It's just like i can't get the notes right.And i've got an exam 3 days later and now i 'm suffering from sore throat. i guess i'm just so unlucky. i'm gonna fail badly.

hey join the club!! i cant sing either and too be honest i dread the aural tests in the exam, but when i did my grade 5 i acctually passed the aural!!!miracle!!

I tend to think of sight singing, and sight noise making, I can barely get the rhythum right, let alone the notes. at this stage I guess the best anyone can do is give you sympathy, which I'm trying to do (unfortunetly I'm rather rubbish at it) Just remember, it's only a few marks, and you can easily make them up on your pieces etc.

Teenage boys often hate the singing bit of the aural. I think it is OK to hum or whistle if you really hate it that much (although whistling in tune is harder than singing) as they aren't testing your singing ability but your ear. I always tell pupils that you will never see this person again so just go for it.

Don't panic!

This IS something that you can learn to do but you've got to take it slowly.

Play one note on the piano and try to sing it back. Get someone else to play the note if you can, and trust them to tell you if you're singing right or not. This could take ages and ages or you might get it straightaway. It's the same as learning to play in tune on your instrument - your ears learn how to pick it up the more you do it. Keep trying over and over until you can hit the note right straight away. Try it with different notes too, but still only one at a time.

Then try two notes - keep them consecutive (eg C-D, E-F, G-F etc). Same again - just keep trying until you get it right.

Maybe then add another note so you are doing three? Or change the interval between the notes. Practice really does work for this - it's not just practicing the singing bit, it's practicing listening too and then learning to relate what you hear to what you do with your voice.

Seeing a singing teacher for a couple of lessons might help too?

Sorry to carp but there's something wrong here! Playing music shouldn't be something that's so separate from aural abilites...

This is convincing me more and more that we as teachers should be teaching aural understanding very much alongside the technical aspects of instrument teaching. And anyone here who's having trouble with the aural tests should check out whether there's any Kodaly classes in their area. Seems like there's a huge need...

For now, as you've only got a few days left, practise singing along to something you're playing; or how about play something simple like Twinkle Twinkle and see if you can pitch your singing along with it - this should be simple enough unless you're playing a wind instrument in which case you'd have to think of something else. I'll put my thinking cap on.

In addition, I think you can play Twinkle Twinkle Little Star in different keys and try to sing it on bye one. (The keys are better not in fixed order.)

QUOTE (Violinia @ Jun 8 2004, 02:43 PM)

Sorry to carp but there's something wrong here! Playing music shouldn't be something that's so separate from aural abilites... This is convincing me more and more that we as teachers should be teaching aural understanding very much alongside the technical aspects of instrument teaching. And anyone here who's having trouble with the aural tests should check out whether there's any Kodaly classes in their area. Seems like there's a huge need... For now, as you've only got a few days left, practise singing along to something you're playing; or how about play something simple like Twinkle Twinkle and see if you can pitch your singing along with it - this should be simple enough unless you're playing a wind instrument in which case you'd have to think of something else. I'll put my thinking cap on.

So, should our teachers teach us with aural all the way through learning? before my grade 2 with my old teacher, she didn't do any aural until the day of the exam, and i couldnt do it and cried all the way through (although it was 5 years ago...) the singing, the only bit i could do was telling the time signature and the spot the difference!
And this kodaly... what is it? will it help me learn how to sing and hold a tune when i try to sing? i sight howl really badly... i can never get the note. Do you happen to know whee we can find out about these kodaly classes and if there are any going in birmingham??

Yes, Kodaly training will help you to 'hold a note' and to sight-sing. I could do the former but not the latter before I started learning Kodaly. A lot of people think that solfa (do, re, me etc) is old hat - or just that song from The Sound of Music! - but IT WORKS. There is something about it which is magic. It helps with memorising phrases, too. If you can hear the phrase in solfa you can remember it much easier than if you are just trying to hang on to an amorphous mass of pitches and can't remember whether it went up or down in a particular place!

Kodaly IS being taught at the Birmingham Conservatoire, to undergraduates, but I don't know off-hand of any other classes in the area. You could try looking on www.britishkodalyacademy.org. Also on the website is my Libretto article which gives a bit of background to how the approach came about and what it entails. In a nutshell, it's all-round musicianship training!

How I wish that everyone who learns an instrument had Kodaly and Dalcroze classes every week too! Kodaly said, 'Before we rear instrumentalists, we must first rear musicians'......You have only to see the stunning teaching in Hungary to be both humbled and impressed. I was about 30 before I reached the standard of some of their 8 year-olds! In Hungary music students can major in musicianship rather than an instrument. Such a concept would be alien in this country, sadly.

Kodaly musicianship training is not easy and it's not a quick fix - but it's really solid training and will make anyone, of whatever level, perceive music in quite a different way.

Good luck and I hope you manage to find a class!

QUOTE (tamsin @ Jun 7 2004, 06:13 PM)

I can barely get the rhythum right, let alone the notes.

Me too!

I don't really find it hard, i just get them wrong every now and then. Try this:when u go up or down a note by 2 or more steps sing the notes up to the note you need-just sing it in your head in the exam!

QUOTE (tamsin @ Jun 7 2004, 06:13 PM)

remember, it's only a few marks, and you can easily make them up on your pieces etc.

I disagree with this, people are often upset if they fail by 'a few marks'even if their pieces are good. But anyway, about the sight singing, i just try to picture the sound in my head. asnd after all, it isn't the quality of noise you make but whether it is the right note or not. Just try you hardest, nobody can ask for anything else, and if you feel inconfident singing in front of an examiner, you won't ever see them again in your life, i have never seen anybody called Quientus Benziger again so just breeze through it! And practise the other parts of aural so hopefully you won't get the big 0.

good luck,

Kees xxx

although i can't sing or sight sing or do anything which invloves singing, my teacher says that when i sight sing to look for scale or arpeggio patterns.

QUOTE (clarinetlover @ Jul 10 2004, 01:09 PM)

although i can't sing or sight sing or do anything which invloves singing, my teacher says that when i sight sing to look for scale or arpeggio patterns.

Yeah patterns help!
a perfect fourth is the first two syllabuls (sp) of "my grandfather's clock" and a perfect 5th is the first two words of "twinkle twinkle little star". It might not help you at all, but it helps me and my friend in our lessons!
"Believe in yourself in everything you do"!!!

well, for my sight singing, i usually practice it by playing one note on the piano, singing it back, and then trying to sing two notes above the note i just sung, then see if I got it right!

It did help me a lot, and i just go for it in the exam because I won't ever have to see the person again, but usually won't sing in front of my teachers. that's probably quite bad, but i'm too shy!

I'm too shy too