Hi!

I am hoping to study music performance at A level and maybe go on to do a Degree in it.
I'm 14 and am grade 8 at classical guitar and bass guitar and grade 3 piano. For the audition to get into the A level performance course you have to play two different instruments.
What I want to know is, will the bass guitar be classed as a different instrument to the classical guitar? (Sorry about the stupid question). Classical guitar is my main instrument and I am a much more confident bass player than I am piano player.

Thanks in advance!

On my A level syllabus (AQA) you have to do two performances on different instruments, and for those purposes bass and classical count as two different instruments, so if you do AQA or a similar board then you should be fine. Also on my syllabus my performances only had to be grade 5 to qualify for the highest marks, so by the time you get to that stage you'd also be fine on piano.

I'm really surprised you have to perform on two different instruments! What if you're amazing at one and have never played anything else?!?

I've been doing Edexcel and for that, there've been people performing on classical guitar, electric guitar and drumkit, so I'd have thought bass would be fine too as long as you can find out what grades your pieces are.

Also, when you say 'a level performance' do you mean the performance part of a music a level or do you mean the practical music a level (I think that's what it's called, but it could be different.). I know that many universities don't like the practical one at all, so it's probably not a good choice if you wanted to do music at uni and/or apply to any of the more demanding universities or music college.

Great! Thanks a lot!

You don't have to perform on two different instruments, but you have to do two different kinds of performance - that can be two solo performances on different instruments, like I did, or one solo and one ensemble performance on the same instrument. Partly because one of the criteria for getting even into the top band (not full marks) was 'no discernible faults in intonation' I thought I'd be better off if my second performance was on piano, rather than with a string quartet.

Something has been worrying me (what I do best - worst kind of mother). I was hesitant about starting a thread about it, but it does follow from John's query, and he'll maybe wonder about at some point (although he'll probably make the necessary progress in time, unlike someone around here, no names but she has half my genes...)

Question: What do forum members know about how important your level of keyboard skills really is for applying for tertiary level music - universities/colleges/conservatoires - in the UK?

A lot of them say Grade V or Grade VI and say that you don't need the exam, it can be self-certified - some even say they understand some able musicians don't have any keyboard skills and that should not put applicants off. So far so good (ignoring one glorious place that asks for some thing like "reasonable keyboard skills... grade VIII").

But when you look at ratio of applicants to offers, it's high - I've seen up to 20:1. How do they select, I wonder?

Does anyone have experiences that throw light of whether <all or any of them> (identified cases would be useful if anyone has any*) weed out candidates on the basis of keyboard skills (given how useful they are even at A/S & A level that would be quite reasonable) OR contrarily, do <all/some of them> not select on that basis - unless that's a main instrument.
*No point wasting an application on somewhere where you'd fail at the first hurdle.

Lastly, where they appear flexible in requirements regarding keyboard skills, is that to improve access for students from disadvantaged backgrounds (which would be great, but wouldn't help in our case).

She's re-started piano lessons, dropped after a couple of years ~pre-teens, and is attacking them with characteristic gusto and grit, but it's a steep learning curve. She does have two other instruments to a reasonable standard but, as she says, you can't harmonize a Bach chorale on a bassoon - or even on a violin.

John4: good luck and well done for thinking ahead. Grade VIII guitar at your age shows huge talent and application; you must be a joy to listen.

From what I gather from visiting places, and looking at prospectuses (or is it prospecti or something) the ones that request around gr5-6 piano/keyboard do look at it as a bonus, but not an essential (like just missing out on your A level grades), unless it's one of the big music centred places such as RNCM, holloway, or any conservatoire, though as music places are so tight they will enhance an application. The only one which I've contacted about it and have got a "we would be more likely to take you seriously if you had piano skills" was Manchester...

When my dad did his music degree, he couldn't play anything on the piano but they took him on the course on the condition that he took a few piano lessons to get to about grade 1 standard...he never did work out why. I've not visited the place he did this at 20years back (yet) so I don't know if it's still the case.

Yes of course I can see the bonus of being able to harmonise stuff on the piano for A level music, but I don't play the piano any more than that I know the notes and can play 1 grade one piece! Not playing the piano has not not hindered me in the harmony unit because you can do a lot of it visually (e.g. you don't stick a chord in with a Bb B and a C in if you want it to sound pleasant!) or using music software.

i'd be interested to hear other's experiences...

Fluterocks, thanks for that reassuring perspective. You’ve clearly got better background knowledge (in this house we don’t have even a GCSE music between us), but you’ve also done more research than’s been done here – & you must also be bogged down in A/S exams so we can’t claim that as an excuse.

I think my daughter found she was slow composing/etc. compared to competent pianists in her class – but that may be little to do with playing the piano, now I think about it. Then she saw universities asked for keyboard skills and decided she’d better get some. We do things like that around here, it’s genetic.

The other thing we’re grappling with (any excuse to delay decision-making; that’s genetic too) is what open days are best use of time, i.e. what the A/S results are going to be like, and whether it’s even worth looking at Manchester, King’s London, Cambridge, Birmingham, Holloway, etc, etc. I’ve suggested any open day is useful because they you learn from them all and know what to look for and ask about elsewhere, but you do want to visit places that in the end are going to be within your range. Applying for high-demand courses is new for this family (appallingly I was asked for two Es, but that was about 200 years ago and wasn’t for music).

On balance, it might have been better to start this as a separate thread – if we don’t get more replies maybe we should ‘migrate’ or re-start with a new name? I’ll pass on any feedback we get – we have a week of exams still to go so it probably won’t be for a while.

that sounds like a good plan

I've got 2 exams left now, but not until next week (mon and thurs) then i'm free (well, to some extent)

good luck to your daughter

... and to you. You need such stamina - don't let anyone tell you it was harder in the good old days.