As part of this year's targets my teacher and I decided to so a series of mock exams, so I could get a feel for what level I'm achieving with my playing. We decided it would also be a useful exercise w.r.t. polishing pieces for performance. We'd already done that with three grade one pieces (for LooneyTunes event in Cardiff), so we started with grade two. Yesterday was the big day.

It was dreadful. Practicing in the afternoon I felt fairly happy with scales and pieces. Then teacher arrived. I started the scales and felt apart. Nothing sounded right - the lovely rich tone I'd been getting was replaced with a "skating over the strings" thin sound and as for intonation - I think I played better a year ago.

It was so bad we didn't even get on to the pieces. It was so horrible, all that practice just vanished.

Of course ten minutes later when we were working out how to remedy the situation, I played really nicely. And my teacher made some mild comment about why hadn't I played like that first time round? And I was so upset I said "Because you're so bl**dy hyper-critical. An examiner would be easy to play for because I don't know them, or their expectations and they want me to pass, because too many fails look bad" (OK I know that last bit isn't necessarily true). Then I burst into tears (of frustration).

Sorry to drone on, but I just needed to tell someone how I was feeling. And also I wondered if anyone else had tried this mock exam idea and found the real exam easier, well less stressful.

Sounds like you had managed to wind yourself up into a real state. It happens to us all, the tears were no doubt just the release of the tension. Better luck next time.

Sorry to hear about this

My teacher gives me mock exams but I have the reverse happen - I can play in front of them but go in front of an examiner, I lose it completely.

I'm sure that this is just a minor blip, some lessons feel like being on air and others leave us crying. Hold on to the feeling of how you felt when you played in Cardiff. You played absolutely beautifully and you looked so calm and assured and your tone was fantastic. You've already got such a strong foundation to build on and you will just keep getting better and better.

Oh dear, I don't suppose your teacher felt great either by the end of the session. Sorry to hear it didn't work out, but we all have bad days and better to have a meltdown in front of your teacher than in an exam or concert. Nerves can do funny things to us. Onwards and upwards!

Aww, shucks. Thanks, Blackbird. I did feel calm. I loved that day. I suppose the difference was that everyone there was a learner so it felt more relaxed. At the time I wished my teacher could have seen me play, but I suspect he would have made me nervous.

Yes, of course, you are all right - we all have bad days. It was just the sheer frustration of *knowing* how much better I could have played. But my teacher gave me some pointers on how to try and get a more secure handle on my scales and pieces. For next week I have to learn two new scales and one short piece.

I think (now I've calmed down) what I've really got out of this process is learning how badly I used to practice. No matter how many times my teacher said "break it down into easy sections, and build up from them" I couldn't help myself from wanting to play the whole piece or scale. It's really only in the last week that I've been able to do that focussed work on short sections consistently, but of course by then I'd taught myself how to play the pieces "badly". I remember reading somewhere that the first time you play a piece correctly must be the first of many if you've already played a piece badly many times. Ie you have to compensate for all the bad habits you've put into the piece.

As for teacher - he still stayed for duets with OH and when I apologised to him as we were having dinner he just laughed and said he never thinks twice about it as it's par for the learning course to get over-wrought at times. So we're good.

I guess the thing to do is to really focus on the new work, practice properly and knock his socks of next week.

Thanks guys!

I have not had 'mock exams' so I can't share the experience but I know that MANY others have had the exact same as you happening, you are not alone
I think experience and exposure will help but also practicing in different enviroments too (which is not easy I know), get your violin out in as many different places, in front of as many different people as possible if you can

Yes I have a mock before every exam and the good news is - it IS more stressful than the real one.

Don't know what grade your on BadStrad, and i am new here, but just like to say ---- try not to worry! And a critical teacher is good because if they where not, they probably would not be very helpful. But the violin is very difficult!!!!!!

Not a mock exam as such. But before my last exam, my teacher got my accompanist in and had me play through my 3 pieces - straight off (no restarts allowed!), one after the other, in the order I planned to do them in the exam. (And she recorded it and made me listen back afterwards .)

It was terrifying. I didn't play brilliantly, but it was enough to prompt me to ask 4 or 5 friends if I could play my pieces in front of them too. This felt like quite a big risk - among the non-musicians, which was scary enough, I played for a professional clarinettist, a top notch amateur brass player and (scariest of the lot) another viola teacher. By the time I got to the exam I was more excited than nervous. I would whole-heartedly recommend doing this, even if it is only in advance of your mock exam.

PS I've cried in frustration in more than one lesson - usually when I have actually done plenty of practice and yet still played as if I'm trying to sight-read. I'm sure they have seen it all before.

Sorry to hear that, BadStrad

Sorry to hear that Badstrad.

Two things I can think of that might help:

1. - a bad dress rehearsal makes for a good performance! So maybe you will have made all your mistakes now so you won't make them in the real thing!

2. - it might help to think of your exam as a time to show off and do your stuff! Even if that sort of attitude isn't your thing, give it a big smile and show how much FUN you are having at this chance to perform. Its not my thing performing at all but at singing exams somehow this attitude comes out of no-where and I manage to enjoy singing to the examiner more than I am scared of them and it seems to help a bit!

Best of luck, It will have been a useful experience and you will go on having learnt from it to do very well I am sure!

My frustration is almost always caused when I've done masses of practice, but it looks as if I've done nothing at all.

Yes, oh i would hate having to listen back to a recording of my playing! and is very frustrating when lots of practice, but is only slightly better. Sometimes when i do no practice for a week or two it all seems loads better as well.

I find this too. I have quite big gaps in my practice frequency for various reasons.

My theory is that when you practice every day you become tense about wanting to avoid making errors. Maybe when you take a break you come back to it quite relaxed with fewer expectations of making mistakes so everything falls into place?

Funny - I tell my maths students "make your mistakes here, not in the exam". Sometimes I should listen to my own advice!

I really think the nerves came from knowing my teacher's (high) expectations. I could probably muster a "show off" attitude for the real exams. When I was a small kid I was a real show off - always singing and dancing. It was only at secondary school where I got told I was basically cr*p at music that I stopped. When I played at the adult learners day I somehow tapped into that inner show off and loved the experience of performing.

Viola-mad - I have made it a policy to always play for people if they ask - you know if friends come around - and once I even played for my hyper-critical sister (not THAT was brave!) That also really helped at the learners' event.

And thanks to everyone else who've shared their experiences. Although I wouldn't wish anyone to have a bad time playing, it's reassuring to know that the bad "dress-rehearsal" good performance thing isn't a myth. Maybe if I'd taken the real exam I'd have knocked the examiner's socks off. Or not. . .

And Delicato - I agree - although it's not always easy to deal with, I would much rather be spending my money on a teacher who pushes me to play well, with good technique, than one who lets me get away with sloppy technique.

I sometimes explode just during regular lessons lol. In my last one, I had practiced really well. I only had 4 days between lessons but I had learned the first page of the piece I had chosen. I was really happy, I knew it needed work and proper dynamics and everything, but I thought I progressed great.

Then I played it for my teacher and its like I couldn't play it at all. Which made me frustrated and I played worse, which made him bring up some constructive criticism which I, feeling so lousy, took badly and ended up feeling angry and gutted lol. Its a part of the process, it happens to us all.

I had a mock exam before my last exam and I found it harder than the exam. I think because I try so hard to impress my teacher, the mock exam made me nervous. Whereas with actual examiners...you'll probably never see them again, you're not in the room long and they usually want you to do well. The only offputting thing is that I know my teacher listens at the door, even if he isn't meant to be. So I guess I still stress a bit lol!

This is me to a Tee! I agree that not knowing the examiner and knowing s/he wants you to do well makes it much easier... so I'm sure you'll be "OK on the day" BadStrad.

I, unfortunately, have to do my exams in front of a panel from the centre I study at, including my teacher. It's just the worst thing!

At the last one I pretty well went to pieces from the start when I was asked to play the scale I find most difficult (and my teacher knew it!). Pieces were not too bad but very affected by nerves. Then I had a separate sort of aural exam (separate system here) and my teacher gave me a rocketing on a question of etiquette which I was completely ignorant of... which was really mean because I was visibly shaking with nerves. In fact, I think that's why he did it - make it as worse as possible and see how I cope! I was practically in tears for the next hour, which was too bad as we had an orchestra rehearsal (at which one of our cellists stormed out, so we were really having a bad day...! ). I don't think any external examiner can be as bad as that!!!

For the record, my teacher is extremely kind and generous - just a real monster when it comes to what he demands of his students. And most of the time his shock tactics do seem to work quite well.

So, BadStrad, if you can survive your teacher you can survive anything!!!

I think you've hit the nail on the head there, Aesir22.
I'd say that about my teacher too. If I get upset in the lesson, he always stays longer to get me back to a "good place" before ending the lesson, so it finishes on a positive note. Pardon the pun.

Yes, I find it easier to play in front of an examiner than my teacher. It's not her fault that she reduces me to a gibbering nervous wreck, its just that I know what she is going to say, I don't knows the examiner and it makes it easier. My grade 3 and 4 my teacher was not available to accompany me, so I had virtual strangers do it, and actually I thought that made it less stressful.

The thing is, with the greatest of respect, who cares what the examiner is going to say? Even if they give you 3%, it's just one person, for one moment in time. Their opinion, while potentially a nice thing, doesn't matter in the every day scheme of things.
Your teacher, that's someone you've built a relationship with. It actually matters what they think, and what they think week after week after week.

Yes, I think that's it. If I mess up in the exam in front of my teacher I feel I have let her down. The examiner doesn't know me from a hundred other people who have messed up in their exam.

Do not worry, the exam will go fine! I think that the whole point of a mock exam is so that you can make mistakes or realise things that you are doing wrong so that you can polish them up before the exam! Good luck!