Does anyone know why piano and violin have examination books with the exam pieces in them, but the other instruments don't?
It would be so useful for all the other instruments to be treated in the same way.

I agree with you Judy. I would like to see the guitar exam pieces all in one book. Far less costly for parents of my pupils. As long as the pieces were appealing that is!!!!

Des

I had a look at the ABRSM pub and yes they don't offer a very good range of guitar material just the bare baics. Infact i e-mailed the company as to why this was the case, its not like the guitar is not a popular instrument. They said they were only able to cope with the present demands as they are only 14 members of staff to deal with publications. Hmmmm?

I've always wondered why there are no exam books for the flute since this is such a popular instrument. It would save a lot of hassle, and I think that it would be more important to have the pieces all together in one book for instruments which require an accompanist than those which do not, as a child taking grade one flute, for example, needs to bring five books to the exam (three flute books and the piano accompaniments for lists A and B ). The potential to lose or forget something is tremendous. Finding the music for higher grade pieces was also problematic for me, for example, the piano accompaniment for my list B Prokofiev was such that it had the violin part and not the flute part! All this could be be saved if the pieces came in one book.

I've also wondered why there aren't the tapes/CDs for instruments other than piano? It would save people a lot of money to have demonstrations of all the pieces on one CD instead of chasing them up individually, not to mention the benefit that could be gained from the commentaries.

ABRSM do produce practice tapes/CDs for a few other instruments, including Flute, Clarinet, Vioin and Cello. They're really helpful for getting to know the pieces (and choosing the ones you like to begin with). Some of the accompaniments I find a bit too fast to keep up with though.

I wish there were exam books for the descant and treble recorder syllabuses, especially in the early grades - it would solve a lot of problems!
Trinity do have theirs collected together, but I'm not very keen on their syllabus so I don't use them - but when I'm in my music shop I always cast an envious eye at them - it's just so much more convenient for teacher, pupil and parents to have all the exam material together like that!
I think that the reason the AB don't do this is probably due to copyright costs payable to the publishers concerned, though I don't know for sure. Anyway, whatever the reason it's a shame for us!

There are some nice pieces in the violin exam books, but it can be annoying when you have to choose one you don't like (there's an A,B and C list and you have to choose one song from each). For my flute I end up having to spend sometimes a lot of money on loads of different books to get the pieces I need, which can be a pain if you're only buying a book for one certain piece and hate all the others in it!!!!

QUOTE (Desmond @ Feb 18 2004, 08:31 AM)

I agree with you Judy. I would like to see the guitar exam pieces all in one book. Far less costly for parents of my pupils. As long as the pieces were appealing that is!!!! Des

Hi,

I am a student playing both piano (grade 1) and violin (grade 4), and I think it is very useful that all the music is in one book........ But I don't know why they don't do it for the other instruments....

Manpreet
age:13

I find an exam book for piano exams works very well. We can usually find pieces we like and if we can't there are alternatives we can turn to.

However for my flute and recorder pupils it is very difficult choosing pieces as you have to weigh up the usefulness of the book after the exam, its cost (one recorder book I like to use is £13 which I find very hard asking pupils to buy) and the fact that once the book is bought you feel you have to stay committed to that piece. I am sure that many people are tempted to photocopy music which the Board is obviously against. It is a shame when I can see how much easier the piano exam books are to use and I cannot see why the piano and violin are given 'special' treatment.

The recorder music seems very expensive, considering that it is often just folksongs or dance tunes which are obviously not in copyright. To take Grade one requires spending around £30 on music. So my solution was to produce my own booklet - I e-mailed the publishers to get the relevant permission (which they gave readily, even for some contemporary pieces) and then put them all together in one booklet. It took a lot of time, but looks good now - and only costs 75p to photocopy (includes 14 pieces and scales). But the Board is very protective about its syllabus and I don't have permission to sell it or let anyone other than my own pupils use it - sorry! But if enough of us asked to do it they might get the message...
Might be worth considering for other instruments... I was surprised at how easily I got copyright permission (aren't e-mails wonderful!) but you really have to be careful how you approach the Board!

im sure it is to do with printing costs and less popular instruments

Do AB mind if you use photocopies of the music in the exam? Because I did an exam a couple of years ago with another exam board and they check that the music is not photocopied and sign the book to make sure nobody else can use it.
It would be much cheaper is you could just photocpy them.

You can photocopy a page to make page turning easier. You can even photocopy a double page to make page turning easier. You can't use a photocopied piece of music though.

Thank you Alison - getting permission to put the pieces into your own book is a good idea.

Not allowing book sharing seems particulary mean!!
What about more than one member of the same family using the same book?
What about a teacher lending a book if only the one piece is needed?

QUOTE

Thank you Alison - getting permission to put the pieces into your own book is a good idea.

Brilliant idea - full marks for initiative !!

Maggie

the AB doesn't do that, and the Guildhall doesn't do that. What exam board doesnt' allow lending or sharing of books.

Re: violin and piano exam books:

In these books only the first three pieces from each list are included (for violin at least, I'm not sure about piano). Although this is great if you find pieces that you like, if you have to buy alternative pieces then you have the same problem. Oh, and it's not the same for all grades; violin grade 8 doesn't have a book.

Is it something to do with how often the syllabuses are changed? The woodwind syllabus doesn't change much, whereas the piano and violin one changed every two years?

I wonder why this is?

I think all the instruments should have exam books as it does give you a great start with 9 pieces to chose from.

Trouble is, if the Board doesn't want to change the syllabus as regularly for woodwind as piano and violin, and puts the basic 9 tunes in a book, the examiners would probably get fed up with hearing the same tunes year after year. Answer - change the syllabus every two years and treat all the instruments the same!

It really would be much easier and cheaper to have clarinet and saxophone music in the same book. It can take so long to actually find all the individual books and decide which pieces you like and them having to buy three different book can be so expensive. You often have to compromise the pieces you like, for the pieces ytou can afford!

Thankfully this has been adressed for several instruments within the jazz exams, all the pieces for each grade are found in individual grade books with grades 4-5 lumped together in the 'AB Real Book'. Also the CD's are extremely useful as an alternative to piano accompaniment as you can't always find a suitable pianist to accompany jazz students.

Could we have a response from the Board on this one?

I also think it would be a good idea to have exam music in one book. I play the clarinet and its a nightmare having to find which shops sell the pieces I need whereas when I do piano exams its quite simple, i just buy one book!

Nat

What about if you use a copy that you have PAID to download from the Internet? e.g. Telemann fugue Grade VI piano from sheetmusic now. It has all the publisher detail on it but it looks for all the world like a photocopy! :

I know the LCM board doen't allow sharing of their electric guitar book and CD. Their flute exams (Grade1-5) say that you must play at least one piece from the book for that grade, and there's only one piece from each list in the book!

QUOTE (helena @ Feb 18 2004, 01:56 PM)

I've always wondered why there are no exam books for the flute.

Me too. . Each of my three exam pieces is around £10 each. . Thats even before we've even got to the actual cost of entering for the exam.
And its just come to me that when choosing a piece, I have to find a way to listen to them all or just go with what my flute teacher tells me are nice before I buy them, because my local music shop is very small and doesn't usually have them in!

I wish there was a book with all the flute syllabus pieces in it! However, that would be very expensive too, as you'd also need the piano accompaniment for all the pieces!
Still, it would be nice (and save some running around after the music!).

QUOTE (july @ Feb 25 2005, 04:50 PM)

I wish there was a book with all the flute syllabus pieces in it! However, that would be very expensive too, as you'd also need the piano accompaniment for all the pieces!

The violin books have piano accompaniment and they manage a reasonable price of around £6.

Know-it-all Violinia to the rescue!

I once rang the AB about this, and was told it's a copyright problem. Due to the smaller numbers taking exams on instruments other than piano and violin, copyright laws make it non-viable for the pieces to be put into one book. It makes it very expensive for viola players and everyone else....

It would be helpful if they could pick pieces that did appear in one book, otherwise flautists etc have to pay far more to do their grade exams, which doesn't really seem fair, does it?

Or the people who put books of varied pieces together for other instruments should work with the AB to get round this! I noticed recently that 2 of the pieces for the current viola syllabus feature in one compilation book - surely it couldn't be too difficult for 3 of them to figure....?

Or even 9? Or 18?

Violinia

Know-it-all Violinia to the rescue!

I once rang the AB about this, and was told it's a copyright problem. Due to the smaller numbers taking exams on instruments other than piano and violin, copyright laws make it non-viable for the pieces to be put into one book. It makes it very expensive for viola players and everyone else....

It would be helpful if they could pick pieces that did appear in one book, otherwise flautists etc have to pay far more to do their grade exams, which doesn't really seem fair, does it?

Once you add up the exam fee, plus accompanist, plus at least 2 or 3 books, you can be looking at nigh on £100 if the relevant books are expensive...

Or the people who put books of varied pieces together for other instruments should work with the AB to get round this! I noticed recently that 2 of the pieces for the current viola syllabus feature in one compilation book - surely it couldn't be too difficult for 3 of them to figure....?

Or even 9? Or 18?

Violinia

QUOTE

I once rang the AB about this, and was told it's a copyright problem. Due to the smaller numbers taking exams on instruments other than piano and violin, copyright laws make it non-viable for the pieces to be put into one book. It makes it very expensive for viola players and everyone else....

Hmm, weird as flautists aren't exactly rare!!

Flautists aren't at all rare, but apparently there's not anything like as many of them as there are pianists and violinists...

Did you mange to sort out your teacher/book situation, Nicki?

Violinia

I'm sure I've said this before somewhere on these forums, but if Trinity manage to put together flute exam books for Grades 1-5, I'm sure the ABRSM could. They must have more candidates for flute exams than Trinity do.

QUOTE

Did you mange to sort out your teacher/book situation, Nicki?

Not yet, but JRBailey might be able to help me so fingers crossed!