (IMG:style_emoticons/default/blush.gif) sorry! Just read Clara's response to last month's thread....... thank you AB for taking teachers' views, thoughts and suggestions seriously................ (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)

[sbhoa]

SCALES
My reason for saying this is that the majority of my pupils (and myself) always play from music in brass bands, windbands, orchestras, etc. so they need to be able to spot the scale/arpeggio patterns and to be able to play them fluently. However, the current requirement, which places so much emphasis on memory, means that they have to stop using the music quite early in the learning process in order to memorise the fingering. For all but the brightest pupils this causes problems after the exam as no matter how much I remind them of key signatures when they're preparing for the exam, they find it difficult to recognise the scale patterns in a piece of music.

In France there is not the same emphasise on memorising scales. My oboe teacher insisted I buy a scale book and STOP playing from memory for the reasons you give above.

I think I'd find it harder to play scales from music. Especially when you get to 4 octaves.

[Roseau]

SCALES
My reason for saying this is that the majority of my pupils (and myself) always play from music in brass bands, windbands, orchestras, etc. so they need to be able to spot the scale/arpeggio patterns and to be able to play them fluently. However, the current requirement, which places so much emphasis on memory, means that they have to stop using the music quite early in the learning process in order to memorise the fingering. For all but the brightest pupils this causes problems after the exam as no matter how much I remind them of key signatures when they're preparing for the exam, they find it difficult to recognise the scale patterns in a piece of music.

In France there is not the same emphasise on memorising scales. My oboe teacher insisted I buy a scale book and STOP playing from memory for the reasons you give above.

I think I'd find it harder to play scales from music. Especially when you get to 4 octaves.

I must admit that at home I still tend to play without the music. Even when I actually get it out and put it on the music stand, I find it hard to concentrate on the notes. (A bit like when I'm reading out loud while thinking about something entirely different from the words on the page and if someone interrupts me I have no idea where I am).

[jacobvaneyck]

I am now insisting my pupils learn scales from memory AND following the music. Both have their uses and should be observed.

I am also glad the volume is being reduced. They do seem excessive in the higher grades, especially for piano though not so much woodwind.