Good evening,
i would like to apply for the ABRSM grades exams, and i am not starting from scratch, i already can play piano and read music sheet quite well.
My question is: do i have to start from Grade 1 to grade 8? or Can i apply directly for example from grade 3 or 4 according to my knowledge without passing from grade 1 and 2.
In other words, is it possible to study alone and jump grades?

Hoda El Ridi

Yes. You can do as many or as few as you like in any order!

You do not have to take all the exams, and can start at any level up to grade 5 with no previous exams. The only requirement is to have passed grade 5 theory before you can take grade 6 or above in a practical exam.

Good luck

I only took grades 3,4,5 and 8. Good luck!

That's a common misunderstanding. You don't necessarily have to have passed grade 5 theory before taking grade 6 or above. Grade 5 practical musicianship would be sufficient too.

or Grade 5 in a jazz subject, but the vast majority of people take grade 5 theory rather than one of the alternatives, or go to another exam board if they don’t want to do any of this.

Very few people seem to take either this or the jazz option though. In 2009 there were 3,879 entries for all jazz subjects and grades combined, and 290 entries for all grades combined for practical musicianship, compared with just over 22,000 Grade 5 theory entries. Any ideas as to why Practical Musicianship is so unpopular?

Because it requires skills most young instrumentalists don't have? Things like playing by ear, improvising, transposing and sightsinging, which few children would be encouraged by their teachers to take an exam in. In fact, I suspect many teachers wouldn't feel confident about preparing young pupils for these exams. It's much easier to send them down the tried and tested theory route.

I'd guess that Practical Musicianship tends to be taken by older musicians who have always found playing by ear easier than reading music, or who want to set themselves a new challenge. Personally, I'd be terrified of trying to do it on piano, though singing might be OK.

I don't teach therory myself, basically because I just don't have the time. It takes enough time just to teach piano. I send anyone who needs to learn theory to a friend of mine. He only teaches theory, nothing else, and has students of all different instruments. Consequently he sends anyone who wants to learn piano to me. The method works well. Naturally my students do learn some necessary theory during the course of their piano lessons but not up to grade 5 standard. I find practical musicianship to be a better option because it goes together well with the piano lessons, which are practical anyway. I encourage my students to improvise and make up their own tunes. One of mine surprised me last week when he played something he had made up at home based on a poem called "the Highwayman" which he was reading at school. It was a simple, short piece but he had created a lot of atmosphere, including clusters of notes played with his fist at the bottom of the piano to imitate gunshots. He had read the poem and tried to describe it in music, which I thought was great.

And I: 1,2,5,6,8 . You'll get similar tales from lots of Forum members.

If I was now a beginner, knowing what I know now about the grades, I would only bother with 1,5 and 8.

Yes, absolutely great! At a lower level, my younger son after his first cello lesson was asked to write a story accompanied by cello sound effects. My older son has always "composed" on the piano and played by ear.

Ah that reminds me! The book that baby cellist uses has play by ear exercises - a bar of a well-known song is given and the student is asked to carry the tune on. Elder son would have no trouble with this, younger son has a definite mental block here. I assume that most people would find it easier to play a single melody by ear on a keyboard instrument than on any other (discuss... or not...) but if he's already played a piece from the music he can play it from memory, whereas he quickly gets quite stressed and panicky doing these exercises (even something like "Jingle Bells"). Any suggestions for how to grow this skill? Or at the very least how to stop a temper tantrum about it?

Interesting. The only people I have known do Practical Musicianship have been very musical children who have really struggled to get to grips with the theory.

I'd be terrified too. Give me theory any day.

The first and only graded exam I took is grade 8 The disadvantage of this was that I had never seriously practiced scales nor any kind of aural tests before in my life, so it was a lot to take in at once (which it would never be for a candidate who has progressed through all the grades) and unfortunately I didn't leave myself much time to do it (My teacher 2 weeks before the exam: "Oh, right, the aural tests... but you have perfect pitch so that should be easy." Me: "...I don't have perfect pitch..." )

I think it depends how quickly you want to progress. It is obviously a good idea to work through grades one at a time, so you learn the right techniques in the right order, but that doesn't mean that you have to take exams at every grade level.

Whilst it is a good discipline to work towards, and prepare for grade exams, you will probably find that your learning will stop for several weeks or months whilst you prepare for each exam, which will slow your progress.

SB

But can you not learn the techniques by, for example, learning a grade 5 standard repertoire without looking at grade 4 pieces? Why would a tecnique be missed out by jumping a grade if more techniques are required to accomplish a grade 5 piece.

You might miss a step in the middle.

I don't like the idea of jumping grades. I don't mean that I think every exam has to be taken but that talking about jumping grades or not always appears as though exams are the main focus of learning.
I'd rather think of taking an exam when ready, whatever level that might be. Sometimes other learning goals are more important than taking the next grade in which case you move on and decide when to think about another exam.

I wonder if this question is more relevant to the piano rather than another instrument.

Exactly. There is also a greater danger of learning bad habits that way as you have missed out a vital step somewhere, and bad habits can be difficult to break. This applies in any field, not just music.

SB

I'd say it was relevant to clarinet too, maybe even more than on piano, so very likely the same for most instruments.
I think it's rarely good to hurry new technical development.

I would go as far as saying it's never good. It may well be that some people will pick certain things up quicker, resulting in moving on to other aspects quicker, but it's never good to hurry new technical development or take short cuts just for the sake of getting to the next grade level that much quicker.

No I don't think so. As for "not doing Grade 4 repertoire" I think what will happen there is that the student will be attempting to take on board certain technical difficulties whilst learning repertoire a couple of jumps ahead of their current standard (does that make sense?). That is adding a layer of difficulty which may interfere with sorting out technique. I'm sure it's better to work through the syllabus even if the exam isn't going to be taken. Of course how quickly that is done and new techniques taken on board is down to the individual. That said, I don't think there is anything wrong with occasionally having a stab at stuff which is well beyond your current abilities (but as a dessert not a main course).

As long as the work is covered, it doesn't matter if the exams are taken or not. I've had a pupil jump from Grade 1 -3 why, because he had covered the huge technical leap of being able to play scales in similar motion within a term and I did not want him taking exams that close together. Instead he explored more repertoire in a way that through the repertoire he would cover the technical differences between grades 2 and 3. He would have got a better pass if he had not blown up in the exam, so one learning objective next term is how to handle nerves. Another is how to gain more confidence at aural and sight reading which I will do through practical musicianship tasks, then it is a case of building the scale portfolio and building the repertoire portfolio.

We will see which exam he will be ready for next summer, but my bet is it will not be grade 5, it will be grade 4.

Yes. And that missed 'step in the middle' might well be a missing link in the shape of one or other of the supporting tests.

for piano i sat 1,2,3,4,5,6,8.
violin - 1,2,3,4,5,7,8.
viola - 8.
theory - 5,6,8.

like the others have said as long as your technique is up to it it sholdn't be a problem.

I do not see the problem in missing grades, as long as you have DONE the work and not just skimmed over it. Missing grades does not equal missing work/practice. Some people may only do grade 8, but may be good players. Some people never do graded exams are still are good players.

That usually happens when too ambitious parents wants their kids to skip grades so that they can finish Grade 8 much earlier than the peers. Some parents have even suggested that that is a very economical way which will save a lot of money being paid to the music teacher for lessons. Many parents will look for a teacher who can guarantee that their child is able to skip grades.

The truth is: It really depends too on how well you know the work of the skipped grade. (E.g: a piano student wanting to skip to grade 3 without understanding or knowing how to play the basic scales and piano technics within grade 1 and 2 very well is indeed asking for a disaster to happen in the grade 3 exam)

Also, there is no hard and fast rule as to one taking every grade like a compulsory exam. As long as one knows his/her work from the missing grade very well, one can consider to skip to the next grade. If you feel good & comfortable with the pieces & the signup date is near, why not sign up for that grade then? It gives a good motivation to working on the exams better & it can be very rewarding in the end.

Some people play their instrument and never do exams. Exams do not mater to them and they do not want to do them. But this does not mean they have not worked hard or skipped material.

This.

Theres no point skipping over the repertoire because you'll learn all sorts of different things from it even if you don't take the exam.

But it doesn't have to include anything that's on an exam syllabus if you don't want.
Chances are at higher levels you would naturally play repertoire that happens to be listed on an exam syllabus but it's not essential to do so where there are plenty of other choices.

I had a slightly different experience because I changed instruments. Not in a massive, massive way, most people feel there is little difference between a violin and a viola once you can read alto clef and make that pesky C string speak to you, but I was really, really struggling with my violin. I couldn't make the jump from grade 4 to grade 5 (and there really are some grades in each instrument with a bigger gap between them than others, the jump from 1 to 2 is much smaller than the jump from 4 to 5, then 5 to 6 is quite small and 7 to 8 larger again, but not as big as 4 to 5, at least that's how it worked in violin). I decided to change to viola and found my home right away and skipped direct to grade 7 in the space of a single term!

Entering or not entering the grades is neither here nor there I don't feel, but preparing a range of repertoire is important. The grades do force you to work on a piece to a high standard, but as do other opportunities from teacher concerts, school concerts, playing in church, performing for a nursing home, making a Youtube video, whatever it is that makes you put on a proper performance every now and then with a fully polished piece.