My husband and I both did abrsm practical exams in the late 70s, early 80s and have no recollection at all of aural tests. Are we just forgetful?!
Thanks

I did mine in the late 60s/early 70s, and aural tests were certainly there then. The marking system was slightly different as scales and arpeggios were marked separately (scales out of 18, arpeggios out of 15), pieces were each marked out of 27, and sight reading and aural wer both marked out of 18.

The aural tests were different though. I don't remember exactly what we had to for each grade, but I remember that instead of clapping in time to a piece, we had to beat time as if we were conducting. I also seem to remember having to sing - or perhaps identify - particular intervals and to sing the top, middle, or bottom note of a chord played by the examiner. But as the last exam I took was in 1972 it's all a bit of a blur!

Hi! I'm not a teacher, but I took grade 6 piano in 1983 and still have the mark sheet. Yes they did have aural, and I did abysmally in it (9/18), so I know there were sections A to D as they tell you all the bits you got wrong!

Maybe you expunged a similarly awful experience from your memories?!

Shame they took those bits out.

Hehe. Your own mind probably blotted them from your memory; it does that with horrific experiences.

I can confirm that they have definitely been around since 1965.

Yes I remember doing that too. They played you the tonic note and asked you sing a given interval. I liked the conducting too!

Also I think the way you picked pieces were different. It was 2 from section A or 2 from section B, and then one from section C, if I remember right.

Did my Grade exams in the 1950s and 60s, definitely aurals then. I remember vividly standing by my teacher's piano gazing at all the ornaments in her china cabinet as she gave me aural test after aural test after aural test etc.

There was no sight-singing then!

I remember conducting time and feeling extremely silly.

Aurals were around in the early eighties but from grades 6 to 8 you could opt to do keyboard skills instead which included things like transposing at sight and adding a cadence, I think (despite chosing to do this I can't really remember what you had to do anymore). For the aurals at the earlier grades there was no sight singing, I can remember beating time, clapping back rhythms, identifying an interval, singing the upper or lower note of an interval depending on the grade and singing back phrases (I didn't mind the rest but I hated the singing parts).

As someone said, for pieces you had to do either A1 and A2 or B1 and B2 and you only really had a choice for the C pieces. For grades 6 (and 7 I think but I didn't take 7) you had to play four pieces for the piano (the A and B pieces were worth more marks than the C and D ones) and for grade 8 you had to play a complete sonata.

I think that somewhere I've got an old aural book from the 1970s. If I can find it I'll post the details.

Certainly remember trying to sing the lower or middle note of a chord and conducting.

Got an old aural book from the early 1970s. For Grade 8 you had to:-

- Sing or play from memory the lower part of a 2-part phrase
- Recognise and describe harmonic intervals not greater than an octave - these could be treble or bass clef.
- Clap the rhythm pattern of a melody, then to desribe the time-values of the notes of a section of the extract.
- recognise chords o tonic, dominant, subdominant or submediant in root position, and of tonic in first inversion in a major or minor phrase. Up to 4 chords will be asked. These weren't always at the end of the extract but could be taken from any section.
- Modulation. To say if a short passage modulates to dominant, subdominant, or relative major/minor.

I've got the other books somewhere, including a book of diploma aural tests, but need to bundle myself up now and take the dog gor his walk - it ain't half cold on the beach at the moment.

I remember all those. I also remember my old piano teacher being totally absorbed with the importance of sight-singing. Every single lesson included it!!! In the past she had worked with the Choristers of Canterbury Cathedral so that probably explains a lot. Probably I should thank her for it, but I HATED it and it nearly put me off music for life.............

When I did grade 8 voice in 1993/4 there were singing and voice exams. Voice was for adults and bigger voices. Different repertoire.
I remember having to sing a harmonic minor scale and scales with dynamics and vowels chosen by the examiner.

My first grade was clarinet grade 3, back in 1985, and there were aural tests then, though they were a bit different. Got 15/18 (found the old mark form...)

I took all of my practical exams in the 1970's, and these Aural Tests for Grade 8 bring back horrid memories - especially the recognising chords and Modulation sections! I was hopeless at these tests, and my Teacher used to go mad with me - I just missed a distinction, and she always said it was the Aural that let me down. Now as a Teacher, I try and be a bit more sympathetic when practicing Aural with Pupils, as I definately developed a bit of a "complex" about it - so try and make out that it really isn't any big deal and only a small part of the exam.

Hope you enjoyed the walk with your dog - am also finding it rather cold taking ours for a walk at the moment!!

I love that sort of thing. I have a book from 1955 which is the AB's "Rudiments and Theory of Music" and it's divided in to 8 chapters, for Grades 1-8, and it's great fun to see what's different (C clefs [alto and tenor], for example - they don't appear until Grade 8!)

I hated the whole lot. Found them totally terrifying and/or cringe-inducing.

Yes - beating time, naming an interval, singing an interval, singing one note of a chord and singing/clapping back is all I remember.

Yuk.

Yes - I remember doing aural tests in the 1970s, but I also remember the relief when I could do the keyboard harmony for grades 6 - 8. I'm not sure I was that much better, but I generally found it easier to make things up on the spot!

I've got that book as well. I got it from someone. I like it better thatn the Ab pink book as its easier to fit in your bag and to look through.

Yup, me too

And now there's just 'Singing', with a one-size-fits-all (or perhaps not!) approach.

Additionally, woodwind grades started at Grade 3, which would come as a bit of a shock to many youngsters of today.

I took my G8 practical some 22 years ago now, when I was 17 years old (Ha!! those halcyon days. )

I remember doing aural and lots of sight reading in addition to the set pieces from sections A B & C. I passed without too much effort so they must have been fairly easy.

Sorry, just found some new smilies and couldn't resist it. Dog was shivering at the end!

I can assure orals always existed.
I did them for both my ALCM piano in 1963, Grade 8 Organ in 1964 and ATCL organ in 1965.

In fact at my ALCM they more or less saved my bacon. I think the examiner realised I needed 9/10 to pass. Things were going well until he gave me a Diminished second inversion triad to identify. I hesitated.
OK, he said. whats this interval ? (it was G flat to C). Augment 4th said I without batting an eyelid. OK ,he said, then what triad is it. ? Diminished second inversion, I replied. Bingo !

I seem to remember Grades 6-8 Aural being much harder, particularly Grade 8.

I hade to be 18 before I could take Grade 8 Voice, which is why I took it in my Gap year.

Pianists had to play whole piano sonatas for Grade 8 Piano too, and the scale lists for Pianists and woodwind players were even more horrendous than they were today,

1st Oboe exam Grade 3, and the pieces on the Syllabus, the Scales and the Study are still on the syllabus for Grade 3!

'Singing' exams - before they were subdivided into 'Singing' and 'Voice' - used to start at Grade 4 - the Board, at that time, being of the opinion that young voices should develop naturally, without the ' strain of singing to an examiner' !!

Examiner colleagues have told me that they would not be particularly sorry if this were re-introduced.

Sorry, just clicked wrong button.

When I was looking through my old Grade 8 aural book this morning I thought that the old ones (1972 ish) were no more difficult than those today, even perhaps slightly easier, as the general knowledge/analysis question included today weren't there then. Some of mine find these quite difficult as they don't get the general knowledge of music in schools that we used to.

'Fraid I'm going to disagree about the other point too. I did Grade 8 in 1961 and I certainly didn't play a complete sonata - there wouldn't have been time in the exam to do a complete one and the other pieces and scales, etc. Of course, between 1961 and now maybe it changed and you were expected to play a complete sonata. Anyone know?

I definitely did a whole sonata for Grade 8 piano, but I can't remember what year that was. And yes, there were four pieces in the higher grades.

I've still got a very battered copy of the old green aural book which I use for the beginners, for singing and clapping back short phrases, as it's a handy size!

A whole sonata was definitely required for grade 8 piano between 1982 and 1984.

I did Grade 8 in 1961

so did I !

But it was organ, not piano, so can't help with the sonata question.

When I did my trumpet grades (starting in 1973), brass also started at Grade 3, and there was no Grade 7. That might also explain the illogicality of the situation now of going from needing to know 16 scales (including melodic/harmonic minors, so 12 arpeggios) at Grade 6 with the daft jump to 36 scales at Grade 7.

I suppose that the old post Grade 6 lull could be compared to the good old days of the first year of A-level study ... no looming exams, a chance to learn round the subject.

Re the aural tests, interestingly, the recently defunct Guildhall exams (pre Trinity merger) retained almost exactly the old format from the 70's ... and I have to say, they were a lot fairer in many ways than current AB aural, as they did not assume an in-depth knowledge of classical repertoire. In fact I think I shall start a new thread, as I feel a little rant coming on...

And in 1975/76.

I did grade 8 in 1962 and definitely played a whole sonata - the examiner had to use part of the box for the third piece as he couldn't get all his comments in. I think he probably didn't hear all of each movement, though.

Aural tests changed about 12 years ago -there may of course have been other changes. I remember the shock of the examiner asking me which set I wished to do for my grade 8 and I couldn't decide- the old ones, where I had at least the experience of grades 3-7 behind me, or these strange new tests I thought I had to do and had been trying to get my head round without the benefit of earlier grades and years of experience in similar tests. The verdict: 'barely passable'.

Crikey, I bet they wouldn't be allowed to write that sort of thing nowadays, for fear of being sued for defamation or something like that!

Of course I was only 3 years old when I took Grade 8!!!!!!!!!

A popular one for scales these days is, ".......somewhat exploratory."

or "rather hesitant".